Getting a Web Design Project Started
Here’s an introduction to our process in getting a new project started.
1. What you need to get started:
First and foremost, understand that building a website takes time and effort. Before starting on a website design project, know that you or someone at your business will need to invest many hours. Gathering content, refining goals, targeting your ideal customer, making decisions on design, and much more. So, when you’re ready to invest some time into your online business, let’s get started!
The next step for you is to clarify your goal for the website. Are you looking to generate leads? Are you trying to get sales? Are you just trying to have an online “brochure” website? Once you clarify your goal, we will be able to focus our efforts.
2. What I need to get started:
- Complete this website design questionnaire to help me form an idea of the scope of the project and some initial guidelines .
- Your Current Web Hosting Account Login (if applicable)
- Your Current WordPress Login (if applicable)
- Initial content for the website- We have a 14 day email course to help you gather the initial information needed for the website.
3. Project Management-
When we manage a project, we utilize the best tools available. If we’re doing a custom design, we might use a tool like InVision to do design collaboration. And to make sure we work efficiently and cover all the details needed, we’ll use a Project Management tool like Redbooth or Asana. These tools allow us to invest a little time upfront so that we can save time and avoid delays later in the project.
Using these tools, we will create a detailed list of what we need from you as well as when you can expect us to hit milestones in the project. As items are due, you will get email reminders to keep us on track. You’ll also get a sense of satisfaction as you see the various tasks on the project being completed and see us moving toward our goals.
4. The Design Process
Designing a website whether small or large follows a similar process.
Research
The first step is we need to thoroughly understand your business, your business goals, your customers and their expectations and behavior, and how your website factors into all of it. We’ll also look at the competitive landscape to establish context and benchmarks for how your site should function and then improve on that. This stage will give us the foundation for moving forward with just the right recommendations for the design and development of your new responsive website.
Design
Once we’re armed with this information, we’ll begin putting together a base design based on your feedback. We work collaboratively with you so we give you access to see how we’re working and value your feedback. At this stage of the process, we will need all of the content for the website so that we can actually see what everything will look like and we can tweak the design as needed.
If our vision is not aligning with yours please let us know how we can get back on track. Once the base design is complete we will build out the home page, sub page, the blog template, and any additional templates needed.
Development
Once we have the Base Design, we will begin developing the additional features you requested. For e-commerce websites, this is the stage where we integrate payment gateways, design the product pages, emails, and customer interactions.
Once things are set, we’re ready to test them and make sure everything is ready for your customers and all end user’s experience is top notch.
5. Launch Preparations
Just as “Beauty is not skin deep,” there is much more to a website than mere looks. Many hours will go into your website to prepare it for launch. This is where we will optimize your website for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), enhance the security of the web server, Cache your website for speed, and prepare to train you and hand over the keys to your new website.
We will also test your website on PC, Mac, iPhone, iPad. (Optional testing on Android and Chromebooks available for an additional fee upon request)
