1. Understanding the purpose of your web project

You want a website; the first thing we need to know is why? The PURPOSE of your project is the most important thing we need to understand. Once we know what you want your website to achieve we can start helping you towards your goal.

Consider:

A. What are your goals for the new website, consider both short and long term?

B. What do you want to communicate?

C. Do you have an existing brand or identity that should/could be used in the web design process? And can you supply us with the artwork? Otherwise you might like us to give you a quotation for identity design work. We've done this many times at Ionic as part of the overall website project and and even extended into the area of Stationery and brochure design.

D. Will your new website need eBusiness or eCommerce features?

2. Understanding your Audience

Who you would like to visit your website and why? And what audience do you wish to maintain? Armed with this information we can make sure that the website is correctly configured for your target audience. 

Consider:

A. Who is your target audience?

B. How will your customers use the website?

C. What search terms or phrases do you think users will use to find your website?

D. Are there any other websites that you like? Why do you like them? (navigation, design, imagery, colour, features etc).

E. Who is your competition? You might consider the standard of competition you wish to excel with your site - and also how you'd like to distinguish your own website form theirs. 

Part 3: Content

At design stage, we need to understand what content you want to put on your website for 3 main reasons:

• To allow us to plan the information architecture, organising content in a way that makes it accessible to your audience.
• To ensure that our content management system is configured to manage and display your content in a clear and consistent way.
• The content affects the navigation of the site and may relate to search engine optimisation.

To facilitate this process we will:

1. Produce a wireframe for your website as part of planning for the navigation structure.
2. Show a list of content types which will apply to your Website Package.

Consider:

A. What types of content will you have? [text, pictures, galleries, video,

B. Can you tell us what main sections you envision for your website. It's best to keep the number low if possible and then sub-categorise.