How to write a good website design brief

Unless you can find a clairvoyant web designer (and we haven’t come across one yet), your web designer can only go on what you tell him / her.  A written brief avoids confusion and misunderstanding - and gives you something to refer back to as you progress.  It also helps you to think through what you want before you start.  The website design brief doesn’t have to be long: 2 - 4 pages should be plenty for most small business websites. 

What to include in the website design brief

Here’s a top ten of what to write.  Make sure you include a little bit about each:

1. Your target market.  Think of your typical user. What are they like?  Any information you can give your web designer about them (eg. gender, age, experience online etc)  is useful in choosing a website design which will appeal to your target market.
2. Background to your business.  What do you do? What are your most important products?  What are your key selling points?  Do you operate locally or nationally?
3. Objectives of the website.  What does the website need to achieve?  Examples include
   • Showcase my business products / services
   • Generate sales leads
   • Sell products online
   • Collect a database of subscribers / leads eg. Via registration
   • Offer information / after sales advice to existing customers / staff
   • Move some repetitive tasks / processes online  (eg. Homeworkers visit a secure part of your website rather than your having to call or email them to give them rotas / tasks)
4. Keywords.  What are the words which users might type into Google, when they are looking for a site like yours?  Knowing these upfront will help your designer include them in tags and page titles, which in turn will help your search engine rankings.
5. Your call to action.  If your users like your site, what do they do? Call you? Email you?  Purchase online?  Donate money? Think carefully about this - these details need to be prominent throughout the site.
6. Your timing and budget.  How urgent is your website?  Do you have a specific budget in mind? Deadlines when the site must be live eg. A tradeshow, marketing campaign etc.
7. Format.  Number of pages and number of images.  Amount of functionality (eg. Will there be a shopping basket? Forms? Movies? Just text?)  The designer will need an idea of this to be able to quote for the work.
8. Home page.  This is the most important page on your website and should showcase the rest of your site. Think very carefully about what should be included on this page.  Product Information / promotional links and offers etc.
9. Your own web experience.  How experienced are you online? How much of the jargon do you understand.
10. Designs you like.  Do you have a particular look and feel in mind?  What colours / layouts do you like?  Do you want to use the colours from your logo?  If possible, list some websites you particularly like.

How to lay out your design brief

Don’t worry too much about the layout of your website design brief.  The content is much more important than the format, but if you are looking for guidance, we've always found the following simple format works well: 

Titles
Name of business, website address, your contact details, date of brief etc.

Background
What does your business do? Why are you setting up the website? Is it a redesign?

Objectives
What does the website need to achieve? 

Target market
Describe the user you want to attract.

Website format
Number of pages and image, functionality etc.

Considerations / Guidelines
Include everything else which may be relevant in here.  Call to action.  Accessibility. Technical requirements (if you have any).  Do you need personalisation, on site advertising, site wide search?  How will it be maintained (and by whom)?

Budget
What budget are you looking at? 

Timing
When do you want (or need) the site to go live?