Web design process by Rafal Tomal

Rafal Tomal follows the following web design process:

1. Do research and sketch ideas.
2. Create typography style guide.
3. Create color palette.
4. Make wireframes of all pages.
5. Design home page.
6. Design about page.
7. Design … page.

Do research and sketch ideas.

1. Set goals.
2. Research your target audience.
3. Create a sitemap
4. Seek design inspiration.
5. Turn your first ideas into sketches on paper.

Project Planning Deliverables

• Project description
  • What are we building?
• Project goals
  • What do you want to achieve from this thing you are building?
• Target audience
  • Who are your clients?
  • Create an imagined profiled (persona) of a typical user/client.
• Deliverables
  • Clarify your deliverables.
  • Deliver well-organized project files to show professionalism, accuracy, and precision.
  • Examples:
    • Typography style guide
    • Color palette
    • Wireframes
    • Design mockups
    • Assets (design materials, photos, etc.)
    • Information (link to web fonts)
• Project management
  • Define your bigger milestones then divide those into smaller portions until you have a full lists of to-do tasks for each milestone.
  • Sample:
    • Project research
    • Style guide
      • Typography
      • Colors
    • Wireframes
      • Home page
      • Blog page
      • Blog post
      • About page
    • Design mockups
      • Home page
      • Blog page
      • Blog post
      • About page
    • Delivering the final files
• Sitemap

Goals can be:

• Get more clients
• List services
• Present portfolios
• Show client reviews/testimonials
• Build authority through a blog
• Have a way to contact you
• Start an email newsletter
• Preference for a design (e.g., minimalistic)

After design assets are created, they should be passed down to the developer for execution.

References

Tomal, R. (2015). The Essential Web Design Handbook.