Write down what it has to achieve.
- More enquiries, online sales, bookings, or simply the right impression when someone looks you up?
- One or two goals are enough, and they shape a proposal more than the number of pages does.
- Note who your customers are as well, because the website is written for them.
Gather what you already have.
- Logo, photographs, copy, price lists or presentations: whatever exists helps to estimate the work.
- If you already have a website, note what you like, what bothers you and which pages your customers open most.
- Find out who holds the logins for the domain and the hosting too, because they will be needed for the move.
Define what it has to do.
- A contact form, bookings, an online shop, customer accounts or a link to your accounting software?
- How many languages will it have, and who will write or translate the copy?
- Every feature and every language changes the work, so a short list saves a lot of questions later.
Give a budget range and a date.
- An indicative range helps you get a proposal that fits it, rather than a solution that does not suit you.
- If a date matters, such as a trade fair or the start of the season, say so from the start.
- Ask what is paid once and what is paid every year, so you compare proposals on the same terms.
Bring examples, not solutions.
- Two or three websites you like, even from another field, say a lot about the style you are after.
- Note what exactly you like about each one: the simplicity, the photographs or the way it explains things.
- You do not need technical terms. Your own words are enough to start the conversation.
Written by the Omnica team.