Planning Your Website Roadmap: Why Every Website Project Needs One To Save It From Expensive Mistakes
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The document outlines the essential stages and roles involved in planning a website roadmap, emphasizing the importance of strategic communication and effective collaboration to avoid costly mistakes. It covers five key stages: Discover, Design, Develop, Implement, and Evaluate, detailing activities, outputs, and keys to success for each stage. Additionally, it offers guidance on budgeting and hiring the right professionals to ensure a successful website project.
Planning Your Website Roadmap: Why Every Website Project Needs One To Save It From Expensive Mistakes
- 1. Planning Your Website Roadmap Why Every Website Project Needs One To Save It From Expensive Mistakes Jasmine Andrews | Brain Candy Consulting
- 2. Who Am I?
- 3. Why Client Education Matters
- 4. What will you get out of this session? Learn the stages and activities in a website project The different roles you can turn to for help How to communicate effectively How to prevent wasting time and money
- 6. Overview of Project Stages
- 12. It’s flexible and scalable
- 14. Discover: Activities Do all the research. Set the strategy. User/market research Competitor analysis SEO keyword research Content audit Business operational planning and process analysis Ux and Service Design
- 15. Discover: Outputs SEO keyword plan Site map Content inventory Business requirements User requirements Personas Customer Journey Map Project brief Functional specs User flows Sales funnel maps Digital Strategy document Tone of voice document / Style Guide
- 16. Discover: Roles Web Designer Ux Consultant Service Designer Digital Strategist SEO specialist/copywriter Information Architect Business Analyst Brand Strategist Digital Marketing Consultant
- 17. Discover: Keys to Success Think strategically Share information openly Apply empathy Put it in writing Assign one point of contact
- 18. Stage 2: Design
- 19. Design: Activities Brand and logo design Typographic design Wireframing Layouts
- 20. Design: Outputs Mood board Branding and logo Colour palette Typographic Scheme and heading styles Wireframes Mockups/layouts Style tiles
- 21. Design: Roles Web designer Graphic designer UI designer Typographer Brand designer/strategist
- 22. Design: Keys to Success Communicate clearly - be specific and objective Consolidate feedback into rounds of revision Respect timeframes Remember that you are not the target audience
- 23. Stage 3: Develop
- 24. Develop: Activities Development - building the site Customisations Testing & Quality Assurance User Acceptance Testing Email automations and CRM integration Add SEO metadata
- 25. Develop: Outputs A built and fully functioning website
- 26. Develop: Roles Website Developer WordPress Developer WordPress Customiser Automations/CRM Specialist VA or Technical VA for basic sites SEO Consultant
- 27. Develop: Keys to Success Be clear on your website functional requirements before you choose to hire. Not everyone can do ecommerce sites or membership sites etc. It also affects the costs considerably. Don’t expect a developer (code) to do design (creative) or write content Provide all the documentation, layouts, brief, brand style guide, logos, fonts Provide all the content and images (properly prepared files)
- 29. Implement: Activities Migrate the website files to the hosting accounts Repoint the DNS settings (if needed) Archive the old site files Set up any redirects if URLs have changed
- 30. Implement: Outputs A live website
- 31. Implement: Roles Website Developer WordPress Developer WordPress Customiser Automations/CRM Specialist VA or Technical VA for basic sites
- 32. Implement: Keys to Success Keep account details written down - hosting and domain name registration Allow a day for the site to transition Perform preventative maintenance Back up regularly
- 34. Evaluate: Activities SEO keyword performance reporting Traffic reports Goals and conversion rates CRM reports Heat maps User testing
- 35. Evaluate: Outputs All the reports
- 36. Evaluate: Roles SEO consultant/copywriter Digital Strategist Digital Marketing consultant Ux Consultant Web Designer Web Developer
- 37. Evaluate: Keys to Success Start collecting data from day 1, even f you don’t look at the data for the first 3 months Get a little education so you can understand what the reports are showing you
- 39. Which path is right for you? Do it all yourself You run the project and hire individual freelancers to do their parts independently You hire a multi-skilled freelancer who “does it all” You engage an agency/business to be your single point of contact and they do it all including project management
- 40. Setting your budget Match your stage of business maturity and goals Rule of thumb: set marketing budget at 10% of annual turnover Scale the work to fit your budget Project price and scope of work, not hourly rates
- 41. Free ebook Ultimate Guide to Hiring the Right Website Professional https://www.braincandy.com.au/hiring-guide/
- 42. Key Points Write a good brief before you hire Consider user needs and business needs Set goals so you can set an appropriate budget Know what skillset you are hiring for Start with a signed contract and understand the terms Use a good project management system Document all your requirements before you design
- 43. Key Points Finalise design and content before you start development Be available and responsive Consolidate all file sharing to one cloud based storage Consolidate all communications to one platform, ideally one that allows threaded comments against each task Be willing to discuss your business operations and planning in order to get the best results
- 44. Key Points Nominate one person to be the point of contact Nominate one person to provide the approvals Don’t compare on hourly rate Be clear on the scope of work Be clear on the process SEO is not something you add to a completed website The best prepared clients get the best outcomes. Every can do their job more effectively and your project will be prioritised over others.