Website Design - What do you need?
If you’ve never had a website designed by a professional before, you may not realise what you need to provide to your website designer to make your website the best it can be. Some of the things you need to provide can be a little time-consuming and most of the time, these things are the reason that web design projects can drag out for months on end.
Logos and website design
Your website design should reflect your branding so your logo is the first thing your website designer will need. You’ll need to provide a high-quality logo so that it doesn’t appear pixelated on your website.
Having a few different file formats such as .JPG and .PNG can be useful and sometimes having alternative coloured options such as all white or all black may be required too. If you’ve had your logo designed by a professional graphic designer, then you should already have those files.
Some of my clients have opted to have their logos redrawn to ensure they have a quality logo which strengthens their brand. I can also refer you to one of the fabulous graphic designers I work closely with.
Contact details for website design
Your website generally will be telling your potential customers how to get in touch with you so it’s important that your contact details are correct. Decide which email address you want enquiries to go to and which phone number should be displayed. Providing these properly from the very beginning will avoid any confusion.
Website design research
No you don’t need to provide a written research report! It does, however, help if you’ve had a look around at different websites so you have an idea of what you’d like your website to look and feel like.
You can also see different functionality and design components that might be suitable for your website design. Sometimes these things need to be incorporated into your quote as they require additional work and sometimes the design may need to be created around them so having your wishlist and vision organised before you engage a website designer will be beneficial.
photos, videos and website design
Photos and videos are one of the most important things you will need to provide for your website design. Whilst you can use stock images or videos, you don’t want your website looking like anyone else’s.
Having your own professional images of you and your business will allow your website to look more personalised and authentic.
Here’s a few reasons I encourage my clients to engage a professional photographer:
- They know what images/video to take
- The image quality will be high, so your website looks professional
- A great photographer will stage things to make them visually appealing
- It creates less work for you as they collate all the images/videos and provide them directly
- You can use the images/videos for all your marketing activities
In addition to professional photos and video, you may also want to include some before and after photos, some photos/videos from events you’ve attended or hosted or any other photos/videos that you may want to feature on your website.
Whatever the photo/video is, it is important that it is of high quality so you don’t get pixelation which make your site look less professional.
Copy for website design
Copy is the words that you will use on your website. Most website designers will expect you to provide the copy and most of them will find that your copy is not very good. As blunt as that seems, it is usually true.
Your website copy should:
- Speak directly to your target audience
- Engage
- Add value
- Build credibility
- Convert
- Be simple and effective
- Help you get found on google
There is an art to copywriting that can take time to develop and if it’s not your area of expertise, I encourage you to engage a professional copywriter such as myself to write the copy for you. It will speed up the process and require less time from you and it will pay for itself.
At Kickass Marketing, I include copywriting with all my websites as standard for this reason.
For more information about the importance of copywriting, here is a great article that outlines it all.
testimonials for website design
Perhaps one of the most time-consuming components you will need to collect is customer testimonials. If you already have a google my business page then you may have collected some there or perhaps you have some Facebook reviews.
Testimonials are a fantastic way to support the copy you provide. For example, if you have a page that details a particular service then a testimonial from someone that specifically mentions that service can be used to back up your claims of why that service is valuable.
Simply put, testimonials are proof that you aren’t just making things up!
If your testimonials are from other business owners then having a copy of their logo and/or photo is also useful and you can link back to their website if you want to.
Website domain access
If you have an existing domain name, then your website designer is going to need access to that so they can point the domain to your new website. If they are setting up a new domain for you then this won’t be a problem.
If you have an existing domain that requires 2 factor authentication then you may need to temporarily change that over to them or organise a time to do it together so they can add the records to make your website live.
Although they won’t need this until the very end of the process, most business owners don’t know these logins off the top of their head so getting that ready is a good idea.
conclusion
If you are planning on having a new website designed then hopefully this will help you have a smoother experience with your website designer. Nobody wants to be harassed for photos, testimonials, logos etc and trust me – your website designer wants to build your website as quickly as possible! We all dream of clients who have these things ready to go from the start!
If you are ready to create a brand-new website or redesign an existing one, I’d love to chat with you about how we can work together. You can check out my prices here. Or book a FREE 15 minute chat.
