What to Expect When Working With a Website Design Agency

What to Expect When Working With a Website Design Agency

As a business owner, no matter how non-creative you may consider yourself to be, you’d most likely have some sort of idea about what you expect out of your website. That is absolutely necessary. Keep that alive. When working with a website design agency, there are several things, like your vision for your website, that you’ll need to express.

Partnering With a Website Design Agency

It all begins with a phone call or an email (could be a meeting too, you get the point). From there, the process starts to unfold into six clear stages. It begins with clarifying goals and budgets, with a straight dive into research from there. Wireframes and mockups are created, codes are tested, and finally, the product is launched. There is also the ever-important after-launch support. Let’s walk through each step. No pun intended.

Initial Consultation and Onboarding

It all begins with a nice little chat. Nothing too serious, just a conversation. Well, at least no reputable website design agency directly jumps into pushing their plans onto you. You sit down with the agency, along with potentially the web designers, and they ask you about your brand’s vision and your target audience. The discovery phase is all about getting to know you and your brand. Expect questions like:

• Who is your target audience?
• What features do you need? (Think: booking forms, e-commerce, blog, etc.)
• What websites do you admire?
• What do you want visitors to do when they land on your site?

This makes it easy to formulate a plan to follow and prevent any mid-project U-turns, though those still do happen. Think of this phase as laying the groundwork. The better the brief, the better the outcome.

Planning & Site Architecture

Once your goals are clear, the web designers move into action. They create a map of your website and plan the site structure. To put it simply, the blueprint. It shows how pages will connect and what content would go where. No fancy colours, visuals or content just yet. This step is simply to show how your site flows logically. Consider it the chassis of a car. It cannot run yet, but seeing a strong base is certainly comforting.

Design Mockups

Alright, now comes the fun part. The team starts adding visuals like your brand’s colours, fonts, and style preferences. The website design agency will start to put together mockups so you get to see what your site actually looks like.

This is hardly a first-time approval situation, so expect a back-and-forth and plenty of rounds of feedback. It is a collaborative process, let’s just put it that way. The aim isn’t just to create something pretty, but something that speaks to your audience and supports your goals.

Development & Build

Once you’ve approved the designs, the team will turn them from prototypes and static images into an actual working website. The design team steps back, and the development team takes over. They’ll start coding, set up the required systems (payment gateways, CMS, or whatever you need), and make sure everything works.

Be patient, as this process takes time. Quality cannot be rushed.
The site needs to be fast, secure, and bug-free. A good website design agency will test everything thoroughly, from browser compatibility to page speed.

Content Integration/Creation

With the design complete, content will now replace the “Lorem Ipsum” text used as placeholders. Many companies offer copywriting and SEO services too. If not, you’ll need to work with professionals for this step. Content and SEO are not areas where you want to cut corners, as they directly affect how well your site performs in search results.

Testing, Tweaking & Training

With the big day approaching, the site is tested thoroughly, like an athlete prepping for competition. Everything is checked like loading speeds, image optimisation, links, and mobile responsiveness. You’ll likely be asked to do a final review too. This is your chance to spot any last tweaks or fixes before launch.

Most agencies will also offer basic training if you’re using a CMS like WordPress or Shopify. That way, you can update content or add blog posts yourself down the line.

Launch & Ongoing Support

Here comes launch day. Once you give your final thumbs up, the site goes live for the world to see. Time to say goodbye to your website design agency? Not quite. Many agencies offer ongoing support, and that’s important because maintenance, updates, and future improvements will still be needed.

It’s worth asking the agency right at the start whether they offer post-launch support. Handovers can be tricky, and having continuity can save you stress later on.

Conclusion

While the website design agency does most of the heavy lifting, you, the website owner, still play an active role. They’ll guide you through strategy, design, build, and more, but they’re working off your vision and feedback. A good agency won’t impose, but they will tell you if your expectations are unrealistic.

Remember, creating a website that grows well and lasts is a win for them too. They want to build something great just as much as you do.
So, whether you’re a small business or an ambitious start-up, investing in experienced web designers is a move you’re unlikely to regret.