Scranton Web Design

The Creative Cog

The design process at Otreva Designs allows for creation of amazing web design products that help boost user experience and company exposure. Everyone wants their website to perform well; whether that means bringing in more users, getting more sales or getting more sign-ups. Most websites should be functional interfaces that help serve a purpose while looking great. Although many people are focused on what the site looks like, many don’t think about it’s function first. Most users will spend more time on an ugly site that quickly provides them with the content they are looking for rather than a site based solely on expression or beauty. If users cannot find what they want in three clicks, they can likely find it at your competitor’s site. This process helps us focus on the true purpose of the website before moving into aesthetic design.

1. Define goals

The most important step is to define the project goals. What do you want out of your product? What does the website need to do?

2. Conduct company and market research

This is one of my favorite steps. Learning about your company and how it functions is an integral part of the process. Discovering who your customers are and what markets you serve is interesting to us. Some clients learn more about their users after our process because it forces questions that they thought they knew the answers too. How well do you know your customers/clients?

Download our FREE website planner to give this exercise a go.

3. Organize

After collecting data from you, I’ll come back and organize the research, graphics, artwork, and content you provided. The content is put up on an artboard to consult throughout the entire process. Pieces are added and removed. This gives me an overall view of your organization, it’s personality and who it really is. This is the beginning of planning and layout of the design.

4. Design and/or develop

This is where my expertise kicks into gear. A web design normally starts with a company logo and moves outward from there into a wireframe. A mock-up is created with a Visual Interface Design that has the goals from step 1 in mind. After all, a great looking site that doesn’t focus on the main goal is a waste. The VID is composed of a few main building blocks:

The interface design isn’t just about how it looks or where buttons and menus are but more so the interaction between the user and website design or application. It is important to understand what makes a great user interface when developing web products. All great interfaces share qualities that we aim to achieve with every web solution:

5. Testing & performance optimization

Some of the most annoying things on the internet are slow and unresponsive websites. If your website is annoying to you, imagine what your users think of it. Testing and optimization is the only way to avoid annoying websites. I’ll spend time testing different browsers as well as servers to ensure your site is fast, attractive and optimized.

6. Launch

There are two phases of launch that are used. The first is a soft launch. This is where you send the product to friends and family to get their input on the site. This is tricky because everyone will have their own idea and you’ll second guess yourself. DON’T. There is only so many things to test for in step 5 which is why the best way to fully test this is to have real web users who have no idea of how the site works offer feedback. Again use this more for testing, not for design queues. Normally a few small fixes will need to be done in this phase. The second phase or ‘hard launch’ is the final step in the process where your solution is published for the world to see. The most exciting part for sure!

7. Analytics

Studying website analytics data can speak volumes about the website design and functionality. After collecting a few weeks of data, certain areas of the website may need to be tweaked after learning how real users interact. Step 7 is a continuous process.