Design your way

According to internet live stats, there are more than a billion websites live today.

This number illustrates the importance of websites and how they are an integral weapon in the online marketing arsenal of businesses.

When you make a website, it’s important to remember that it is not just an online page filled with text and images; it is much more than that. Think of it like a front door to an entire organization. It has the onus of creating a good first impression on its target audience.

It is used as a rallying point for all the marketing efforts of a business.

All the promotional campaigns will direct people to visit the website for more information. All the leaflets, all the posters, all the TV advertisements, all the social media advertisements on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, etc. will direct people to home in on the website of an organization.

Therefore, there is absolutely no doubt your website plays a stellar role in driving business growth by conveying the unique value proposition offered by your client’s business.

Image source: Divan Raj

If a website is unable to fulfill its duty, the consequences can be disastrous. You will have your work cut out for you while building a website because you have to make a great first impression and if that goes off-kilter, no amount of efforts can remedy that.

There is no doubt that your clients will be extremely conscious of each detail of their website. So, a website has to fulfill all client expectations in terms of its usefulness, aesthetics and functionality. But above all, it must be able to achieve their lead generation and conversion objectives.

As a designer you must ensure your hard work pays off and the client is satisfied with the website you’ve built. But, this is easier said than done.

The web design and development process is long and difficult, but you can simplify things by asking some key questions that will give you much needed clarity about client expectations from the site.

These questions will help you get into the mind of the client, which is vital if you want the website to satisfy the client’s business goals.

1. What do you do?

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This the best question to start with. Since you are going to be working on a website that must be a perfect online representation of the client’s business and reflect his business philosophy and value proposition, it is imperative that you understand who your client is, what does his business do and how does it differ from the competition.

A website that is made for a pet shopwill be different than a website built for a real estate agency. Therefore, you need to be clear on the path you have to take regarding design. Any misunderstanding can screw up your design ideas even before you have commenced your work.

Personal Learning: You know what they say about assumptions. Very early on in my career, I used to get a tad uncomfortable asking clients about their business in a drill down manner. While I used to get an overview of the business, I did not focus on getting a granular understanding of the client business. Result – I couldn’t zero in on a client USP that I wanted to showcase throughout the site; resulting in an ordinary site.

2. What should your website do?

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You need to know the purpose behind the website you are creating. You should be aware of the aim of the website and what it is meant to accomplish.

Is it meant to act as a front to let people download magazines? Is it meant to act as an information tool that offers insights into the services offered by a company? Is it meant to get people to fill in registration forms?

A website can have more than one purpose and it is your job, as a designer, to ensure that each purpose is fulfilled without a hitch.

Personal Learning: A basic question isn’t it. For me personally, this question is about getting on the same page as the client. I remember this project wherein the client was selling jackets on a wholesale basis, and I assumed the client wanted to ‘sell’ his jackets through the site, but what he actually wanted to do was get leads through ‘form filling’. Big difference! But this question sorted it out for me.

3. Who is your target audience?

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This is a very important question. Each website can be customized to appeal to a set of target audience.A website for children will be designed differently than, say, a website used by business professionals. A children’s website will use more images and bright colors to attract children, while a business website will have a formal and an elegant layout.

If you know the target audience, you can create a website design that attracts and entices exactly the group of people that your client is targeting.

Personal Learning: I had a client who was very clear about the target audience he wanted to work with. So, the instructions were – ‘Male, US, 18-25, had the money to buy an expensive product (which meant the parents needed to be at the upper end of the wealth bracket)’, this made my task a whole lot easier. I could focus on a theme that talked to and resonated with the audience. There was no confusion in my mind.

4. What should your website visitors do?

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Once you know the target audience, you should ask what they are supposed to do on the website. If the people are to be guided to watch videos that showcase the business features, then that should get prominence in the design.

If the visitors are to be directed towards registering on the website, then they have to be subtly moved towards it with strategic call-to-action buttons. If the visitors are supposed to share the blog content on social networking sites, then the share buttons must be easily visible. The design depends on what your client wants the visitors to do when they visit the website.

Ideally, most visitors have very little time on their hands and given a small timeframe to consume information on a site, they will prefer consuming content that is designed beautifully as compared to something plain.

Personal Learning: Think of this one as an extension of point #2. Visitors are an extension of your website. Your website serves to serve visitors, right? Wrong. I thought along these lines as well. But, over time I realized that the primary objective of the website is to get its visitors to do, what you want them to do. So, if you want them to fill a form, make sure the design elements on the site gang up, to prompt them to do just that.

5. What elements do you want to include?

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Your main motive is that the website should fulfill all client objectives. Hence, their choices, likes and dislikes matter a lot. You need to ask them what would they prefer to include in their website and which are the elements they would definitely not want to miss out on.

You also need to ask them about stuff they would like to exclude. They might have a clear idea regarding design elements they detest. If you know what they do not like, you can avoid those elements outright.

But, it’s important to remember you are also designing for the target audience. While you need to include elements that the client will like, it is doubly important to make designing choices that will resonate with your target audience.

Personal Learning: Through the course of my life as a website creator, if there is one important aspect I learnt, it is to make sure you are aware of the likes and preferences of clients. I was working with this client who discussed website objectives and then asked me to create a website the way I thought fit. But, it didn’t work out that way. When I suggested a color scheme, he came up with his own preference, when I showed the images I wanted to work with, he had his own ideas. Finally, I asked him what he wanted, in detail. These days, this is one of the first questions I throw at the client. Life’s easy this way.

6. What additional features do you require?

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You need to ask your client about what extra elements they want integrated on their site.

Do they want to have embedded videos? Do they want users to be able to comment on blog posts and other types of content?? Do they require a chat box? Do they need an internal search engine for the site?

Any additional features that your client wants should be included in the website.

Personal Learning: Website design and development doesn’t work on hindsight. Again, I learnt this the hard way. One of the my website projects needed to be broken down, after it was complete and ready to go live. Why? The client decided he wanted a nice new feature he had read about. So what I also learnt was that there needed to be a cutoff date. Post that date, no requests for new feature/design integration will be considered.

7. What is your budget?

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It is best if you don’t approach this subject with apprehension. What a client wants and what a client can afford may be two different things. Therefore, some amount of negotiation will be necessary. If you maneuver intelligently through the budget negotiations, you will be able to freeze on a figure that is mutually convenient for both of you. Make sure you have all your costs figured out so that you don’t end up committing yourself to unsupportable costs.

Personal Learning: I know this question is uncomfortable, but in the interest of a good working relationship, you must ask this question upfront, after you get a clear idea of the clients’ requirements. Don’t be shy. In my early days, I used to commit to a project with all its requirements, without working out the budget with the client. Needless to say, there were times when I suffered.

Many a times a website fails to meet a client’s requirements. This may happen if the wrong kind of questions are asked. But, if you ask these 7 questions, you are bound to succeed in your endeavor to satisfy the client by building a website that looks and functions as it is supposed to. Be a nosy parker and start asking the right kind of questions now!