PixelGood.®—Design is in the Details.®

Company name:

Company address:

Suite/Floor:

City:

State: AK AL AR AZ CA CO CT DC DE FL GA HI IA ID IL IN KS KY LA MA MD ME MI MN MO MS MT NC ND NE NH NJ NM NV NY OH OK OR PA PR RI SC SD TN TX UT VA VT WA WI WV WY

Zip:

Company phone:

Primary contact person:

Contact’s title:

Contact’s phone:

Contact’s email:

Current/intended website URL/s (ex. www.mysite.com):
http://www.

Website launch date:
Should be launched by:
No firm deadline

Is this a new website or a “redesign” of an existing one?
Brand new
An update or “redesign” of existing website

Would you prefer that this project be divided up and sections launched in phases to accommodate budget and timing restraints?
Yes
No, all of the content/features of the website need to launch at the same time

Budget range established for this project:
(To have a proposal generated for this project, a range MUST be selected.)

Select Range $2,000 - $5,000 $5,000 - $15,000 $15,000 - $30,000 $30,000 - $50,000 $50,000 - $75,000 more than $75,000

Annual Marketing Budget:

Reflect on why your company wishes to have a website. It’s natural for the initial answer to be “to make money” or “everyone else has one,” but if you never refine your purpose beyond that, your website will be limited in focus. Form follows function. The content and design of your website should reflect both why you are creating it and why people visit it. Start by focusing on the results you want to achieve from your website.

What are the goals you hope to achieve with the website?
Build a database for organization contact/mailings
Build retail or business traffic
Develop a list of prospects/leads
Direct product sales from the website
Establish a web presence, increase marketing and public awareness
Generate advertising revenue
Generate requests for information
Increase positive organization/brand awareness
Increase product/services awareness
Internal communications
Knowledge sharing
Offer service or support
Provide information regarding new products/services, procedure, sales, events
Recruit new employees/post job opportunities
Reduce existing advertising costs
Reduce support costs
Support existing marketing efforts
Survey customers/prospects
Other (please indicate):

What is the main message that the website should communicate?

Briefly describe the products/services the website will be promoting:

How would the website fit with current marketing materials?
Brand reinforcement
Entertainment
Product/services awareness
Product/services sales
Other (please indicate):

How will you measure the success of this project?
Increased website traffic (visitors or hits)
Positive customer comments
Increased media coverage
Increased customer information requests
Increased sales
Other (please indicate):

Who is your intended audience? What are their needs? Your response to these questions will help determine the type of information that your website should provide. First-time buyers, for example, would need a lot of “how-to-buy” information; whereas repeat buyers require more details (specifications, features, etc.…).

Who comprises your external target audience?
Competitors
Current customers
Investors
Potential customers
Potential employees
Professional/trade organizations
Schools/educators
Sight-impaired
Suppliers
Other (please indicate):

What is the age range, occupation, interest and income level of your target audience (i.e. 35–45yr, banker, enjoys ballet, earns $95k/yr)?

Gender (percentage of each if applicable):
Female:
Male:

Where is your audience geographically located?
Locally
Regionally
Nationally
Internationally

Are they already knowledgeable about your products or services?
Yes
No

Other demo/psychographics that would help to further define your audience?

Who is your internal audience?
All employees
IT Department
Management
Marketing/Sales
Operations
Stockholders/investors
Other (please indicate):

The primary action/s the user should take when visiting your website?
Call/submit a form for information
Make a purchase
Search for information
Subscribe to a publication
Visit your location
Other (please indicate):

The key reason(s) a customer chooses your products/services?
Price
Quality
Service
Value
Other (please indicate):

How often do you wish visitors to return to your website?
Daily
Weekly
Monthly
As needed, no fixed interval

Identify the websites of competitors and others that may provide direction on the content, feature set, look-and-feel for your website. What are you aiming for? This part of the profile is very important. The more work you put into it, the more your project will benefit. Find at least three high-quality websites (more is better) that relate to your project in the following categories:

• Branding in a similar situation to yours (new company, new brand, established brand, etc.)
• Target customer appeal
• Colors, look-and-feel, user interface, layout
• Size of website
• Publishing model (frequency, novelty of content, etc.)
• Attracting visitors (newsworthiness, giveaways, impact, etc.)
• Quality of content
• Quality of graphics
• Functionality (actions visitors can take on websites)
• Community, special features, responsiveness, or other categories important to your project
• Overall favorite websites (what do you like about them?)

Use a few adjectives to describe the feeling consumers should receive from your project (i.e. prestigious, friendly, corporate, fun, forward thinking, innovative, cutting edge, etc.):

How is your company currently perceived?

Do you wish to portray this same perception in your website?
Yes
No, we’d like to be perceived as:

How does your company differentiate itself from competitors?

Why should customers choose your company’s products and/or services over others?

What is the look and feel that you feel is relevant for your website? List examples of websites, magazines, publications, artistic works, etc. Do you have a specific genre, culture, or style in mind?

Please visit a few partner/competitor websites and briefly state what you think does/n’t work about their overall website strategy and offerings.

Website 1
URL:
Comments:

Website 2
URL:
Comments:

Website 3
URL:
Comments:

List any general websites that you find compelling, not necessarily industry-related. What specifically do you like about these websites?

Website 1
URL:
Comments:

Website 2
URL:
Comments:

Website 3
URL:
Comments:

Information or content forms the basis of every successful website. An attractive, easy to navigate, fast loading website that lacks good content may win awards, but won’t produce results. Your website will succeed to the extent that your information and your audience’s needs overlap. As you review the websites you have visited, analyze how they meet the needs of their visitors.

Do you have existing assets that should be used with this website?
None, all new visuals, copy and multimedia need to be created
Copy to repurpose for the campaign (i.e. from brochures, pamphlets, annual reports, publications, etc.)
Graphics/icons
Illustrations
Logo(s)
Photography (product shots)
QVTR or other 360-degree viewing content
Sounds or music (MP3, Windows Media, etc.) please indicate below:

Video (Podcasts, QuickTime, Real Video, Windows Media) indicate below:

Other (please indicate):

Do you have existing materials, which show branding elements, colors or styles, which this campaign should be consistent?
Yes (please indicate):
No, our campaign has not been visually defined at all
We have some, but would like to “redefine” our image at this time

Which informational elements should your website have?
About us
Contact us
Frequently asked questions (FAQ)
Legal statement/disclaimer
Map to facilities
News or latest happenings within organization
Postal/street address
Privacy statement
Staff pages
Other (please indicate below):

Which functional elements will your website require?
Content management system (CMS) to allow for website updates
Credit card/payment transactions
Database integration (i.e. FileMaker, Access, SQL Server) please indicate below:

Discussion forums
Downloadable items (i.e. images, PDFs, applications, etc.) please indicate below:

E-commerce/shopping cart
Email newsletter sign-up and distribution
Forms (i.e. contact us, feedback, information collection, ordering, registration), please indicate below:

Live chat
Member logins, password protected secure areas
Personalization of content based on visitor preference
Search function
Survey/polls/voting tools
Other (please indicate below):

Does your Web campaign need to be 508 compliant/accessible to the handicapped or usable on PDAs or mobile devices?
Yes, should be compliant with:
No

Where will content be generated from?
Our staff will generate original content to be written for the website
Repurposed, existing copy
We have a consultant who will be generating content—consultant name/contact Info:

Other (please indicate):

How often will new content be added?
Daily
Weekly
Monthly
As needed, no fixed interval

Who will update the ongoing content?
We will
We request your company to update (will require a separate maintenance agreement)
We have a consultant who will update—onsultant name/contact info:

Sketch out the basic areas of your website and what you expect to include. You can type right into the boxes and define the names of your website sections and secondary links/sections.

• = Section   • = Links within section

If more space is needed for additional sections or links, please indicate so in “Part 11: Notes/Comments.”

PixelGood® Web projects are designed to be viewed in modern Web browsers (i.e. Internet Explorer 7+, Chrome, Firefox, Safari). Is there a specific browser/version that your website should be specifically targeted?

To which display/screen resolution would you like your campaign designed?
Unsure, please advise
800x600 pixels
960x780 pixels
1024x768 pixels
Other (please indicate):

Please indicate which features you envision your campaign offering:
Unsure, please advise
Animation (flash, animated GIFs, etc.)
Database-driven pages
Download areas
E-commerce
Forms
QVTR or other 360-degree viewing content
Sounds or music (MP3, Windows Media, etc.) please indicate below:

Video (Podcasts, QuickTime, Real Video, Windows Media) please indicate:

Other (please indicate):

Who will update these ongoing features?
We will
We request your company to update (will require a separate maintenance agreement)
We have a consultant who will update—consultant name/contact info:

Who will serve/host the website?
Our website isn’t currently hosted, please advise
We will host internally
We request your company to find a host
We have a third-party hosting firm. Hosting company/ISP:

What is the host account URL/website, FTP address, user name and password for this website? (This is only necessary if you wish PixelGood® to upload the website to your host’s server)

No matter how appropriate your website’s design, its success depends on an ability to attract first-time and repeat visitors. Promoting your website starts during development, with attention to search engine requirements from the outset.

Website description (not to exceed 200 characters, i.e. “A design consultancy based in the metropolitan Washington D.C. area, PixelGood® specializes in the visual disciplines of identity, graphic and Web design.”):


characters left

20–30 key words or phrases (i.e. widgets, “widgets that work”):

Do you require search engine marketing services?
Yes, we request your company to handle these efforts
No, we will handle this internally
No, we have a consultant who will handle these efforts—consultant name/contact info:

Which search engines/directories would you like to be listed in?
Google
Yahoo
Overture
Specialty or industry–specific directories (please indicate below):

How often will the search engine rankings be evaluated?
Monthly
Quarterly
Annually
Other (please indicate):

Do you have an existing or planned strategy in mind to promote your website? If so, please describe. If not, would you be interested in investigating a strategy to promote your website in other media beyond the Internet?

A website is a process, not a goal. Stale, tired websites are an invitation to failure. Inaccurate or out-of-date information will result in a loss of visitors to another one that promises more relevant content.

Will there be content you want on the website that will need to be updated on a regular basis? If so, would you or someone on your staff be committed to the content development (copywriting, image creation, etc.) and approvals for the website?
Yes—If so, how often and what type of content is it?

No

How do you anticipate your company supporting the website (updating information, responding to inquiries, etc.)? Do you have someone on staff who will be able to keep the website updated or will you be in need of outside maintenance service? If internal maintenance is a possibility, what level of knowledge does this person have with HTML formatting of Web pages?
We will keep the website updated and/or already have a maintenance service. Maintenance services provided by:

We require an outside maintenance service, please advise

Which content is likely to go out of date?
Features
Homepage copy
News, new happenings
Other (please indicate):

How quickly will content go out of date?
Daily
Weekly
Monthly
Not timely

How often will website links be reviewed for accuracy?
Monthly
Quarterly
Annually
As needed, no fixed interval

What is the budget for hosting and maintenance of the website?

Briefly, what are your marketing goals, short and long term?

How will this website help to meet your goals?

Do you require a new logo, identity system, collateral or other communications materials to be designed in addition to this website?
Collateral (please indicate):
Logo and/or identity standards manual
Stationery (letterhead, business cards, envelopes, etc.)
Other (please indicate):

Why are you considering working with PixelGood® at this time and how did you hear about the firm?

This space may be used for notes or comments. Please provide any additional information or considerations for working on your website.

This space may be used to provide feedback on your use of this planning tool. Did you find it helpful in planning out your website? Is there something that you think should have been included but didn’t find? Any suggestions on how it may be improved?