Interesting question…

I was asked by a client this week “Why do you request a deposit before providing mock ups” – to be honest she sounded a bit put out when she found that this was our standard T&C.  

Well…

We’ve been in business for over 6 years now.  When we we starting out, websites for start-up’s were not usually too complicated; logo, banner, menu, some text and a footer.  We didn’t have a large portfolio at the beginning and we were happy to spend half a day mocking up a design for a potential client so that they could see what they would be getting.  The problem was that spending half a day on a design just on the basis of a telephone call was not really getting the best results.

1. We were mocking up websites without first seeing the clients content.
2. Sometimes the client would be happy and sometimes we’d get it completely wrong.
3. Getting the mock up wrong could cost us the sale and at best we’d have to rework it before the client would sign up.
4. Loosing half a day of time cost money.   

We stopped creating mock ups in advance of payment around three years ago. 

We now have a large portfolio of work that clients can look through before making a purchase and even the most basic of websites being created now are much more complex that those on the market 6 years ago.  Start-ups require a custom look and feel, SEO, update tools, logo, branding, blogs, shopping carts etc.  Building websites has never been so complex and involved (which is great for us because we love it!).

In order to get the best results for your website project, we need to complete the following tasks before even putting pen to paper (yes we do often start with pen and paper).

1. Lengthy conversation/meeting with the client to understand there business and their website requirements.
2. Write up on the lengthily conversation which is reviewed by the client.
3. Los of research into client competing websites and target market.
4. Review the any existing branding and marketing materials.
5. Review the clients content.  For example often the client might suggest a fairly flat website like a word document with static pages, and we like to make them more interactive. We might converts pieces of content into banner, calls to actions, widgets and side adverts.
6. Plan the website structure.
7. Sketch the layout.

see left- A sketch form a current website project in progress. 

(Ok it’s basic, but I have filtered through the clients content and decided which bits are the most important and given them priority and focus on the page.  It might look cryptic to you but is accompanied with a meeting with the graphic designer and also a report on the findings of step 1-5 above)

All in for a 5 page website this ground work usually amounts to 3-4 hours and this is before one of our graphic designer gets their hands on it to convert my scribbles into a gorgeous website.

Once the design is proposed we like to work closely with the client to tweak it to make sure that its 100% correct. 

 
In short its best to create a mock-up with the full requirements, our clients content and full commitment.

Website Design | 17.11.2009 17:05 | No Comments