What to include in a business website brief

Start with your business, your customers, and the next step you want a visitor to take. Then gather the facts and content needed to support that journey. A short, accurate brief is more useful than a long list of effects copied from other websites.

1. Name the business goal

Write one sentence about why the website needs to change. For example: “Customers cannot tell which of our services fits their project” or “Our inquiry form does not collect enough information to route a request.” These are clearer goals than “make it modern.”

Choose an observable result: a completed inquiry with the right details, a booking request, or a visitor finding a relevant service page. Record how the current journey works so the new site can be checked against it.

2. Describe the customer and the offer

List the main customer groups, the problems they bring, and the services you can deliver. Identify the questions a buyer needs answered: what is included, who it is for, how the project starts, and what happens after delivery.

For each service, supply the facts you can support. Real project examples, screenshots, and a clear explanation of your role are useful evidence. Unverified results, borrowed testimonials, and vague claims create a weaker brief.

3. Plan the essential pages

• Home: what the business does, who it helps, and where to go next.
• Services: an overview and focused detail pages where the offers need different explanations.
• Projects: relevant examples with accurate descriptions of the challenge and build.
• About: the business approach and verified contact context.
• Contact: the information needed to start a useful conversation.
• Supporting pages: privacy information and practical answers that help a buyer decide.

The right page count follows the content. There is no benefit in dozens of near-identical pages written only to repeat keywords or city names.

4. Gather content and access

Collect your current logo files, approved images, service details, contact information, and useful existing pages. Decide who will write, check, and approve content. If photography, copywriting, or illustration needs separate production, include that in the scope.

Identify who manages the domain, hosting, email destination, and any listing or inventory system. Use the provider's appropriate access process. A website replacement should preserve useful URLs with redirects and keep the inquiry route working through launch.

5. Define the inquiry journey

Decide where inquiries go and what the form must collect. Ask only for information that helps the next conversation. Define what a visitor sees after submission, who receives the message, and who is responsible for responding.

A successful form screen is not proof that a message reached an inbox. The launch check should distinguish the email provider accepting the message from the intended recipient actually receiving it.

6. Agree on the finish line

Your proposal should define pages, content responsibilities, features, integrations, review milestones, investment, and ongoing costs. It should also say what is checked on desktop and phone, who approves launch, and who maintains the website afterward.

Search readiness belongs in that checklist: useful page titles, canonical URLs, a sitemap, crawlable content, and search account access. Indexing and rankings are decisions made by search engines after publication.

A brief you can send today