So what is web design?

It almost sounds like a no-brainer. What is web design?
What's the actual process which is undertaken when we're commisioned to design a web site?

The trouble with this line of work is that there's a disconnect between those who need a website design service and those who build them. The people who need websites can often assume that their creation is the matter of flicking a switch or recolouring a template; when the quotes come in, the reality sets in too.

You and Us - perfect.

Let's take a look at the end-to-end, day-to-day web design business, from the first phone call to the last bug. We start with the client - let's say that's you - calling up the developer - us - and saying "Hi! We need a website please!". From that moment on, as far as we are concerned, the clock is ticking. You're costing us money!

"WHAT!" you say? "I'm going to *give* you money, I'm not costing you money!".

True. But web developers don't have warehouses full of boxed website products ready to ship out to you; we're in the service industry, and time is the only thing we have to sell. As soon as someone starts taking up our time, they're costing us money!

Why are we highlighting this? Are we trying to put you off? Well, no. This is a detailed analysis of what goes into making a successful website design. We want you to be aware of the way we operate so you can better understand our process. With the time-is-money scenario, we need to balance time we spend dealing with your enquiries with the amount we charge you. So when you're on the phone, we're immediately wondering what features you need on your website, if you need a redesign and new content, do you have an existing domain name and server, and all those things that can help us understand what you need, to better understand how to come up with a bill of works.

When we do have a list of your required features, we've made the first step to a drawing up a specification.

The Specification - downloading your ideas to us

The specification is an extremely important part of the process. Imagine you're buying a new outfit from a mail order catalogue. Imagine you phone up the company and say "Hi! I need a new outfit please!", and you send them the cash. A few days later they send you a clown outfit, and you're not happy, and the same applies to your new website - though hopefully there won't be a clown outfit involved. Maybe.

You need to be specific, and what better place for that than the specification? We can note, in detail, exactly what you want to see on your homepage, on your news page, which items you want to be able to edit yourself and how you want to tweak your search engine rankings. All these things and more allow us to describe what we're going to deliver at the end of the process.

That's a key point actually. If we don't specify, not only will you be annoyed with yourself for not asking for the right thing, there's also the chance you might come back to us feeling dissatisfied with what we've given you. So a specification is for the benefit of both parties, to ensure that the cash you're investing will get you exactly what you expect.

Once the spec is clear and agreed we give you a fixed price to build your dream website or web application. The work we then do for you falls within this price.

Beautiful design is no coincidence

So we're good to go. We know which features you want, so we get our graphic designer in gear and they mock up a homepage which they think you'll like.

Now, the trouble is that although we know your needs, we don't know your tastes, and as we all know, there's no accounting for taste.

We now go through one or more "web design iterations", where we go back and forth tweaking the design until we find something you're satisfied with. It may be that we limit the number of design iterations (because as we now know, time is money) so we need to make sure we quickly understand what you really like. In reality, the designer will have reviewed some sites that you've cited as favourites, in an attempt to understand what you're after.

Web development, when our geeks earn their bread

And so to the guts of the project, and the place where you get your value for money. Web developers have a lot of tricks up their sleeves - creating intuitive forms, slick editors, strong search engine optimisation - and will fill in the gaps that a designer inevitably leaves when they paint the broad strokes of your mockup.

A good web developer knows that by structuring their code just so, Google and other serach engines will find it easier to search through. They'll make sure that your site can expand in future both in terms of visitors and functionality, by putting their software architecture skills to work.

Web development is a craft. The more time spent, the more polished the finished product.

One or more of our web developers will create the database and code which powers your site, most likely under the guidance of a project manager. One of the team will constantly be in touch with you, giving you the link to the latest development snapshot so you can see how things are progressing. This is the time where you can make sure we've got the right end of the stick and are creating the right solution, but because we've got a good specification we should be on the right track.

Our support to you and the work we create

When all of the features are implemented and you're happy with what's been done the site is made live for the whole world to admire. In this early time, if there's anything that goes wrong with your website, it'll get fixed. It could be that a higher number of visitors after launch means that an unforseen problem turns up, and that's not unexpected.

However, if at this point you realised you've forgotten about feature Z that you *really* wanted in the site - that's another thing entirely. We'll probably suggest that you think about any other features you'd like to see, and we wrap those up in a second phase of development. That allows us to get the first lot of work completely finished while pushing future work through the same structured, well specified process that we used for the main site.

The End? No just the beginning.

Designing your website is a process involving a number of people and a whole lot of time.

We'd love to be able to bring you that perfect site first time but in truth, we need your input to combine with our expertise and we need to do in within a structured setting. By doing so, we can build a website which exceeds your expectations. Well thats the plan and we always have a cunning plan.

We look forward to hearing from you, get in touch >>