1. Discovery and Planning

We meet with our client to understand their product range and the sales process. Every business is different, and we need to understand how their customers choose their products over their competitor’s offering. At this stage, we will consider how customers will find the website at each stage of the buying process, and how we provide the information they need to move them to the next stage of the customer journey.

We will analyse competitor’s websites and industry trends and create a specification that will outline the structure and the features that will be required, and a timeline with milestones for each stage of the design and build process.

2. Information Architecture and Wireframing

The next stage will be to plan the content structure – how the products are categorised, how much information will be presented to help the customer make a buying decision, features such as wishlists, comparisons, product filters to narrow down the selection. The functionality can be complex, but must be intuitive and easy to use.

This process will result in wireframes for key pages which will describe the layout and user flow through the site.

3. Design

The design must reflect the client’s brand identity, with colour schemes, typography, and graphics all working together to provide a consistent user experience, vital to build trust.

Design will consider the full range of devices that may be used to access the site, and the site will use a responsive design to ensure excellent performance and ease-of-use across mobile and desktop devices.

4. Development

We will choose the best ecommerce platform depending on the requirements, concentrating on the customer experience but not forgetting the need for easy administration by our client. We ensure the site is optimised for speed, and set up the payment and shipping systems, and any required integrations with external systems. At this stage, the products can be imported, and we can often import product details and images from another system to save a lot of manual work.

5. Testing

We test all functionality carefully to ensure a smooth launch. Example tests may include:

• Functionality Testing: Test all features, including product search, add-to-cart, checkout process, payment gateways, and account creation.
• Usability Testing: Ensure the website is user-friendly, with intuitive navigation and clear calls to action.
• Performance Testing: Test site speed, load times, and responsiveness across different devices and browsers.
• Security Testing: Conduct security checks to protect against vulnerabilities, ensuring the site complies with data protection regulations.

6. Launch

A crucial stage of the process, especially when replatforming from an existing site. We will set up redirects from any pre-existing site, and ensure that everything is in place for search engines to index the site. Analytics will be put in place and tested, including any conversion tracking. The transition to live can be actioned, and we can avoid any downtime.

7. Post-Launch Support and Maintenance

We are all about continuing support – our job is not over when the website goes live!

Our hosting is designed to provide high availability and consistent high performance. We can provide a premium email service for transactional emails – these are a vital part of the customer experience and another key part of building trust. We monitor your site for any downtime, and we offer support for any issues that may occur. We can also add new features as the need arises – the digital marketplace is constantly changing – we ensure that you can evolve to keep one step ahead.