How to use it
- 01
Answer what you know
Open each part and fill in what you can. A sentence is enough for most answers. Skip anything undecided, since an honest gap is more useful to a studio than a guess.
- 02
Mark the features
For every feature choose must, nice or no. This single table prevents the most common misunderstanding in website proposals, which is two studios pricing two different sites.
- 03
Read the document
The brief appears beside the form as you type. Read it as a stranger would. If the goal is not clear from the first lines, rewrite that answer before anything else.
- 04
Copy or download it
Copy the text into an email or download it as a file. Send the same brief to every studio you approach, so that the proposals you receive can be compared line by line.
What a website brief needs to cover
A brief does not have to be long. It has to answer the questions every studio will otherwise ask in its first call, so that the proposal can deal with your project instead of a generic one.
| Part | What it settles | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Goal | What the site is for and how success is judged | Decides what gets priority when time or budget is tight |
| Audience and actions | Who visits and what they should do | Shapes the structure, the wording and the forms |
| Pages and content | The kinds of page and who writes them | Content is the usual cause of late launches |
| Features | What the site must do, and what it need not | Has the largest effect on cost |
| Design direction | The state of the brand and references you like | Shows how much design work is involved |
| Technical setup | Platform, editing, search traffic and connections | Reveals migration and integration work early |
| Practical limits | Timing, budget range and decision makers | Lets a studio propose something you can actually approve |
A worked example
A joinery workshop replacing a one-page site
Press Load the example in the builder to see this case filled in. The company is invented. Its brief runs to about a page, and three of its answers do most of the work.
- The goalMore enquiries from homeowners, each with enough detail to quote without a visit. That one sentence tells a studio the enquiry form matters more than the home page.
- The featuresEnquiry forms and a connection to the email tool are marked must. A shop, a login area and search are marked no, which removes a large part of the possible scope.
- The contentPartly written. A studio reading this knows to ask who will write the remaining pages and photograph the work, and to allow time for it.
With these answers two studios would propose roughly the same site, and the owners could compare approach, people and price instead of guessing what each proposal includes.
What this tool does not do
The builder helps you write down what you know. It is deliberately modest about everything else.
- It does not estimate a price or a duration. Those depend on choices a studio makes with you.
- It does not store or send your answers. They stay in your browser until you copy or download them.
- It does not replace a conversation. A good studio will still question the brief, and should.
- It is not a contract or a specification. Scope is agreed in the proposal that follows.
What to do with the finished document
Send the brief to the studios on your shortlist and ask each to respond to it in writing. If you would like our response, we read every brief we receive and reply with questions before proposing anything. Send it through the contact page or book a 30-minute call and bring it along.
Common questions
Do I need to finish every part before sending the brief?
No. A brief with a clear goal, the audience and the feature table is already enough for a useful first conversation. Unanswered questions are left out of the document. It is better to send an incomplete brief that is accurate than a complete one padded with guesses, because guesses get priced as if they were decisions.
Should I include a budget?
It helps, though it is your choice. A range tells a studio which kind of solution to propose, in the way a price range helps an architect. Without one, proposals tend to differ so widely that they cannot be compared. If you would prefer not to state it, describe what matters most, and ask for options at two levels of scope.
Is my information saved or shared?
It is kept in your own browser, so that you can close the page and return to it on the same device. It is not sent to our servers, and we cannot see it. Clearing the form, or clearing your browser data, removes it. The brief reaches us only if you choose to send it to us yourself.
How is this different from your guide on writing a brief?
The guide explains the thinking behind each part and what studios look for. The builder is the form itself. Many people read how to write a website project brief first, then come here to produce the document. Either works by itself.