How to brief a web design agency

A good brief doesn’t need to be long. It needs to answer the questions every agency will ask, so the proposals you receive are comparable and grounded in what you actually need.

1. Who you are and what you sell

Two or three paragraphs on the business, your customers and what makes you different. Include anything a newcomer would misunderstand.

2. Why now

What’s prompting the project? A rebrand, a new service line, too few enquiries, an outdated platform? The reason shapes the priorities.

3. What success looks like

Be specific: more qualified enquiries, online sales, fewer support calls, faster updates by your own team. If you have current numbers, share them.

4. Who the site is for

List your main audiences and the one thing each needs to do on the site. A buyer, an investor and a job-seeker want very different things.

5. What exists today

Your current site, analytics access, brand guidelines, photography and content. Note what works and what doesn’t.

6. Scope and features

The pages you expect, plus features such as bookings, payments, multiple languages or integrations with tools you already use. Mark each one as essential or nice to have.

7. Budget and timing

Share a budget range. It isn’t a negotiating weakness: it lets agencies propose the best solution for what you can spend, instead of guessing. Add any fixed dates and the reason for them.

8. How you’ll decide

Who approves the work, and how you’ll choose: price, experience, approach, chemistry. Agencies write better proposals when they know what matters to you.

A one-page template

• The business, in three sentences
• Why we’re doing this now
• Success looks like…
• Our audiences, and what each needs to do
• What we have: site, brand, content, analytics
• Must-have and nice-to-have features
• Budget range and key dates
• Who decides, and how we’ll choose

Send it to us, or to anyone you’re considering. You’ll get better answers, faster.