Welcome

The foundation of a successful website is a clear strategy. Before we dive into the fun visual stuff, we need to get the logic right. This phase is all about learning about your business goals, gathering your branding assets and content, and defining the journey your visitors will take. We focus on the “skeleton” of the site before we worry about the “skin,” making sure everything just works before we start making it look pretty.

Duration: Typically 1–2 weeks

What we’ll be doing:

• Discovery: Learning about your business, goals, audience, competition and what you actually need the site to do.
• Sitemap: Creating a “bird’s eye view” of the site so we know exactly how many pages we’re building and how they connect. Learn more here.
• Wireframing: Sketching out the layout of your core pages. Think of this as the blueprint—it’s all about placement and flow, not colours or photos yet. Learn more here.

The Goal: Getting the plan for the website in place from the start helps to prevent forgotten pages or important details later on. This upfront planning keeps our project timeline on track and protects your time and budget by getting the foundations right the first time.

Client Milestone: You’ll review the sitemap and wireframes. I’m available to answer any questions you have. Once you’re happy, fill in the feedback form to give me the “thumbs up,” I’ll implement any necessary changes; then, once you’re happy, we move on to the fun stuff (the design!).

Once the structural bones are in place, we focus on the aesthetic layer. Whist integrating your branding, we ensure the high-fidelity page designs align perfectly with your goals. This stage transforms the wireframes into a polished, engaging interface.

Duration: Typically 2–4 weeks

Key Activities:

• Brand Integration: Applying your visual identity, ensuring consistency across all pages.
• High-Fidelity Mockups: Designing key pages (such as the Homepage and core Service pages) to show exactly how the final website will look and feel.
• Design Refinement: UI (User Interface) and UX (User Experience) fining-tuning the interactive elements (hover effects etc), icons, and imagery to ensure a seamless experience for your visitors.

The Goal: To create a visually stunning and cohesive interface that resonates with your audience. We focus on “look and feel” here so that the development phase can proceed with a pixel-perfect roadmap.

Client Milestone: Review the visual designs, to provide one comprehensive feedback list via the form provided. Once the single round of revisions is complete, give the final sign-off to move to the Development phase.

In the development stage, the approved designs are developed into a working website. This is where the interactive elements are built, any necessary tools are integrated, and ensure the back-end infrastructure is secure and scalable. The focus is on transforming the static visuals into a fully responsive, high-performance website.

Duration: Typically 3–6 weeks

Key Activities:

• Setup & Architecture: Installing WordPress and configuring the necessary plugins, themes, and security protocols.
• Core Coding: Building the approved designs into a functional, responsive website that performs across all devices and browsers.
• Functional Integration: Implementing features such as contact forms, e-commerce capabilities, and third-party API integrations.

The Goal: To build a stable, fast, and user-friendly website that matches the approved designs. By the end of this stage, the “skeleton” and “skin” becomes a real life website for your business.

Client Milestone: Access the staging site to review functionality and content. Provide one comprehensive feedback list via the form provided for the final rounds of refinement before we move to the Launch phase.

Before the site goes live, everything gets triple checked! This is to ensure every element performs perfectly, from mobile responsiveness to site speed. Once the site is deployed, the focus shifts to ensuring your new website is indexed correctly by search engines and ready to perform for your business.

Duration: Typically 1 week

Key Activities:

• Quality Assurance (QA): Testing all links, forms, and functionality across various browsers and devices to ensure a bug-free experience.
• Performance & SEO: Optimising site speed and inputting essential SEO metadata to ensure search engines can find and rank your site.
• Deployment: Moving the site from the staging environment to the live domain for the official “Launch Party.”
• Post-Launch Checks: Setting up analytics and submitting the sitemap to search engines to track your success from day one.

The Goal: To ensure a smooth, error-free transition to the live web.

Client Milestone: Provide final sign-off on the polished site and confirm the go-live date. Please note, to ensure support is available, I do not launch on Fridays.

🎉 Launch Party

It doesn’t end once the site is live. To ensure your investment remains secure and effective, we provide a transition period to get you comfortable with the new system. We also offer ongoing support to handle the technical heavy lifting, allowing you to focus on running your business.

Duration: 30-day warranty / Ongoing support

Key Activities:

• Client Training: A guided walkthrough of your CMS (e.g., WordPress), ensuring you feel confident updating text, images, and blog posts.
• Warranty Period: A 30-day “safety net” where we monitor the site and fix any immediate bugs or technical hiccups that may arise post-launch.
• Ongoing Support: For those on a Hosting & Maintenance Plan, we handle recurring updates, security patches, and automated backups to keep the site a high-performing asset.

The Goal: To empower you with the knowledge to manage your content while ensuring the website remains secure, fast, and technically sound in the long term.

Client Milestone: Complete the training session and, if signed up, let the Hosting and Maintenance plan ensure your site stays protected beyond the initial 30-day warranty.

Content Delivery

The sooner I have your text, photos, and branding, the sooner I can get stuck in. Just a heads-up that if these bits hit a delay, our launch date usually has to shimmy back a bit too.

Feedback

To keep us moving at a good pace, I’ll ask you to get your thoughts back to me within the timeframe set for that phase.

Sign-offs

At the end of each stage, I’ll ask for a quick formal sign-off. This just ensures we’re both 100% happy before we move on to the next exciting part of the build.

Office Hours

My core contact hours are Tuesday, Wednesday & Thursday, 9.30am – 2.30pm. If you contact me outside of these days, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

Payments

50% Upfront (Deposit), 50% Pre-Launch.

Scope Changes

We love new ideas! If a request falls outside our initial agreement, we’ll provide a separate quote before starting the work.

Every project is different, so there’s no one-size-fits-all answer — but I’m always upfront about costs from the very first conversation. Once I understand what you need, I’ll send a clear, itemised quote before anything moves forward. No surprises, no hidden extras.

Every project is different, but a typical build usually takes between 7 and 13 weeks. The biggest thing that speeds us up (or slows us down) is how quickly we can get content and feedback from your side. We’ll give you a clearer timeline once we’ve nailed down the planning and strategy phase.

Absolutely. While I’m based in Exeter, I work with clients all over the UK entirely remotely. Most projects run smoothly over email and video calls. If you’re local and would prefer to meet in person, that’s always an option too.

Mainly your brand assets (logos, fonts, colours) and any copy or images you definitely want included. Don’t sweat it if you haven’t got everything ready yet—we’ll walk you through exactly what we need as we go.

We’re all about getting it right, but big changes after the design is signed off can sometimes shift our launch date or the budget. If you have a change of heart, just shout! We’ll chat through how it affects the project and go from there.

Absolutely. In this day and age, it’s a non-negotiable. Your site will be ‘responsive,’ meaning it’ll look just as sharp on an iPhone as it does on a massive desktop monitor.

Yes. We build with the goal of giving you the keys. We’ll show you how to swap out text or add a blog post yourself so you’re not waiting on us for every little tweak.

See our hosting and maintenance plans here. If you’ve already got a domain registered and hosting purchased for your site, just let us know.

The website is yours and yours alone. As soon as we’ve wrapped up the final payment, 100% of the ownership sits with you—we’re just here to help you build it.

Your domain is your digital “address” (e.g., www.yourbrand.com). You pay a yearly fee to keep this name registered to you. Your domain is registered with a “registrar”.

Hosting is the “land” where your website files live. Without hosting, your website has nowhere to stay on the internet. Think of the domain as your address and hosting as the house itself. A fast, secure host ensures your site stays online and loads quickly.

A sitemap is a website’s architectural blueprint, mapping the hierarchy of pages to ensure a logical user journey. It functions both as a visual guide for planning navigation and as an XML file that helps search engines index content efficiently.

A wireframe is a low-fidelity skeletal framework of a webpage that focuses on layout, functionality, and content placement without using colours or graphics. It acts as a visual guide to define where elements like buttons and text sit, ensuring the site’s basic structure and user experience are solid before moving to the aesthetic design phase.

A “Call to Action” is a button or link that tells your visitor what to do next. “Book Now” or “Get a Quote” are common examples. Every page needs one to be effective! Every page should have a clear goal. We’ll work together to define the primary CTA for each section of your site.