How to Write a WordPress Website Brief That Gets Better Quotes

A WordPress website brief explains what you need, why you need it and what a successful finished website should achieve. It gives designers enough information to recommend the right approach and provide a realistic quote.

You do not need to understand web development or arrive with every design decision made. A good brief concentrates on your business, customers, priorities and practical requirements. Your designer can then help turn those requirements into a suitable structure and design.

The clearer the brief, the easier it is to compare proposals, avoid misunderstandings and identify costs that might otherwise appear halfway through the project.

Start with the reason for the project

Begin with a short explanation of why you need a new website or redesign. Avoid relying on broad statements such as “the website looks dated”. Describe the business problem behind the project.

For example:

• The current website generates visits but too few enquiries.
• Customers struggle to find important services or information.
• The website is difficult for your team to update.
• The design no longer reflects the quality of the business.
• You are launching a new company, service or product range.
• The existing site performs poorly on mobile devices.

Then choose one or two primary goals. These might be generating quote requests, encouraging telephone calls, securing bookings, selling products or explaining a complex service more clearly.

Trying to make every possible outcome equally important usually produces a cluttered website. A clear priority helps your designer decide what should be most prominent on each page.

Describe your business and ideal customers

Your website designer needs more than a list of services. Explain what your business does, where it operates and why customers choose it instead of an alternative.

Include a simple description of your main audience. Useful details can include:

• Whether you serve consumers, businesses or both.
• The geographical areas you cover.
• The problems customers are trying to solve.
• Common concerns that delay an enquiry or purchase.
• Whether visitors usually understand your service before reaching the site.
• The action you want them to take next.

You do not need to invent detailed fictional customer profiles. A practical description based on genuine enquiries and sales conversations is normally more helpful.

List the pages you expect to need

Provide an initial page list, even if you expect it to change during planning. For a small service business, this might include:

• Home
• About
• An overview of services
• A separate page for each important service
• Case studies or previous work
• Reviews
• Blog or resources
• Frequently asked questions
• Contact
• Required privacy, cookie and legal pages

Think about what a potential customer needs to know before contacting you. Important information should not be hidden inside a single, overcrowded services page merely to keep the website small.

If you are redesigning an existing website, identify pages that already attract enquiries, links or search traffic. Do not assume they can be deleted simply because the design is changing. Google advises website owners to map old URLs to relevant new destinations and use permanent redirects when URLs change. Its site-migration guidance is useful background, although the implementation should normally be handled by whoever builds the website.

Specify the functionality you require

Functionality is one of the biggest influences on scope and price. State what visitors and staff must be able to do rather than asking vaguely for an “interactive” or “modern” website.

Requirements might include:

• Contact, quote or application forms.
• Online appointments or event bookings.
• WooCommerce products and payments.
• Customer accounts or restricted content.
• Email marketing integration.
• Maps, directories or location searches.
• Testimonials, portfolios or case-study filters.
• Connections to a CRM or another business system.
• Different access levels for staff who edit the site.

Mention the systems you already use, including payment providers, booking tools and email platforms. Integrating an existing service may be very different from replacing it or developing a bespoke feature.

Clarify who will provide the content

A website cannot be completed without words, images and accurate business information. Confirm whether you will supply finished content, require help improving existing pages or need everything written from scratch.

Also identify who will approve the content and how quickly they can respond. Delays are common when several people believe somebody else is responsible for supplying a team photograph, checking prices or approving service descriptions.

If writing is not your strength, include professional copy in the project scope rather than treating it as a final task. ThriveWP’s SEO copywriting service can help turn business knowledge into clear pages designed for both readers and search visibility.

Give design direction without prescribing every detail

Include your logo, brand colours, fonts and any established guidelines. You can also share examples of websites you like, but explain what you like about them. It might be the uncluttered navigation, photography, page structure or overall tone rather than the entire design.

Examples of competitors are helpful too. They show the conventions within your market and can reveal opportunities to explain your services more clearly. The aim is not to copy another website but to give the designer useful context.

If you have no fixed visual direction, say so. A capable designer should be able to make recommendations based on your audience and goals.

Include accessibility and mobile use in the brief

Accessibility should be part of planning, design, content and testing. It is much harder to correct fundamental issues after layouts and components have been approved. The W3C Web Accessibility Initiative recommends defining accessibility goals and responsibilities early, with checks throughout a project rather than only at the end.

Ask how the proposed site will handle keyboard navigation, readable text, colour contrast, form labels, headings and image descriptions. Automated tools can identify some problems, but they are not a substitute for thoughtful design and manual checks.

Your brief should also explain how customers are likely to use the website on mobile devices. Someone contacting a local service business from a phone may need visible opening hours, a simple form and a telephone number they can tap.

Record the current technical setup

For a redesign, provide the current domain registrar, hosting company, WordPress access arrangements and details of any important plugins or connected services. Do not put passwords directly into a general project document; access can be shared securely when required.

For a new website, confirm whether you already own the domain and need hosting. WordPress currently recommends hosting that supports PHP 8.3 or later, MariaDB 10.11 or later or MySQL 8.0 or later, and HTTPS. You can review the current specifications on the official WordPress requirements page.

You do not need to choose the technical stack yourself, but asking who will manage hosting, security certificates, backups and software updates prevents gaps between different suppliers.

Ask what happens after launch

A website continues to need attention after it goes live. Your brief should ask who will handle:

• WordPress, plugin and theme updates.
• Backups and restore testing.
• Security monitoring.
• Software licence renewals.
• Performance checks.
• Technical support and small changes.
• Training for staff who edit content.

Do not assume these services are included indefinitely in the build price. If you would prefer one team to look after the site beyond launch, include ongoing management in your quote request. ThriveWP provides WordPress website design alongside hosting and ongoing WordPress care plans.

State your budget, deadline and decision process

A realistic budget helps a designer recommend the right scope. If the budget is fixed, say which requirements are essential and which can wait for a later phase. Hiding the figure does not necessarily produce a lower quote; it can lead to proposals based on very different assumptions.

If you have a deadline, explain why it matters. A launch linked to an event, relocation or seasonal campaign needs different planning from a flexible internal target.

Finally, identify who will approve the proposal and website. Too many late decision-makers can create conflicting feedback and additional work.

A copy-and-paste WordPress website brief outline

You can use the following headings to prepare your first draft:

1. About the business: What we do, where we operate and why customers choose us.
2. Project background: Why we need a new website or redesign.
3. Primary goals: The main results the website should produce.
4. Audience: Who will visit and what they need.
5. Pages: The initial page or content list.
6. Functionality: Forms, bookings, ecommerce and integrations.
7. Content: What exists, what is missing and who will supply it.
8. Design: Brand materials, preferences and useful examples.
9. Technical details: Domain, hosting, existing WordPress site and connected systems.
10. Accessibility and testing: Required standards and important user journeys.
11. Post-launch support: Hosting, maintenance, backups and training.
12. Budget and timing: Available budget, ideal launch date and approval process.

Your first brief does not have to be perfect. Its purpose is to start a useful conversation and make important assumptions visible before work begins.