Development Process

The most important aspect of any project is the establishment of a Project Team.

Each project requires varying levels of expertise. Determine what project-specific needs you have. Is the site a dynamic site? Is there a large multimedia effort? Will you need specific Web programming or database expertise?

Once the key objectives have been defined we would build a team, which met your requirements, during the life of the project a key contact person will be available to answer any questions you may have and keep you informed of all progress.

Below we have outlined the typical stages of a project.

Planning Meeting

60% of the project time is spent in Meticulous Planning.

Account Manager and Creative Director meet prospective Client to establish their objectives, budget and time scale. At this meeting the Client's needs should be identified, defined and clarified, before the project goes into the design and production process.

Proposal

Account Manager, in conjunction with Creative Director and Technical Manager, produces a proposal defining the scope of the web project, both in terms of production resource requirements and costs. This would be submitted to the Client for consideration.

Commissioning

Account Manager confirms project scope with Client and Contract is signed. Project Manager is appointed and becomes single point of contact for Client and requests details of it for Client organization plus an agreed communication method. Client is given access to a project specific extranet site where status reports and work-in-progress is made available for Client review.

Architecture

Project Manager creates a detailed site map, describing the overall structure, hierarchy of content, navigation and naming of major sections.

Design

Creative Director ensures full understanding of the Client's brand, facilitates brainstorming and ideas generation. Web Designer produces a number of home and sub-page combinations for review by the Client. The Client chooses one of the treatments and agrees that this specifies the website's 'Look and Feel'.

Functionality

Project Manager produces 'Walk Through' screens that show the functionality of the site from a user's perspective. Technical manager ensures that the 'Walk Through' show functionality that is technically possible. 'Walk Through' is made available to the Client who agrees that this shows the exact functionality to be made available to user.

Content Population

The Project Manager, who works with the Client to obtain content from within the Client organisation, collates content and the site is populated. Project Manager advises Client on any content issues.

Programming

Technical Manager produces code that enables the defined functionality.

Testing

Site is now complete and all content, coding and links are manually checked for errors and to ensure site integrity. A person not previously involved in project best carries out testing.

Sign Off

Project Manager agrees with Client that the site is ready to be made live.

Launch

Project Manager Co-ordinates the site launch activity. Technical Manager handles all technical aspects in regard to the launch of the site i.e. domain naming, server set-up and bandwidth issues. The website becomes available to users and search engines and directories are notified of its existence.