What Exactly Is A Website Design Questionnaire?

Simply put, a website design questionnaire is a set or list of questions that web designers ask their potential clients. This allows them to understand the vital factors like the design requirements and business of their soon-to-be clients. It’s similar to a site briefing where you can apply the questions in gathering that resource.

Moreover, it will be smart on your part to obtain all the information you can upfront before starting the web design process. Doing so can give you helpful insights regarding the goals and target audience of your client. This can result in a final deliverable that accomplishes or even exceeds the original vision you and your client have.

However, keep in mind that a web design questionnaire is very much different from various means of obtaining information like email and standard forms. That’s because they are specifically for your clients and include questions relevant to them. Hence, it makes for an easy reference as the website design project progresses.

Questions To Include In Your Website Design Questionnaire

You have to be precise when compiling your list of questions. There are times when you have to rephrase some queries in a different way just to get to the core of what your clients want and understand their objectives. So to make things a little easy for you, here is a list of the most important questions to ask when designing a website.

Do you want to build a new website or have an existing one you want to be redesigned?

This should be on top of your list to help you know whether it’s going to involve creating a new website or redesigning an existing one. Once you’ve determined this, you’ll be able to estimate the amount of work the entire project will require from you.

For instance, the improvement of a current website may only include minor updates. Also, redesigning an existing site means it’ll be easier for you to determine the likes and dislikes of your client. Additionally, you may want to keep in mind the problems for the need to redesign.

How do you define your business in a few sentences?

Asking this question will come particularly beneficial when the business of your client is not that visible from the get-go. What’s more, you can begin to uncover important details, including what motivated them for putting up their company and also their mission, vision, and values.

These kinds of queries will enable you to obtain insight into things that matters most to both your clients and their target audience. Additionally, this can become valuable when your client wants to display the origin story of their business on their site.

Furthermore, the industry of your client can influence some design elements of the project. These include the structure of the pages, essential features to include, and the type of content you need to make the most noticeable.

For instance, if the business of your client is photography, you may want to design a website that features their work more prominently. That means you may need to create something similar to a lookbook instead of a typical website.

What are the products or services do you offer or provide?

Next on your questionnaire will give you a better idea of the products or services your client is offering and business model. What you want here is to see what type of web design is suitable for his brand and the services they want to promote.

There’s more to understanding what a business is offering. As a website designer, you have to dig deep into the business of your client and know how it exactly works. For instance, your client maintaining an online subscription may need you to build a registration form. On the other hand, those selling online may require you to create a few e-commerce functionalities.

So identifying all the feature requirements from the start is a smart move since you’ll be able to know if their proposed budget or timeline is realistic or not.

Who’s your target audience?

All websites have one goal, and that is to be relevant to their target audience. So aside from basic customer demographics like location, gender, and age, you also have to know their industry, job title, company size, and other important details. You may also want to ask if the ideal customers of your client require more knowledge about their products and services or if they are experts in what they’re offering.

What makes your business unique or stand out?

Anyone would prefer a web design that makes them stand out from the competition. One of the best ways to achieve this is knowing their competitive advantage or unique selling point, and making it the core of their site.

It can be anything from free product shipping, offering the most cost-effective services, and so on. When you have an idea of this, you’ll be able to easily incorporate design elements that can provide their site visitors with the best possible impression of their brand.

What features can attribute to the success of your website?

Your client’s answer will greatly rely on his niche or industry, business goals, and target audience. They may want to increase the visibility of their website in Google and other search engines, boost engagement, or increase sales.

One of the goals of your website design questionnaire is for you to have an idea of the problem areas of the business. This will ensure that you will be able to come up with an effective design solution applying essential principles of web design. The answer you can expect from this can be CTA, social media integration, or a simple contact form.

Are you looking to incorporate content marketing on your website?

Content marketing is a crucial deliverable that your client may need, which will also depend on their target audience. Some of the requirements for the final outcome may include articles, blog posts, media, and so on.

Make sure you are aware right off the bat who will be in charge of all the deliverables connected to the site, including content. Moreover, you must know if your client wants an SEO-optimized content. Some clients may also want their site to be implemented with a performance tracking or analytics tool

This question will not only aid you in assessing the scope of the project. It’s also an excellent chance for you to upsell clients. You may offer them SEO and content marketing services on a monthly basis. A question as simple as this can provide you with an opportunity to turn your one-time project to an ongoing contract.

Do you want us to handle maintenance?

Maintaining a website and keeping it up to date will require time. As a web developer, you are aware of this, but your client may most likely not. Hence, your web design questionnaire is the perfect place to know if a client is expecting you to take care of this matter or not.

Some of the most common maintenance and support tasks involve renewing the hosting provider and domain name, backing up the site, and tracking security. Similar to content marketing, this is another effective opportunity for you to upsell.

What budget do you have in mind?

You may already have a little idea of how much the web design project will cost bases on the answers of your client from the previous queries. Nonetheless, this is now the right time to find out how much your client is willing to spend. This can help you determine the extent of what you can do for the website.

Usually, the budget of your client will influence the features and tools you will include or use in the final outcome. For example, it will make a lot of sense to use a site builder for a client with a low-end budget. On the other hand, you can provide a customized solution for those with a higher budget like an extended plugin functionality for CMS.

Moreover, the answer to this can help you determine right away if you are the best for the client and vice versa.

Do you have a target date for the launch of your website?

One of the things that will influence the amount you need to charge your client is the timeline for finishing the entire project. This is especially true if the entire design team has to work extra hours just to make sure you have everything right on schedule. Likewise, you may prioritize this web design project and park others for a while.

So having a timeline allows you to effectively select a date to launch the site and make sure that everyone is on track. It’s also crucial that you carefully considered all aspects before committing to a specific deadline. What you want to avoid is putting the break when you’re already halfway done with the project.