Brainstorming A Website Design

Date Added: July 13, 2011 08:21:07 AM

Whether you are a pro web designer or a small business owner looking to build a new site there are certain steps that must be taken to design a good site. Experienced designers go through this checklist subconsciously as they do it time and again. But if you are designing a site for eth first time, or, doing it after a long time this is a good list to have handy whole taking up the web design project.

·       Know The Site’s Objective

A lot of guys tend to skip this step as they assume that they already know this in head and do not need to brainstorm things. Wrong. You can’t just think about designing a site and identify site objectives casually. It’s one of the most important steps of web design. You miss this and you might have to regret later to the point that a redesign might be required. So spend time on it and write it down on a piece of paper. Find out what’s te purpose of the site. Whether its just an informational brochure, or, a ecommerce store aimed at selling. You want it only to capture leads, or, actually do hard sell straightaway. Once you know the exact purpose of the site go and checkout similar sites. You’d get the hang of things pretty quickly.

·       Budget

Next logical step soon as you know the site objective is t know the budget. Before rushing to the drawing board you must know t cash flow available. Do you need a lot of bandwidth? Would you require SSL and other secure certificates? Would you be posting videos and making user accounts? All this would define your budget.

·       Who’ll Manage It?

An important question to ask at this stage is who will manage the site once it’s ready. If it’s going to be managed by non-technical person than you need to find simpler options. If you have people who know such stuff you can go and employ the best technologies your money can afford.

·       Design Process

This can be a subjective process but the objective, budget and post-design management will have a strong bearing on the design.

·       Testing

Once the site is done it’s paramount that it be tested properly for speed, cross-browser capability, usability, and if possible accessibility. You have to make it prove itself in all possible browsing environments it might face in the real world.

·       Handing Over

Handing over a complete site should be a smooth process with your client knowing exactly what has been done and what to expect from the site. How to troubleshoot in-house and when to shout for help?  The last bit is important, as a lot of client seem to get nervous at the slightest issue, so you have to clear the scores right at this point.

 

Victor Solovey is a creative director in a web design agency. He has spent early part of his career as a designer and is very much tuned in to newer design updates. Victor can be contacted to do psd to css conversions quickly.