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How do I brief the web designer properly?

Posted 17/October/2014 by vicky

When you are getting quotes for a website, especially for a custom project the web designers will throw questions at you that you probably hadn’t even thought of. So here are some things to help you prepare for your meeting.

Share the background. When we are designing and developing a website it’s important for us (the web design company) to really understand your business. We don’t just want the sales pitch. We want to know where it all started, what made you start the business, is it a startup, have you been running for many years, how many people in your team etc. What does the business do, what sectors does it service etc.

 We don’t know your lingo. Now we all know that web designers are sometimes known for using jargon or technical lingo but sometimes our clients do the same! Remember we are web designers and we may have developed websites in a similar industry to yours before but we are by no means specialists in your field so go gently on us. Steer clear of industry lingo, explain things to us as you would to a customer who knows nothing about your business.

Research your customer and explain them to us. It’s just as important for us to understand your customers as it is understanding your business. We understand if you are a startup you might not have a great knowledge yet of your customer but we need to at least understand who you are hoping to attract as a customer. What does your ideal customer look like, why are they your ideal customer, how is your business going to be a match for their needs, are you expecting your clients to be repeat clientele or one off purchasers? If you have been in business for some time now tell us what you know about your customers. Which products or services do they purchase most from you, why? How did you attract these customers? What age group are they in? What sort of information do they expect you to provide them with?

There’s you and there’s the competitors..now what. We next need to understand your market and the competitors. How many competitors do you have, do you know who they are? How long have they been established? What separates you from them? How do they market to their customers? Is their pricing the same, similar or completely different? How do you plan on showing your differences online, are you planning to market to your customers the same way as them or do you have a unique strategy?

What do you need us to build? Once we understand your business, your ideal customer and the level of competition you have we want to know what your expectations of the website development are. So often people say to us I just want a standard business website. However, no business is standard; each business is unique and has different requirements no matter how small or large the organisation is. This is the part of briefing your developer you need to be most comprehensive with. Let’s pull this apart based on a small business website build. First the obvious pages, The home page and contact us. OK the contact us is usually the most standard page in a website, so let’s tackle that first. Do you want a map on their showing your location or is your location not to be revealed? Do you require an online form? If so how many fields on the form? What should the fields be? Do you have several offices that all need to be listed on there or just one? What social networking sites do you have/ will you have that need to be included on this page?

Next the home page. Do you require a slideshow, opt in form, live social media feed? Will you need a news feed? What features did you plan on having on this page?

Following pages for consideration. Let’s assume you have a corporate service that you offer, maybe you are an accountant or an recruitment company.  You might consider having an about page – a great opportunity to provide some quality content for your clients, a team page – adding a level of personal to your website really helps to engage with your customers, perhaps a testimonials, blog, in the press and of course a page on your services. The idea when thinking about what pages you will need is to think about the type of content you want on the website.

The complex stuff. If you are briefing a web design company on a custom project that straight from the start requires some complex features or functionality such as a members area you will need to map out the details for and with the web developer. The web developers will help you by asking the right questions but try to plan as best you can what information you want from a member and what pages they can access and what are on those pages etc.  The developer will guide you through the rest.

The wish list. OK so we have established what we need to build, now tell us about the functionality that you are not sure about, can you afford it, is it necessary etc.

It's just as important for a developer to know about functionality you might one day like to have as it is understanding what you need to have now. Perhaps the features you thought were too difficult or expensive can actually be easily included in the initial development or perhaps those feature mean building the site initially in a certain way so really map out in your mind your long term goals for the site.

An example of this might be for a recruitment agency. Initially you might want to simply have a page in your website where you manually update job posts and people simply contact you via online form to enquire about listings on your site. Eventually however, you may want a full job board with advanced search facilities etc.

Getting noticed. The web designers and developers will want to know if you have thought much about ways in which you plan on driving traffic to your website. Google adwords doesn’t suit every business and SEO can be a long haul so you may have connections in media, have engaged a PR company or you might have some old fashioned creative tactics for marketing, you might have no idea which is fine too – that’s what the web design agency can do for you.

Of course there are many other fine details to discuss but this guide should get you started so you can prepare for that quote. If you would like sit down over a coffee and have a chat about your requirements give us a call today on 1300 858 495