Website Design
By Website Design Company editorial team · Reviewed 2026-10-14
Start with a business task
Write down what a visitor should accomplish: enquire, purchase, book or understand a service. Choose one primary conversion and identify the information needed before a customer can take that step. A visual reference is helpful, but a business objective is the more reliable starting point.
Describe the audience and decision process
Identify the people you are trying to reach, their location, their likely devices and the questions they ask before buying. List objections honestly. Do not assume every visitor arrives at the homepage; campaign, search and referral visitors often land on a deeper page.
Inventory content and ownership
List existing pages, brand assets, photography, product information and legal text. Assign an owner to each item and record whether it can be reused. Agree who writes, approves and uploads the final content. Missing content is a project dependency, not something an attractive layout can solve.
Define integrations and permissions
Document forms, CRM, payment providers, booking tools and analytics. For each integration, identify its account owner, access method, recurring cost and test environment. Avoid sharing master passwords. A scoped API key or provider-managed invitation is safer and easier to revoke.
Agree acceptance criteria
Define supported devices, key journeys, accessibility checks, redirect requirements and the launch approval process. Ask for a working preview and a test record. Distinguish a design demonstration from a live payment, mail or production deployment test.
Use this checklist
Your brief should name the decision maker, goals, audience, page inventory, assets, budget, timeline, integrations and launch conditions. Share uncertainties early. A good scope makes room for discovery rather than pretending every dependency is already solved.