What to Give Your Web Designer Before Design Starts

Give your web designer a clear account of what your business offers, who each page is for and what a visitor should do next. Add the material that supports those answers, identify the person who can approve them and flag anything still undecided. That is a useful content handoff even when the final wording has not been written.

Finished copy may be your responsibility, part of the designer's scope or work for a separate writer. Settle that early. The same applies to photography and sourcing images. A folder full of files cannot tell the team which claims are current, which pictures are usable or who has the final say.

Begin with what a customer needs to know

Choose a service page and imagine someone deciding whether to enquire. What work do you take on? Where do you provide it? Are there limits the visitor should know before contacting you? What happens after they send a request? Give the designer confirmed answers in ordinary language. Bullet notes are fine at this stage.

Put each answer beside its source. That might be the owner's confirmation, an approved service description or a current operating document. If an old brochure says one thing and the team now does another, resolve the discrepancy instead of sending both and expecting the writer to choose.

Keep sales language separate from facts that need evidence. “Friendly service” gives a writer a desired tone. A claim about a qualification, warranty or result needs a reliable source and approval for its use. If that support is missing, leave the claim out of the draft rather than trying to make it sound more convincing.

Agree who writes, checks and decides

Writing and factual approval are different jobs. A writer can make an explanation clearer, while the person running the service confirms whether it accurately describes the work. The owner may approve the overall page without being the best person to check every booking instruction.

For each page, name the person preparing the first draft, the person checking service facts and the final approver. Agree how their comments will be combined. Otherwise, a designer can receive contradictory edits from several people, with no way to know which version reflects the business's decision.

State the status of the material you supply. Useful labels are “confirmed fact”, “draft wording”, “reference only” and “decision needed”. An attractive paragraph copied from an old proposal may still describe a service you no longer sell. Its polished appearance should not make it look approved.

Keep one working version in an agreed location. Link to source records instead of scattering revised attachments through several conversations. Account invitations and access arrangements belong in the agreed secure handover process; passwords do not belong in a content document.

Send images with a purpose and permission record

For each image, explain what it should help the visitor understand. A photograph of the team can introduce the people customers will meet. A service photograph can show a relevant type of work. A purely decorative image has a different job, so it should not be treated as evidence of a completed project.

Supply the best available original file and any brand guidance for its use. Note who created it, what permission or licence allows publication and any restrictions the designer needs to follow. If you cannot establish that an image may be used, mark it unavailable until that question is resolved. A picture found online or stored in an old folder is not automatically ready for the new website.

Give the designer context for alternative text as well. W3C's writing guidance recommends text alternatives that communicate an image's information or function. Explain the meaningful detail, such as the particular service activity pictured, rather than supplying a filename as its description. The final wording depends on how the image is used on the page.

A reference image can still help explain the visual direction. Label it “reference only, not for publication” and say what you like about it. That keeps a discussion about lighting, composition or colour from becoming an assumption that the image will appear on the finished site.

One service page, ready for a first draft

Here is a fictional content packet for a garden-maintenance service. All answers, roles and permission records below are invented to demonstrate the handoff. They are not evidence of a ZXP project or an actual business's services.

This packet gives a writer enough to begin the service explanation and gives a designer a reason for each section. It also makes the missing service-area decision hard to overlook. The page can progress without filling that gap with a guessed list of towns.

Decide what can start now and what must wait

Design can begin with a stable page purpose, credible draft material and agreed responsibilities. The team can explore hierarchy, establish a visual direction and identify where an image or explanation belongs. Use visible placeholders for unresolved content and make sure everyone knows they are temporary.

Before launch, the information a visitor needs to choose the service must be settled. In the example, the service area and enquiry process need approval. Any published claim needs its supporting evidence, and any chosen image needs its permission question resolved. If an optional photograph is unavailable, the team can agree to omit it instead of holding the entire page for decoration.

Ask for the final content review in the layout. Headings, buttons and images change how a message is understood. W3C's writing guidance recommends descriptive headings and meaningful link text. A button should explain the action or destination, and a heading should help someone find the answer they came for. Those checks are part of useful content review, not a complete accessibility audit.

You can use this packet as the basis of a website brief. ZXP's website services page asks for the business, audience, main offer, useful existing content, brand materials and the person who approves decisions. Send what is confirmed, show what remains open and agree who will produce the rest.