What your digital agency wants to know is: how can we make your website work for you? A solid website brief can give you the best chance of reaching your goals in the most cost-effective way, by helping us understand what you want to get out of your site.
A successful project requires many different people from across different teams to work on your project – from strategists and developers, to designers and creatives. So, no matter how professional your web design agency, a well structured, informative brief can’t go amiss in helping everyone on the project maintain a clear vision for your website and achieve the best results.
Before you begin your brief, don’t hesitate to utilise the support on offer from your agency if you already have one. They should be your partner in this process, and guide you through it. The best results occur when we meet with clients before asking for a website brief, so we can help them map out their objectives.
What to include in your brief to begin with:
Objectives
An idea of what your objectives are will help digital agencies like us understand the overall picture. Outline your main goals: are you trying to generate leads, or to showcase quality? Then outline your primary call to action, that is, what you want people to do when they reach your website (fill in a contact form? purchase a product? pick up the phone?).
Target Market
This is important because ultimately, like you, your web designer answers to the needs of your target market. Who are you aiming your website at? How would you describe your average customer?
Existing Website
If you have an existing website that you’re looking to replace, then there will be specific things about it that aren’t working for you. Singling these out and deciding what needs improvement will help to inform your needs for the new website.
Reference Sites
What websites have you seen that you do/don’t like? They don’t need to be in your industry, but may help our designers to understand your vision for your new website. Take into consideration the layout, the way the site feels, how easy/hard it is to use, and find what you need to help us understand your vision. Perhaps include the web addresses of 3 – 4 websites, and specify what you do or don’t like about them.
Competitors
Who are your main competitors? What can we learn from them? Do you want to follow in their footsteps or break the mould? You know more than your digital agency when it comes to your market, and knowledge of your competitors is one of the ways you can share that knowledge with us.
Content
Have you considered your content and site structure? We will help guide you on this, working with your knowledge of your industry to ensure the website meets its objectives. You might need the copy transferred from your existing website, or perhaps you want to produce new content entirely – we may need to consider resources such as copywriting and photography, unless you are able to do these in-house.
Branding
Do you have brand guidelines for us to follow? Are you able to provide us with the assets? If you don’t, we can work with you to give you an online presence that works for you, even without the full branding exercise.
Timeline
What’s your deadline for the website to launch? Do you have a trade show or marketing piece that dictates your deadline, or are you flexible? We will always do our best to meet your expectations or find a way to ensure that you have a great online presence in place, even if all the bells and whistles aren’t quite ready!
On-going Support & Marketing
It helps us to know your long term business plan for once the website is launched, if you have one. How will you market the new website and drive traffic to it? Have you considered areas such as Google Ads or search engine optimisation (SEO), or perhaps Facebook advertising? Our team can advise on the best approach specific to your business needs and put together a tailored package of on-going support to suit your budget.
Remember that your brief is not the done deal – think of it as a foundation to build upon. As your plan develops, a good web design agency will have lots of ideas and questions to help you realise your objectives.
If you have any questions or want further advice, feel free to get in touch with us at Infotex.
