Steps of a redesign

Overview
Goals
Time estimate and team
Content review
Site structure and navigation
Finalize timeline and content
Visual design development
Production and proofing
Launch and maintenance

Finalize your project timeline and content list

Tips for staying on schedule

Late content is a chronic problem. All the project-management books tell you to plan for it. There are, however, steps you can take to avoid or at least mitigate this problem.

• Hire or designate an editor. Some people can't write well and some can't write quickly. The non-writers on project teams generally take two to three times as long to draft copy as someone who writes for a living. Tell your content providers they're not responsible for perfect writing, just for coming up with a rough draft of the content. Be sure to build time in for the editorial process.
• Stress that, at this stage, on-time is better than perfect.
• The above approach is not effective when dealing with perfectionists. Still, you'll want to try to assure these folks that they can improve their work after the site is up.
• Subdeadlines are critical. Have clear, reasonable, weekly or bi-weekly subdeadlines and check in on a regular basis.

Sample Subdeadlines
Week 1	Pages 1-50 due to editor
Week 2	Pages 50-100 due to editor
	Pages 1-50 due from editor to production (HTML)
Week 3	Pages 100-150 due to editor
	Pages 50-100 due from editor to production
	Pages 1-50 due from production to proofing
	and so on

If your department has print publications

Alert them as soon as possible to your new URLs.

Next step: Visual design development

 

 

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