4 ms·
Not sure if this will help, but this is how we operate at the web design company I manage: 1) Prospect gets in touch with us via email or phone. 2) We send th
by yeahsure 16y ago
Not sure if this will help, but this is how we operate at the web design company I manage:
1) Prospect gets in touch with us via email or phone.
2) We send them a "Project Planner". This is a questionnaire with key questions (i.e. "What's the goal of your project?") that we've put together.
3) We quickly review the project and send the prospect an estimate of how much it will cost to develop and an estimated timeline. We make sure to make the prospect know the quote and timeline is based on the ideal that it doesn't includes revisions. Something like: Each revision will extend the delivery date by XX days.
5) If the prospect accepts we send them a contract and ask for a 50% payment before we do any work. If they are not comfortable with that, or the project is too big, we ask for 25% and then setup several payment deadlines as the project moves forward.
6) After the retainer has been paid, we send the (now) client a new questionnaire, called "Client Worksheet". Here we get specific to get to know the client better.
6) Once we receive payment, we make some research on the project and provide some wireframes along with simple explanations on how we think the goal can be achieved.
7) After the client is happy with the final wireframe and signs it off, we proceed to design the mockups. We already know what he likes so usually a couple of revisions is good enough to get final approval.
8) Once the design has been approved we start coding. Most of the "how will it work" has been already discussed through the wireframes, so it's pretty easy at this point.
9) Testing, final payment and launch :-)
Hope this helps!
- mcotton 16y agothat sounds like a good workflow, thanks for the comment
- bo_Olean 16y agoi am just curious about the "Project Planner" and "Client Worksheet" you have mentioned in the comment. that's a good way to collect prospect's idea of the project. Any pointers that'd guide us build such questionnaire ? thanks.
- yeahsure 16y agoHey, Sure. It depends on which kinds of projects you usually get though (most of the time we develop WordPress sites). We try to keep the questionnaires as short as possible, while gathering all the info we need. For the Project Planner we ask things such as (In parenthesis how this helps us): - What do you need a website for? (The GOAL) - Do you need dynamic content? How often? (CMS or not?) - What action(s) should the user perform when visiting your site? (Which CMS? Are there plugins for this?) - How many sections will your website have? (How many screens we'll need to design) - What's your budget? (Is the client a fit?) As for the client worksheet: - In which market does your business operate? (Helps with research) - What sets you apart from the competition? Please provide competitor URLs. (What can we focus in to make it stand out) - Briefly describe the need you seek to solve. (What we'll focus on) - Color preferences (We also suggest using colourlovers.com to send us a palette if they want to. Otherwise we pick the colors) - List two or three sites that you like, either how they look or the way they work (Usually they'll like a certain format or UX) --- LMK if you have any other questions. Hope this helps!
- bo_Olean 16y agothis will really help, we will add few more questions to suite our client base. thanks for making this clear..