In order to provide you with high quality services Uncut Design follows numerous steps in the web site design and development process. From gathering initial information, to the creation of your web site, and finally to maintenance to keep your web site up to date and fresh.

Here are the steps Uncut Design follows

Phase One: Gathering Information Required

The first step in designing a successful web site is to gather information. Many things need to be taken into consideration when we design the look and feel of your site, so we first ask a lot of questions to help us understand your business and your needs in a web site.

Basic things to consider are:

The Purpose of your Website

Is it provide information, sell products...?

Website Goals

What do you hope to accomplish by having this website?

Target Audience

Is there a specific group of people that will help you reach your goals?
There is no limits here, perhaps you want to target kids or teenagers, or maybe adults.

Content

What kind of information will the target audience be looking for on your site? Are they looking for specific information, a particular product or service, buying a house, online shopping…?

Phase Two: Website Planning

Using the information gathered from phase one, we put together a plan for your web site. Here we develop a site map - a list of all main topic areas of the site, as well as sub-topics (if applicable). This gives us a guide as to what content will be on the site, and is essential to developing a consistent, easy to understand navigational system. This is also the point where we decide what technologies should be implemented - interactive forms, eCommerce, flash, etc.

Phase Three: Website Design

Drawing from the information gathered up to this point, we determine the look and feel of the site. Target audience is one of the key factors taken into consideration here. A site aimed at teenagers, for example, will look much different than one meant for a financial institution. We also incorporate elements such as the company logo or colors to help strengthen the identity of your company on the web site.

Once we’ve designed a prototype, you are given access to the Client Studio, which is a secure area of our web site. The Client Studio allows you to view your project throughout the design and development stages. Most importantly, it gives you the opportunity to express your likes and dislikes on the site design.

In this phase, communication is crucial to ensure that the final web site will match your needs and taking into consideration your personal visual requirements such as colour, layout, etc.

We work together in this way, exchanging ideas, until we arrive at the final design for the site. Then development can begin…

Phase Four: Website Development

This is where the web site itself is created. Uncut Design will then take all of the individual graphic elements from the prototype and use them to create the actual, functional website.

The coding is implemented during this phase, the code I use at Uncut Design varies depending on your individual needs. It can be one or more of the following server-side programming languages: HTML, PHP, Perl, ASP, ASP.NET, Java Script, Flash, C+ or many others. The programming of the database is also part of this phase, for those website designs that require an actual database. When talking about databases Uncut Design relies on MySQL.

Uncut Design will only use high-quality programs and languages, some of the programs I rely on are: Macromedia Dreamweaver, Flash and Fireworks (Now part of the Adobe Family), and Adobe Photoshop and Freehand and others.


Phase Five: Website Testing and Delivery

At this point, Uncut Design attend to the final details and test your web site in all the most common web browsers such as Internet Explorer, Opera and Mozilla Firefo and Netscape. I would like to mention that Mozilla Firefox is the most complete and functional web broser available nowadays and if you have not tried this great product, you should read the small article I wrote about it.

Read about Mozilla Firefox

Again, even though I plan most things around Mozilla Firefox the website design I build for you will be supported all new web browsers.

During this phase, I also test all the links, electronic contact forms and do some minor adjustments if needed.

Once Uncut Design receives your final approval, it is time to deliver the site. We use an FTP (FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol, just in case you are wondering!) program to upload the files to Uncut Design's web hosting server. Here I will personally  test the your website again just to make sure everything is working the way is supposed to work, and to make sure all the files were transfer correctly. 

This marks the official launch of your site, as it is now viewable to the public.

Phase Six: Maintenance

The development of your web site is not necessarily over, though. One way to bring repeat visitors to your site is to offer new content or information on a regular basis. If this interests you, I will be more than happy to continue working with you to update the information on your web site on a regular basis, I have several Website Maintenance Packages available.

 

Keywords: uncut design  information  website design  website development  website goals  target audience  website planning