We will consider all the stages from the initial idea to the course of implementation.
1. Preparation of a technical task.
At this moment, the foundation of the entire project is laid. Filling out the brief, understanding what the website is for and how it will perform its functions, drawing up the technical specification, which is essentially a guiding star for all groups of specialists.
If the client himself provides an understandable technical task, then it is not included in the pricing, but if the web studio must write down the technical task from the client's "words", then this will be the first component of the estimate.
2. Research
At this stage, a web studio identifies the main competitors in the top 10-20 relevant queries.
A studio is revealing the competitor's strengths and weaknesses and their competitive advantages (we are not here for the sake of art, but for sales growth and money flows).
With all the data, we go to the design clan and that is how we move on to the next step.
In terms of time, technical task preparation and researching takes about 1-2 days.
3. Prototyping
A detailed prototype is a skeleton of the future website. It is a laborious process that takes up a significant part of the design stage.
4. Design
This stage is like coloring pages for adults.
Competent design is the perception of the website, company, or your name in general, i.e., an especially important stage.
Stage 3 and 4 takes about 1 to 4 weeks, depending on the task.
5. Web development
So, we have a prepared design layout, designed by the best minds from Silicon Valley. Now we need to breathe life into this amazing, static picture. At the same time, do not forget that there are hundreds of different devices, dozens of browsers, and a couple of operating systems. And the website can be displayed in different ways in all this variety, slightly, but still in different ways. For the website to stay beautiful on every device and browser, there are front-end specialists who develop websites by HTML, CSS, JS.
Stage 5 takes from 1 to 4 weeks, also depending on the task.
6. Functionality, CMS, CRM, Framework
When the entire visual parts are ready, you need to implement all the required functionality - integration with CMS, connection to payment systems, delivery calculation systems, connection to CRM for sending data from feedback forms, for competent tracking and interactions with the leads.
Actually, the development of the entire system from scratch is called - Frameworking, but more about it in the next article.
This type of work will be enthusiastically taken up by back-end specialists.
Stage 6 can take from 3 days to 2 weeks and several months (if developing a large web portal)
7. Search engine optimization (SEO), setting up conversions, connecting analytical systems
We will not dwell here, this is a standardized stage, which is an important stage for advancement, which you can read about in this article.
On average, it lasts up to 1 week.
8. Testing of the entire project as a whole
A very scrupulous task. From several days to several weeks, the testing team specialists check all the aspects of a website.
9. Launching the finished project
At this stage, we pass out the whole website to the client. The entire project is transferred to hosting, internal configurations are reconfigured, and final testing is carried out.
The terms are average, in the case of small projects, the terms are significantly reduced, for example, a small website can be made in just 2-3 weeks.
In conclusion
An individual turnkey website ordered from a web agency consists of 8-9 stages. Throughout the entire work, several groups of specialists from various fields are involved.
The cost of the project will vary from specific goals, objectives, complexity, and urgency.