Web development consists of several stages like collecting basic information, creating the web site, and maintaining the website up to date and according to latest trends.
The execution procedure may slightly differ from designer to designer but the basic components remain the same.
1. Information Collection
2. Planning
3. Designing
4. Development
5. Testing and Delivery
6. Maintenance
Phase One: Information Collection
The primary ordeal for development of an effective website is to really understand your company inside out… meaning, your vision, mission, services, products, dreams, goal and strategies. Gathering this information acts as a corner stone in designing and developing a website that not only has a great look and feel but is also intuitive and strategic.
So, it goes without saying that the web development company begins by asking loads of questions to so as to understand your specific needs and expectations from the website.
The below would be important things to consider:
• Purpose
Understanding the purpose of your business as well as your site is integral. Do you wish to simply have an online presence or would you like to see your product/service etc.
• Goals
It is vital to understand if your aiming to generate business and money through the website or simply share information.
• Target Audience
The look, feel and functionality of the website are greatly determined by the audience you aim to target through the website. The web application development company would seek information on factors like age, sex, interests etc. Depending on the above mentioned factors, the design and development are planned.
Phase Two: Planning
Once all the required information is collected from phase 1, it is used to strategically analyze and develop a site route map.
By site map we mean a comprehensive list of all the main elements, areas and topics and the sub lists the site would consist of.
This site map pretty much decided the content requirement and planning of the content which in turn is crucial to develop an intuitive navigation system. Your website audience plays a major role in determining this, as the system has to be as per their wave length.
A well structured and seamless user interface creates ease among the audience to mean business.
During the planning phase, your web development company will also guide you to decide what technologies should be employed. Should elements such as CMS be incorporated, use of contact forms etc are typically decided when planning your web site.
Phase Three: Design
Once the planning is done and all set, the next strategic step is designing, as in, determining the unique look and feel of the website from the information gathered up to this point, it’s time to freeze the look and feel of your site.
Prospective customers/Target audience is one of the crucial factors in determining the design. Let’s see how: For instance, a site made for students will have to be designed to look much different than one meant for a retail sale. During this phase, crucial elements such as logo and color scheme are used to convey the message more effectively.
Your web design and development company will work on creating one to three prototype designs of your web site. They would send you an image of how your website would look like, with screen wise mock-ups. Two ways they would do this is either sending an email with mock-ups or providing yoyu the access to their work-in-progress server.
The point is to keep you aligned with the progress throughout the design and development stage. This makes it easy to closely understand and work as per your preferences and making necessary amends. This according to us is the most important stage coz it ensures that the final output is as expected. Once this is agreed upon, the development can begin…
Phase Four: Development
The website is technically created here on, taking into consideration all the graphical elements approved by you and actually brings them up to functionality in creating the actual site.
The home page is developed first, followed by a skeleton for the inside pages. These skeletons’ function as template for the content pages of your site, as it constitutes the navigational architecture for the website. Once this is done, the developer will place your content in the applicable positions.
During this whole time, your web application development company should continue to make your in-progress web site accessible to you to examine and point out any improvements if required.
This is
one of the most crucial stages once after the development is done. The testing
has to be done of the complete functionality that has been developed over the
last few phases. It is also highly crucial to test the compatibility issues
between various web browser and versions.
A good
web design and development company is one which is up to date with current
technologies. The technologies presently being used are HTML and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets)and PHP. The designer must ensure that the code written
is valid as per current standards.
It’s time
to deliver the site on receipt of the client’s approval. The program that is
used to upload your website files on your server is called an FTP (File
Transfer Protocol) program. Most of the web
designers nowadays are offering domain name registration and web hosting
services. On the setup of your accounts, a last run-through is conducted to
rule-out any errors and that it is fully functional.
This
marks the official launch of your site, as it is now viewable to the public.
The
development of your web site does not always end here. The main challenge is to
continually attract customers. This can be done if you frequently update the
content of your website to match current needs.
Most web
designers offer to assist you to update the information on your web site and
offer several maintenance packages at discounted prices.
There are
other ways of doing it on your own. You do this by deciding to have a CMS
website right at the planning stage. This allows you to update your own
content, with CMS, you will have a database driven site for you. You can edit
your own content and The possibilities
are endless!
Other
maintenance type items include regular site backups, WordPress upgrades,
additional plugin installation, etc.
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