Your responsibilities for a website project
What you need to know about hiring a web designer… because you’ve got some homework to do.
Building a website is a lot of work… for you.
Before, during and after the project, you’ll have just as much on your plate as the professionals you’ve hired to help build it, so plan accordingly. Even with the best people on your team, you can’t just look at a couple mockups, wait a few weeks and shout, “let’s launch this baby!”
Before the project even starts, you’ll need to have your homework together. Figure out what elements should go on each page. Make sure you have rough content planned for things like your tagline, sidebar, menu items and newsletter pitches (to name just a few). You’ll also need to have a list of every service your web designer needs to access, along with the associated usernames and passwords.
During the project you have to be available (i.e. no three-week silent meditations in Taos) to quickly review everything you receive, or simply to answer questions.
Your web designer made a promise to design and build your website in a reasonable amount of time, so you need to do what’s required of you just as quickly.
Writing and editing content will probably be the biggest time consumer on your end. Web designers don’t do this for you, and even if you hire a professional writer (which you should), your input will still be required.
However long you think the content will take to complete, double it. That’s at least how long it’ll actually take–so plan to have enough time to do it. Almost every project I’ve ever done (as a web designer of almost 20 years) has been delayed because the content took longer than a client expected (even if I explained this from the start).
Most web designers and content writers won’t put your content into WordPress either. Since you’re able to do that without any technical knowledge, this falls on you.
You also have to test your website to make sure everything works. Click every link, fill in every form, go through every process and proofread every sentence. It’s your name and your ass on the line–so it’s your ultimate responsibility to make sure everything is perfect before launch. No one wants their audience to be bug-checking their website instead of buying things from it.
What your web designer needs before the project starts
- Your style guide, if you’ve got one.
- Your colour scheme, if you’ve got one.
- Photography and graphics you’d like to use, in the highest resolution possible.
- Your logo in vector format (ask whomever designed it for this file).
- Domain registrar login information–URL, username, password, list of domains that need to point to the website.
- Web host login information–URL, username, password, ftp server, username, password.
- Newsletter login information–URL, username, password.
- Ecommerce login information–URL, username, password.
- Your sitemap (this is a list of pages your site will have).
- A list of 4-5 websites you like and why.
- A list of 4-5 competing websites and what you like/dislike about them.
- Your content, even if it’s rough.
- A list of what text or graphics should go in the header, footer and sidebar on every page.
- A Pinterest mood board that illustrates your style and visual likes when it comes to colour, photography, fonts and layout.
Clear (or greatly reduce) your schedule when your website project starts. That way you have time to do your job. Then you can actually reach the glorious next step, which is known as ‘heck yes, launching!’