Hi, my name is Elise and I’m a Web Strategist here at TinyFrog and today I want to talk about some elements that can help you have a successful website project.
So, you’re ready to get started on that new website, whether it’s your first website or a redesign of an existing one. The project is always really fun and exciting, but there’s a few things that you should have in place before you choose a web partner or dive head first into the project,
The first thing you want to ensure is that you have all of your branding in place. Yes, a web designer can help you with your colors, your fonts and your images, but you should still have a pretty clear idea of your overall brand identity as a company. Are you casual and fun or more professional and sophisticated?
Having this in mind as you go into a web design project is really helpful and makes things a lot more efficient. To help you decide what route you want to go with your design, look at some other websites both in and outside of your industry and make note of the items that you really like and any items that you would prefer to avoid on your own website. This is going to give your team and your design team a really nice foundation as you dive into the design elements of your new site.
The next thing you want is to understand the purpose and functionality of your website. For example, if you sell products you need to set your website up as an e-commerce platform or maybe you have a lot of educational resources and you need to set up some functionality to share a lot of articles or blogs, podcasts or videos. Having an idea of the functionality that you need to implement on your website is really important because you want to make sure that you’re choosing a team with the capabilities to actually implement this functionality for you.
You should also gather any specific internal content or assets that you need to include on your website. So, make sure that you have the logo ready to go, that your team has their head shots and their bios in place, and any other specific or personal imagery that you may need to include such as images of your products or your company building or images of the work that you’ve done in the past. All of that is also really helpful for design team since they can have it all ready to go and work around what you need to include, rather than waiting to add that content and potentially delaying the process.
You also want to make sure that you have your internal team in place. There is such a thing is too many cooks in the kitchen when it comes to a website project and so choose two to three key decision makers who will be involved throughout the process and be the key point person between your team and the design team. This makes it a lot easier so you’re not dealing with competing schedules or differing opinions on the design or the layout of the website, which can help things move forward a lot easier.
As you look for a web partner, you should be assessing the experience that they have, the people that are on their team, and whether or not there’s any specialties that they bring to the table that could be helpful for your project.
Not every web partner is the same and so you want to make sure that you’re choosing someone that has the strategic background, the design background, and the development skills that you need in order to create a successful website. If you’re ready to get started and you’re curious about our team, we’re happy to have a call with you and talk through your next website project.
