I’ve received hundreds of website briefs over the years. Most of them are terrible. Not because the clients are incompetent, they’re usually smart, successful business owners. The briefs are bad because nobody ever taught them what a web designer actually needs to know before starting a project.
The result? Projects that start with excitement and end with frustration. Budgets that double. Timelines that triple. Websites that look nothing like what the client imagined, because what they imagined was never clearly communicated in the first place.
A good brief is the single most underrated tool in web design. It costs nothing, takes a few hours to write, and can save you thousands of euros and months of back-and-forth. Here’s how to write one that will make your web designer love you.
Why most briefs fail
The typical brief I receive from a small business in Spain looks something like this: “We need a modern, professional website. Clean design. We want it to look good on mobile. Budget: let us know. Timeline: as soon as possible.”
That brief tells me almost nothing. “Modern” means something different to every person. “Professional” is subjective. “Clean design” is so vague it’s meaningless. And “as soon as possible” is not a deadline.
Compare that with a brief that says: “We’re a property management company in Marbella managing 40 rental properties. We need a website where property owners can see their booking calendar and revenue, and where potential clients can browse our managed properties. We currently use Lodgify for bookings and need the site to integrate with their API. Our main competitors are X and Y, we like X’s clean layout but Y’s property detail pages are better. Budget: 4,000-6,000 euros. Launch target: September, before peak rental inquiry season.”
That second brief gives me enough to write an accurate proposal in an afternoon. The first brief requires three meetings just to figure out what we’re building.
What your brief must include
Here’s every section your brief needs, in order. Skip any of these and you’re creating ambiguity that will cost you time and money later.
1. About your business
Two to three paragraphs about who you are, what you do, and who your customers are. Not your mission statement from your LinkedIn page, the real version. What problem do you solve? Who pays you money and why? What makes you different from the other five businesses that do the same thing in your area?
This matters because your website needs to communicate these things clearly. If the designer doesn’t understand your business, the website won’t represent it accurately. I once designed a website for what I thought was a luxury yacht charter company. Turns out they mostly did fishing trips for tourists. The entire design direction was wrong because their brief said “premium maritime experiences” instead of “fishing trips for families in Fuengirola.”
2. Goals for the website
What should the website actually accomplish? Be specific. “Generate more leads” is not specific enough. “Get 20 contact form submissions per month from property owners looking for management services” is.
Common goals I see: generate leads through contact forms, sell products or services directly, establish credibility for a new business, provide information that reduces customer service calls, support an existing sales process by giving prospects a place to research before calling.
Pick your top two or three goals. A website that tries to do everything does nothing well. If you have ten goals, you have zero priorities.
3. Target audience
Who will visit this website? Not “everyone”, nobody’s audience is everyone. For businesses on the Costa del Sol, this is often surprisingly specific: British retirees looking to relocate, German families searching for holiday rentals, Spanish small business owners needing specific services, international investors researching the property market.
Each audience has different expectations. A site targeting British retirees needs different language, imagery, and functionality than one targeting Spanish entrepreneurs. If your web designer doesn’t know your audience, they’ll design for the wrong people.
4. Required pages and features
List every page you know you need: homepage, about, services (list each service page separately), portfolio/gallery, blog, contact, FAQ, legal pages. Then list any special features: booking system, property search, client portal, multi-language support, e-commerce, newsletter signup.
Don’t worry about being too detailed here. It’s much easier for a designer to say “you probably don’t need a separate FAQ page” than to discover mid-project that you needed a booking system nobody mentioned. I’d rather get a brief that lists too many requirements than one that lists too few.
5. Content situation
This is the section most briefs skip entirely, and it’s the one that matters most for your timeline. Be honest about where your content stands:
Option A: “We have all text, images, and videos ready to go.” (This almost never happens, but when it does, it’s beautiful.)
Option B: “We have some content from our current site but it needs updating.” (Common and manageable.)
Option C: “We have nothing. We need help creating all content.” (Completely fine, just say it upfront so it can be included in the scope and budget.)
Also mention: do you have professional photography? A brand guide (logos, colors, fonts)? Existing marketing materials that show your visual style? The more visual references you can provide, the faster the design phase will go.
6. Examples and references
Share 3-5 websites you like and explain what you like about each one. “I like this site’s navigation” is useful. “I like this site” is not.
Even more useful: share 2-3 websites you don’t like and explain why. “This competitor’s site feels cluttered and the font is hard to read” tells me more about your taste than ten examples of sites you like.
Be specific about what you’re reacting to. Is it the colors? The layout? The photography style? The tone of the writing? The way information is organized? Different designers will interpret “I like this site” in completely different ways unless you tell them exactly what caught your eye.
7. Technical requirements
Do you have an existing website? On what platform? Do you need to keep the same domain? Are there systems the website needs to integrate with (CRM, email marketing, booking platforms, payment processors)? Do you need the site in multiple languages?
Also: do you have hosting, or does the agency need to provide it? Do you need ongoing maintenance and support after launch? Who will update the site’s content going forward, you or the agency?
8. Budget
I know this feels uncomfortable. Many clients don’t want to share their budget because they think the agency will simply charge whatever number they give. Some agencies will. Good ones won’t, they’ll use your budget to determine what’s achievable and propose accordingly.
Think of it like hiring a builder for your house. If you say “I want a kitchen renovation” without mentioning budget, you’ll get proposals ranging from 5,000 to 50,000 euros. That wastes everyone’s time. If you say “I have 15,000 euros for a kitchen renovation,” you’ll get proposals that actually match your expectations.
A range is fine: “Our budget is between 3,000 and 5,000 euros.” Even a ceiling helps: “We can’t spend more than 8,000 euros total.” This lets the designer scope the project realistically instead of guessing. Check our web design pricing guide if you’re unsure what’s reasonable for your type of site.
9. Timeline
When do you need the site live? Is there a specific event, season, or business milestone driving the deadline? “We’re launching a new service line in October and need the site ready two weeks before” is infinitely more useful than “as soon as possible.”
If you don’t have a hard deadline, say so, but still pick a target date. Projects without deadlines have a tendency to expand until everyone loses interest.
Common mistakes in website briefs
Being too vague about design. “We want something modern” means nothing. Instead: “We want a minimalist design with lots of white space, using our brand colors (navy and gold). Look at [example site], we like how they use large photography with minimal text overlays.”
Describing solutions instead of problems. “We need a dropdown menu with these 15 categories” is a solution. The problem might be: “Our visitors need to quickly find information about our different service areas.” Maybe a dropdown is the answer. Maybe a search function works better. Maybe the site structure needs rethinking entirely. Tell the designer what problem you’re trying to solve and let them propose the best solution.
Forgetting about mobile. In Spain, over 70% of web traffic comes from mobile devices. If your brief doesn’t mention mobile experience, your designer might deprioritize it. Specify that mobile is a priority, or better yet, that you want a mobile-first design approach.
Ignoring SEO. If organic search traffic matters to your business (it does for almost every business), mention it in the brief. “We want to rank for ‘property management Marbella’ and related terms” gives the designer and developer context for content structure and technical decisions from day one. Bolting on SEO after launch is always more expensive and less effective than building it in from the start.
Not mentioning competitors. Your designer needs to know who you’re competing with online. Not just direct business competitors, but whoever is ranking for the search terms you want. Share their websites and your honest opinion of each one.
Writing a novel. A brief should be 2-5 pages. If it’s 20 pages, nobody will read it carefully. Be concise. Use bullet points. Prioritize information. If you can’t explain your business and website needs in five pages, you probably need to clarify your own thinking before involving a designer.
The template
Here’s a simple structure you can copy and fill in:
Company overview: What you do, who you serve, what makes you different (2-3 paragraphs).
Website goals: Top 3 things the website should accomplish (bullet list).
Target audience: Who visits the site, what they’re looking for (1-2 paragraphs).
Sitemap: List of pages and features needed (bullet list).
Content status: What you have, what you need (1 paragraph).
Design references: 3-5 websites you like with notes on why (bullet list with links).
Technical needs: Platform preferences, integrations, hosting, languages (bullet list).
Budget range: Minimum and maximum (1 line).
Timeline: Target launch date and any driving deadlines (1-2 lines).
Decision maker: Name and contact of the person who approves everything (1 line).
That’s it. Fill this out honestly and completely, and you’ll be ahead of 90% of the briefs any web agency receives. Your project will start faster, cost less, and end with a website that actually matches what you envisioned.
What happens after you send the brief
A good agency or studio will respond with questions. That’s a good sign, it means they read your brief carefully and want to understand your business better. Be suspicious of any designer who reads your brief and immediately says “Great, we’ll start next week” without asking anything. Either they didn’t read it or they don’t care about getting it right.
Expect a discovery meeting where they walk through your brief with you, clarify ambiguities, and challenge some of your assumptions. This is valuable. A designer who pushes back on ideas is more useful than one who just executes whatever you say. You’re hiring them for their expertise, not just their ability to follow instructions.
After the discovery meeting, you should receive a detailed proposal that references your brief, addresses each requirement, outlines the timeline, and states the price. If the proposal doesn’t map back to your brief, the agency isn’t taking your requirements seriously.
One last thing: writing a brief forces you to think clearly about what you want. Many clients tell me the brief-writing process itself was valuable because it made them articulate things about their business they’d never put into words before. That clarity doesn’t just help the web project, it helps everything. So even if it takes you a whole afternoon, it’s time well spent.