#Gantt chart project management template how to#

So figure out who has the bandwidth to do the work on time-and what role they’ll play in the project’s success-before you start handing out assignments. Burnout can be a real drag on productivity.

Establish your project team and roles.

Capturing these details before work begins can go a long way in avoiding delays and discontent later. Work closely with your stakeholders to spell out the features, functions, and tasks that need to be completed to deliver a win. Project requirements define what your website should do and/or include. Use those findings to guide your content and design strategies. Do usability testing to see how people interact with your current site (or competitor sites if you’re building a new one from scratch). Develop buyer personas and customer journey maps to understand your audience better. Don’t forget to include users in the discovery phase of your website project. Look for opportunities to set your brand apart and turn first-time visitors into lifelong customers. Research competitor websites, and pay attention to the story they tell and how they’re meeting customer needs. It’s important to understand the landscape of options your customers have at their fingertips.

It enables you to make smart decisions about what features to include, where to spend your project time, and when to call in reinforcement from third-party resources. A budget sets clear parameters around the scope of the project.

This will inform content and design and make it easier to deliver the desired results. Define the overarching goals (e.g., sales growth, lead generation, community education) and what actions you want visitors to take. Everyone involved in the website project should know why it’s being created or redesigned. Here are the steps you’ll want to take to start your web design project off right. Think of it as your chance to set a clear vision and scope for your site, while learning as much as you can about your users and competitors. The initial planning and discovery phase lays a solid groundwork for success. Website projects typically include the following phases, which can be adjusted based on the timing and scale of the project.

#Gantt chart project management template how to#

Now that you know why planning is so important, let’s break down how to create a project plan for your website design. Everyone will be happier with the end result, and it will be a whole lot easier to finish on time and budget. No matter how busy your team or eager your stakeholders are to get started, the extra time it takes to put a clear plan in place is absolutely worth it. And there’s no source of truth to keep scope creep from wrecking your timeline. Writers, designers, and developers will spin their wheels trying to get it right, meaning more time spent on revisions. And confusion over any of these inevitably leads to delays. Skipping a website project plan leaves deadlines, dependencies, and scope unclear. And that’s especially true with website projects that involve multidisciplinary teams and complex scopes of work. You’ve probably heard it said before: Failing to plan is planning to fail. But taking time to create a thoughtful web development plan can make all the difference between stress and success. It’s easy to jump right into a website build, migration, or redesign project without thinking through the details-especially if you feel pressure to deliver the work quickly. Developing a website? Here’s why you need a project plan