Prepare these things first and your first meeting becomes useful
Before you contact a website designer, spend an hour or two deciding what the site must achieve, listing the pages you need, gathering your text, logo and photos, checking who controls your domain, picking a few reference sites, setting a budget band and naming one person who will approve the work. With those in hand, the first conversation is about your business rather than basic questions, and the quotes you receive will be easier to compare.
This checklist is written for business owners, school administrators, clinic managers and office heads who are about to get a website made or rebuilt. It covers preparation only. Once proposals arrive, our separate guide on red flags in web design proposals helps you judge them.
Decide what the website must achieve
Write down, in one or two sentences, why you want the website. "Look professional" is a start, but it is not enough to guide design decisions. Be specific about what you want visitors to do.
- Primary action: the single most important thing a visitor should do, such as call, send a WhatsApp message, fill an admission enquiry, book an appointment or place an order.
- Main audience: who visits, for example parents of school applicants, patients and their families, contractors buying in bulk, or corporate clients.
- Secondary goals: things that matter but come second, such as reducing repeat phone questions about timings, showing a gallery or publishing notices.
A hospital that mainly wants appointment enquiries needs a very different home page from a hospital that mainly wants to explain its specialities to referring doctors. Knowing which you are lets the designer put the right thing on the first screen.
Draft your page list and gather what goes on each page
Start with a rough page list
List the pages you think you need on a sheet of paper. It does not have to be final. For a small dental clinic, a first draft might read: Home, About the doctors, Treatments (one page each for the main treatments), Clinic timings and location, Appointment enquiry, Contact. For a coaching institute: Home, Courses (one page per course), Faculty, Results, Fee and batch information, Admission enquiry, Contact.
Collect the content you already have
Most businesses already have more content than they think. Look for brochures, admission prospectuses, rate cards, menu cards, service descriptions from old proposals, company profile documents and answers your staff give to common phone questions. Put them in one folder, labelled by page.
Decide who will write the rest
For each page, mark whether you will write it, someone in your team will, or you want the designer to write it from your notes. Be realistic. Owners who promise to write everything themselves are often the reason a finished design sits empty for weeks.
Logo, photographs and brand files to collect
A designer needs good source files, not a logo copied from a WhatsApp image. Gather these before your first meeting:
- Logo in its original file format (often AI, SVG, EPS or a large PNG with transparent background) from whoever designed it.
- Brand colours and fonts, if they were defined, so the website matches your signboard, letterhead and printed material.
- Real photographs of your premises, team, products or work, taken in good light. Recent photos are better than old ones that no longer match.
- Permission from staff, students or patients who appear in photos to use their images on the website.
- Certificates, registrations or affiliations you want to display, with a clear scan of each.
If your photos are poor, say so early. The designer can then plan for licensed stock images or suggest a short photo session instead of discovering the problem halfway through.
Check domain, hosting and account access before anything else
This is the item that causes the most trouble when it is left until later. If you already have a domain, hosting or an old website, find out now who controls each one.
- Domain: log in to the registrar account yourself. If a former employee, relative or previous agency registered it, ask them to transfer it to an account in your business's name before the new project starts.
- Hosting: note where the current site is hosted, who pays for it and when it renews, so the old site does not disappear before the new one is ready.
- Email: check whether your business email runs through the same hosting. Moving hosting without planning can stop email working.
- Google accounts: find the logins for your Google Business Profile and, if one exists, Google Search Console and analytics. These should belong to a business account you control.
- Social media: list the pages and who has admin access, so the website can link to the correct ones.
If you do not own a domain yet, decide on two or three name options and check that they are available. Registering it yourself, in your business name, is simple and keeps the asset with you from the start.
Reference sites, budget band and deadline
Pick three to five websites you like. They do not need to be in your industry. For each one, write one line on what you like: the clean layout, how quickly you found the phone number, the way courses are listed. Also note one or two sites you dislike and why. This helps a designer understand your taste far faster than words like "modern" or "simple".
Look at a few sites of businesses customers compare you with, not to copy them but to see what information customers are used to finding.
Next, set an internal budget band: the amount you would be comfortable spending at launch and a separate amount per year for hosting, domain and upkeep. If you are unsure what drives the cost, our explanation of website cost factors in India shows which choices matter. Finally, note any real deadline, such as an admission season, a new branch opening or a trade fair, and work back from it. Allow time for your own content and approvals, not only the designer's work.
Who decides, and who looks after the site after launch
Name one person who will give feedback and approve designs. When three partners or a committee each send separate comments, the designer receives conflicting instructions and the project stalls. Others can contribute, but their comments should go through one person.
Also decide now who will look after the site once it is live. Someone needs to update timings, add notices, replace staff photos and reply to enquiries. If nobody in your team can do this, plan for a website maintenance arrangement from the start and mention it when you ask for quotes.
Your one-page preparation checklist
Print this table or copy it into a spreadsheet. Fill in the last two columns before you contact designers, and share it with them when you ask for a quote.
| Item | What "ready" looks like | Ready? | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Goal and primary action | One or two written sentences | ||
| Page list | Draft list with one line per page | ||
| Existing content | Folder of brochures, rate cards, FAQs | ||
| Who writes each page | Marked against the page list | ||
| Logo and brand files | Original logo file, colours, fonts | ||
| Photographs | Recent, good-quality, with permissions | ||
| Domain | Registrar login in business name, or chosen name options | ||
| Hosting and email | Current host, renewal date, email setup noted | ||
| Google and social logins | Business-owned accounts listed | ||
| Reference sites | Three to five, with a line each | ||
| Budget band | Launch amount and yearly upkeep amount | ||
| Deadline | Real date and reason | ||
| Approver | One named person | ||
| After-launch owner | Person or maintenance plan |
How MATROP uses this preparation, and when to wait before hiring
The first step in MATROP's website design and development process is understanding your business, audience, services and goals, followed by a sitemap and content plan. A completed checklist lets us move through those steps quickly and quote accurately. You do not need every row filled in; if you are unsure about pages or content, we work through them with you during the requirement discussion, by phone, WhatsApp or at our office in Ranchi. You can reach us through the contact page.
If several rows are still blank because the business itself is changing, for example you have not settled your service list or branch plans, it may be better to wait a few weeks. A website built on undecided information usually needs to be redone soon after launch.
Questions people ask
Do I need all my website text written before I contact a designer?
No. You need to know which pages you want and what each should say in rough points. The designer or a writer can turn those points into finished text, but they cannot invent your services, prices or policies.
How do I find out who my existing domain is registered to?
Log in to the account where the domain was bought, or ask whoever bought it for the registrar name and login. A public WHOIS lookup may show the registrar, though owner details are often hidden for privacy.
Should I tell the designer my budget?
Sharing a rough range helps. It lets the designer suggest what fits, such as fewer pages at launch or an adjusted theme instead of an original design, rather than quoting for everything and leaving you to cut.
What if my business does not have a proper logo yet?
Decide whether to get a logo designed first or ask the web designer to include one. Building a website around a temporary logo and replacing it later means redoing colours and graphics across the site.
