Project Flow Overview

Pre-project- Setting Client Expectations

Creating a successful website takes time. Many clients want their projects done yesterday and timeline expectations can make or break a website project.

Determine Your Launch Date- Working Backwards Towards a Goal

One of the first questions we ask a new client is about the launch date. In order to know how much time we have to finish a project, we work the timeline backwards.

Determine Your Priorities?

Here is a simple system you can use to think about the boundaries that will shape your project. There are three key points: quality, cost, and speed. Your project can prioritize any two of these but never all three.

What are your priorities?

Quality + Cost = Affects the Speed

Cost + Speed = Affects the Quality

Speed + Quality = Affects the Cost

Timeline Overview

This timeline is an estimation. Every project is unique and will have its own timeline.

This example is provided to show the breakdown of phases and how a website redesign can take 6+ months.

Discovery Phase 2-4 weeks
Planning Phase 4-6 weeks
Design Phase 6-8 weeks
Approvals of Design Varies
Development Phase 4-16 weeks
Approvals of Development Varies
Final Approval & Launch Phase 1-4 weeks, can vary

Red Flags:

Don’t forget to account for holidays in your timeline.

These time estimates don’t include selecting your designer, developer, or the time involved in bids and the RFP process.

Keep in mind that you may want to do a soft-launch and give yourself a week or so before promoting your new website. This gives you time to fix any issues that may arise.

Discovery Phase

These are questions you should have answers to before starting the planning phase.

Keep in mind that the more information you gather on the front end, the more flexibility/options you will have in the end because you will have planned for all of your needs.

  • What is working/not working for your current site?
  • What is your target audience?
  • What are some examples of other websites you like the design of?
  • What is your approval process and who are your stakeholders?
  • What are your institutional goals and style guides
  • What is the scope and technical specifications of your project
  • What are the current results of your current Google Analytics?

Red Flag:

Failure to scope out technical specifications. Finding out that a key piece of functionality is out of scope or budget can quickly derail a project.

Planning Phase

It’s time to plan out the project, user experience, and what project success looks like.

Keep in mind: The types of content you create now will take shape in the design as things like feature boxes, spotlight stories, testimonials, and marketing-driven landing pages.

In this step you'll determine:

  • The templates and scope of your project
  • Information architecture
  • Website Content
  • Milestones in your timeline

Frequently Overlooked Tasks

  • Creating/curating resources: graphics, photo repositories and videos
  • Research

Design Phase

Now that you’ve gathered all the information you need in the planning phase, it’s time to design. Keep in mind that by planning strategically and using institutional guidelines your individual needs will dictate the design. This is the time when you will discuss things like:

  • Style guides and branding
  • Design elements
  • Navigation
  • Wireframes
  • Mobile design and break points
  • Create and share static mock-ups
  • Ensure ADA compliance, i.e. color contrast, supplementary content types for items like carousels, sliders, etc.

Frequently Overlooked Tasks

  • The actual design time
  • User experience design
  • Round of revisions
  • Approvals/progress meetings

Red Flag:

Too many cooks in the kitchen. There should be one person who has ownership of the project.

Development Phase

Now that you have approvals on all designs, it’s time to start building the HTML/CSS.

Keep in mind that there are also rounds of revisions to account for and approval time for the development phase.

  • Developer builds all of the page types and elements
  • The pages built should follow W3C, ADA and Section 508 standards.
  • The pages should be tested for functionality.
  • At this point, any changes should be based on functionality and not design.

Work you can be doing while your pages are being developed:

  • Setting up forms and business logic
  • Gathering images, video and other multimedia assets (don’t forget to caption!)

Final Approval & Launch

The final approval time between implementation and launch varies. It can take as long as you need to perfect your website. This includes:

  • Building new pages*
  • Modifying existing pages if you’ve migrated content
  • Fixing minor bugs or change requests
  • User testing

*Keep in mind this is where the earlier content development comes in handy. When it’s time to build pages, you already know what you want to say.

Red Flag:

It is very easy to get lost in the phase of the project when the launch date is dependent on you finalizing the website.

Hear Real Life Feedback

Sometimes, it's just better to hear things from people who have been there. We asked some questions, and this is the feedback we got from users going through the project flow.

Observation: Project completely derailed due to employee leaving.

Lesson: Don’t rely on one single person to know everything about your project. Your system shouldn’t break down if one person leaves. Always have a backup plan.

Observation: One department/office pursues a redesign on their own without consulting other areas of the institution. This can lead to multiple areas creating designs that are not cohesive, which can be timely, costly and can ultimately lead to more redesigns in the future for continuity.

Lesson: The institution as a whole should take a top-down approach to the redesign that includes all departments and offices. Don’t piecemeal it.

Observation: The redesign and implementation are finished, but there aren’t resources to build out the rest of the pages and the project stalls completely.

Lesson: Have an understanding that there is lots more work to be done after your site is in OU Campus, even if you migrate, and plan for it.

Observation: Project is on track until the approvals are needed, then it completely stalls because no one will respond.

Lesson: Give people strict deadlines for approval time and warn them ahead of time that approvals are needed. Delays in approval time, no matter the phase of the project, can derail the project.

"During a manual content migration it’s necessary to take a hard look at what pages are essential and what pages can be deleted. Restructuring the sitemap and eliminating pages make the site more manageable and streamlined. This can prove to be somewhat time intensive. Make sure to give yourself plenty of time when considering a manual content migration and or a major restructuring of your sitemap."

"Not understanding the process, how much time it takes for each step and not having all stakeholders involved from the beginning."

"Having the time to devote to working on redesigns in addition to other job duties."

"Unexpected technical difficulties."

"Planning and content creation. Very often clients have an idea of what they want but don't understand the process, how the information should be organized and presented in OU and how long it takes to complete each task."

"New content creation and changes come from different individuals (i.e. faculty & staff) who have other priorities."

"Creation/rewriting of content."

"Unforeseen obstacles like technical difficulties and employee turn-over."

"The implementation process, user-training and learning about the new templates and the new content management system."

Do your research when considering a redesign. Look at other sites and see what people are doing in your industry. Have a solid understanding of how many template pages your site will consist of and what you’re trying to achieve with each one. Familiarize yourself with some basic website design terminology so you can better communicate with your vendors during the redesign process.

Better prepare your content in terms of accuracy and completeness.

Don't rename/move whole directories without the understanding that it will affect your SEO.

"Emphasize that our target date was just that – a target date barring unforeseen issues. Stakeholders pressed us regularly for completion updates; without the understanding of the issues we were facing."

"Dedicate time in my schedule to devote to a redesign where I did not do anything else—i.e. Fridays each week devoted to working on a site."

"Have a project manager who keeps track and follows up. Have a kick-off meeting with all stakeholders to understand goals and expectations. This is an opportunity to explain the process and timeline involved, design and content requirements."

"Keep a tight schedule when it comes to receiving updated content from departments. Meet face-to-face with each department early on, explain exactly what’s needed and implement firm deadlines to receive content to keep things on track."