What’s the best sequence for a successful website project?

A successful website project follows a clear, strategic sequence that ensures alignment, minimizes risk, and delivers results. At Clear Digital, we’ve refined our approach over 25+ years of working with B2B brands, and the sequence begins long before design work starts.

Discovery: Building the Foundation

The best website projects start with comprehensive discovery to establish business context, design strategy, technical requirements, and content needs. We begin every project with our proprietary Velocity Workshop™, which functions as a live-action brief. This collaborative session brings together all stakeholders—from both your team and ours—to align on goals, expectations, and project realities from day one.

Discovery answers fundamental questions: Where is your business now? Where do you want to be? And how will this website help you get there? We conduct competitive analysis, establish clear KPIs, identify user personas, and determine how your website fits into your broader business strategy.

Design: From Strategy to Structure

Once discovery establishes your foundation, the design process unfolds in strategic phases. We start with information architecture—creating a sitemap that provides a skeletal structure of how your website will work. Next come wireframes, which show content placement and interaction patterns before visual design elements are applied.

This sequencing is intentional: by presenting structure before aesthetics, we generate focused feedback on content, narrative, and functionality without visual distractions. Once wireframes are approved, our UI design team brings the visual identity to life while UX continues refining subsequent sections.

Development: Coordinated Delivery

We use a hybrid model incorporating Agile methodology, allowing projects to progress through defined stages while enabling continuous improvement. As each design section receives approval, it moves to development, with UX and UI teams working collaboratively with developers to bring each part of the site to completion. We create clickable prototypes and incorporate user testing to optimize the experience before launch.

Communication: The Thread Throughout

Successful projects depend on transparent communication at every stage. We establish clear communication patterns from the first pitch through kickoff, using tools like Basecamp and Smartsheet to provide total visibility into project status, schedules, and accountability. Regular status meetings and documented updates ensure everyone stays aligned as the project progresses.

The sequence matters because each phase builds on the previous one. Invest time in discovery, and you’ll save resources throughout design and development. Rush to design without proper planning, and you risk costly revisions and scope creep. This proven sequence has contributed to our 90% client retention rate and 80+ NPS score—because it sets our clients up for success from the start.