Our Web Design Process
Last week, a client asked us, “Why do we need designs in the web design process? Can’t you just build the website?”
Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way, but it’s a question we do hear often about the web design process. Some business owners think all you need is a half-decent developer, and voilà, your site will be ready in a month, bringing in tons of sales and leads. While some take this approach, more often than not, it leads to a subpar website that needs constant revisions, ongoing maintenance, and a developer who has to handle every update – leaving everyone with a sour taste in their mouth. At Squee, we believe web design should be done properly. Here, we’ll walk you through each step of our web design process, showing why skipping any part can hurt the project, and how following it leads to outstanding results for your business.
An Overview of the Web Design Process
Building a high-quality website follows a structured series of steps:
- Kick-Off Meeting
- Discovery
- Sitemap
- Low-Fidelity Designs
- High-Fidelity Designs
- Refinements & Feedback
- Development
- Test Deployment and Content Updates
- Testing
- Go Live
- Maintenance
Our team collaborates with clients at every stage of the process. Effective communication is essential to ensuring the project stays on track and meets the agreed goals. Each step involves a cycle of presenting ideas, gathering feedback, and making necessary adjustments, preventing the need for time-consuming changes later.
Now, let’s dive into each of these steps and what you can expect along the way.
Kick-Off Meeting
The kick-off meeting is the first face-to-face interaction between our team and the client. It’s designed to ensure everyone is aligned on the project’s goals and sets a clear communication standard for the rest of the process. This meeting helps establish a strong foundation and ensures smooth collaboration moving forward.
During this session, we take the time to learn more about the client’s business, uncovering key requirements and gaining a deeper understanding of what’s currently working on the website and what needs improvement. It’s also a great opportunity to discuss any key features or functionality required, helping to shape the project to meet the client’s needs effectively.
Discovery
The discovery phase is all about gathering more specific details about the project. At this stage, we provide the client with a detailed questionnaire to help uncover essential information. This includes identifying key competitors, understanding the unique selling points (USPs) of the business, and learning about any preferred websites for design inspiration.
Additionally, the discovery phase explores assets that need to be included on the website and clarifies the business’s overall goals. This critical information forms the foundation for the ideation and design phase, ensuring the final result is both effective and tailored to the client’s needs.
Sitemap
The sitemap is a crucial step in planning the structure of a website. It provides a clear diagram of the site’s hierarchy, showing how each page fits within the overall framework. This helps to organise content effectively and ensures the website is easy to navigate for visitors. Creating this visual outline also helps lay the groundwork for the low-fidelity design phase.
There are also technical sitemaps, which are used primarily for SEO purposes. These ensure search engines can properly crawl and index the website, but the focus at this stage is on creating a clear and logical structure that will shape the user experience.
Low-Fidelity Designs
Low-fidelity designs, often called wireframes, are simple visual guides that outline the basic structure and layout of a website. These designs are intentionally stripped-down, focusing on functionality and content placement rather than visual style or branding. The goal at this stage is to determine how different elements – such as text, images, buttons, and forms – will be organised on each page to create a logical and user-friendly flow.
Creating low-fidelity designs allows us to quickly iterate and make adjustments based on client feedback. It’s a collaborative process where we present the initial layout ideas and work with the client to ensure the structure aligns with their vision and business objectives. By focusing on the core layout first, we can identify potential issues early, saving time and effort before moving on to more detailed design work.
These low-fidelity designs are crucial for setting the foundation of the website, providing a clear direction for the next step: high-fidelity designs, where we add branding elements, visual style, and polish.
High-Fidelity Designs
High-fidelity designs are where the website truly comes to life. In this phase, we use Figma to create detailed, visually rich representations of each page. These designs incorporate the branding elements, colour schemes, typography, and imagery that reflect the client’s brand identity. The high-fidelity designs allow both our team and the client to see exactly how the final product will look and feel.
This stage is all about refining the visual details to ensure the website not only functions well but also looks stunning and resonates with the target audience. We carefully consider the user experience, ensuring that the design is accessible, engaging, and consistent across all devices. By working closely with the client, we make sure every element aligns with their brand vision and meets their business objectives.
Refinements & Feedback
Now, we’re on to refinements and feedback. At Squee, we offer three design iterations to ensure that the client is completely satisfied with the direction of the website. We aim to get things right early on by actively listening to our clients’ requirements, which often means fewer changes are needed. During each iteration, we gather feedback from the client and make the necessary adjustments to the designs. This collaborative approach ensures that the final product meets expectations and delivers the best possible results.
If, after the third iteration, the client still isn’t happy with the designs, we offer a full refund. This is extremely rare, as we strive to get everything right from the beginning by fully understanding the client’s needs and expectations. We are committed to delivering high-quality work, ensuring our clients feel comfortable and confident in their investment.
Development
Once the designs are finalised, we move on to the development phase. This is where the approved designs are transformed into a fully functional website. Our development team takes the high-fidelity designs and uses them to create a responsive, accessible, and high-performing site. We build custom themes to ensure every website we create is tailored to the client’s needs, avoiding generic templates that can limit functionality and uniqueness.
During development, we use best practices to optimise the website for speed, search engines, and accessibility. The website is coded to ensure it works seamlessly across all devices, providing a consistent experience whether users are on a desktop, tablet, or mobile phone.
We also integrate any requested functionality, such as contact forms, eCommerce systems, or booking tools. Our development process is thorough and meticulous, aiming to bring the vision to life in a way that’s intuitive and user-friendly.
Test Deployment and Content Updates
After development, we set up a staging environment where clients can review the website before it goes live. This allows us to test features and make adjustments. We also work with the client to finalise content, ensuring everything is consistent and ready for launch.
Go Live
Once testing is complete and we have final client approval, it’s time to go live. We make the website publicly accessible and monitor it during launch to address any issues. This ensures everything works smoothly, marking the culmination of all the hard work put in by both our team and the client.
Maintenance
After the website goes live, we continue to offer support through our maintenance services. This includes regular updates, security checks, and performance monitoring to keep the website running smoothly. Our goal is to ensure that the website remains secure, functional, and optimised over time, adapting to any evolving needs or changes in the client’s business.
Building a high-quality website is a collaborative process that requires careful planning, design, development, and testing. At Squee, we guide our clients through each step, from initial meetings to ongoing maintenance, ensuring that every aspect is tailored to their needs. Our structured web design process ensures that we deliver a website that not only meets but exceeds expectations, providing a strong foundation for business growth.