Dallas Website Design & Web Development

Planning a Website — Our Starting Point Questions for Your Company

Typically our development planning for your website begins with by presenting general questions about your business and market place, your target audience, your company message, and goals and expectations for the new website. We want to make sure to develop a solid Web development plan that builds upwards from the identified and set marketing goals and user expectations for the site vs. relying on some pre-existing ideas that we might have about your field of business.

By going through a set of marketing strategy questions, a frame for a unique (Web) brand identity starts forming up; a basis for our Web design and development work. Below are some framing talking points:

 MARKET PLACE & COMPETITION 

• Where does your business operate?
• Who poses the relevant competition and how?
• What can be said about your competition’s Web presences and Web strategies?

 MARKET NICHE/DIFFERENTIATION 

• What are your company’s products/services?
• What unique aspects do these products/services carry?
• What is your company story to the consumer and your people? What is special and unique about your business?
• How could the positive differentiaton be further highlighted and communicated?

 TARGET AUDIENCES/CONSUMERS 

• Who is your target audience or target audiences?
• Who are the consumers who will visit the website?
• How will the audience recognize that they are part of the company’s target audience?

 TONE OF VOICE 

• What do we know about the life style, taste and preferences of the audiences?
• What kind of branding would be accepted and desired?

 REASONS FOR A WEBSITE 

• How would you rate the importance of a new/update website for your company?
• How important is the website as an identity builder in internal and external communication in your company?
• Will the website be the primary source for marketing and/or generating revenue?

For more questions about your business position, please visit the Interaria Brand Workout!


Planning Questions to Us

1) How long will it take to design/develop a new Web site for my company?
We can accommodate the timeline and timetable according to your needs and understand if there is an urgency. Typically, Web site design and development projects average between four and seven weeks and extensive data-driven Web projects averaging between three and six months. The more time we have on hand, the more time there will be for several feedback rounds and confirming each stage of the Web site development process.

Based on our experience, the following factors typically determine the timeline for the project and should be taken into account in order to create a realistic timeline and expectations for the length of the project:


 1) BRANDING AND WEB DESIGN DIRECTION: 

• Has your company already identified the set brand direction for your marketing and/or Web site? If everything is set and confirmed we can move faster than in the case that we are involved with creating a creative brand strategy for your Web site.
  

Our involvement will require meetings/feedback and discussion rounds as requested by us and your company's project manager or appointed project team. We move on a step-by-step style, confirming each development phase before moving forward to the next one. If the branding ideas are not very crystallized before starting the project, we recommend adding one to two weeks additional development time.


 2) AVAILABILITY OF THE CONTENT FOR THE WEB SITE: 

• Has your company already identified the text and image content for your Web site? If not, what would your timetable be for creating and confirming the content?
  
• How much time does the appointed person in your company realistically have for preparing any text?
  
• Does your company have photos available or are you waiting for project photos?
  
• Who will be in charge for proofing the site map structure and number of pages for the Web site?
  
• Would you like to use our copywriting or copyediting services?
  

If your company has all text and image content in hand and there will be no waiting, we can move faster than when receiving a content draft. However, we don’t require all text content before starting the project but only some idea about the number of required pages and amount of content requested for each page. Typically Web site re-design projects move forward a little bit faster than projects where all identity is created from the scratch such as a case with start-up companies.


 3) PROJECT TEAM: 

• How many people in your company will be involved for commenting and approving each development phase for the project?
  
• How quickly can the team give answers to questions and confirm the direction?
  
• How often would the project team meet up?
  
• Are there any dates for management meetings that should be taken into account in the timeline?
  
• What are the priority and commitment levels for the Web site design and development project in your company?
  

Typically projects with an appointed project manager with robust decision power move faster than projects where each step is confirmed by a larger team. Either way, we understand and respect that each company's operational and management style is different and customized to fit their organizational needs.


 4) SCALE OF THE WEB SITE: 

• How many pages will the Web site be?
  
• Will the Web site project involve designing Flash media?
  
• Will the Web site project involve developing and programming database features and/or Content Management Systems (CMS)?
  

Typically it will take more time developing a Web site with an extensive site map and requested feature sets than a smaller scale promotional Web site although the difference in the work load for graphics design may not be that great.


2) Tell me about the design process

Please take a moment browsing through our Portfolio for identifying different Web site design styles, layouts and technologies and your preferences for your own Web site. We have indexed our Web site design and development projects according to different variables and attributes in order for us to better identify what you are looking for.

We are not going to leave you on an island to determine alone the kind of Web presence you need and want: Through our meetings and discussions we aim to get to know you and your company. We ask a set of branding and design questions and go though a set of sample Web sites for your comments to identify your company’s position, differentiation strategy and design style taste and preferences. We also get to know your existing marketing material and all parties involved in your project team. Based on this framework, we design a home page and a sample page layout design with design variables for your team’s comments and honest feedback. Based on the comments we prepare a new round of designs continuing the process until we have reached a unified approval from your team and know and feel that your company is 100% behind the design and information architecture for the Web site. Only upon fully completing the branding/design and Web architecture phase, we will move forward and proceed with the coding and programming phase of the project.