Effective Web Planning Series - Lesson 1

The vendor/client relationship in the Web development world is very unique in that it’s an exercise in managing expectations and education. The client (you) holds all of the knowledge of your business and the vendor (us) has the know-how and experience to translate it online.

Too often, there are simple miscommunications that can spiral into major issues that affect schedule and budget. This happens because someone, somewhere in the process was either confused and pride got in the way of asking for clarification, or there was a mismanagement of expectations.

The bottom line is: if both sides are communicating and agree to a plan, then the process should go smoothly. A reality check is that this is software development, scope creep is real and there will be breakdowns.

The goal of this series, based on our ten years of experience, is to clearly define the Web development process and educate the reader, be they clients or vendors, on what to expect from the different phases of development. We will use real case studies to show you what can happen when things go right and when they unfortunately can go wrong.

Before we get into the weeds, let’s have some fun with a typical scenario:

The phone rings. The Web Developer picks it up. On the line is a Client who could say a number of things:

• We need to re-do our Web site.
• Our Web site has not been redesigned since 2001. It is really bad.
• We need a newsletter to send to our customers.
• Do you do eCommerce?
• How do you charge?
• Do you do Flash?
• We want to add social networking. Can you do that?

In our next blog, we will discuss the one topic on the mind of developers as they're thinking about these questions.