The site is the face of any company or project, so its creation should be approached with full responsibility. It is important not only to find a good and competent performer, but also to draw up a technical task correctly. A well-developed and detailed terms of reference is a guarantee that the customer and the contractor see the finished project in the same way.
Why is it important to draw up TK?
The main advantages for the customer that the drafting of the technical specification gives are:
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The ability to structure and correctly present your ideas. Many people, contacting the studio to develop a site, have a huge number of different interesting ideas and ideas, but at the same time they cannot formulate them normally. Because of this, the performer does not always fully understand how to implement this or that idea. The terms of reference allows all the thoughts of the customer to be collected in one document and neatly arranged on the shelves.
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Guarantee of fulfillment of obligations. The terms of reference is a kind of contract that specifies what and how the contractor should do. If any of the above is not fulfilled or performed poorly, then the client can refer to the TK.
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Saving. If the terms of reference are well written, then the likelihood of problems and additional spending on their solution is extremely small.
At the same time, technical specification is needed not only for the customer, but also for the contractor. The presence of a technical assignment for the performer gives the following advantages:
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Reduces time and simplifies website development. If a developer faces a clear and detailed task, then he knows how to complete it, so he does not have to constantly contact the customer with various questions.
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Protection for the performer. By and large, the performer must do everything that is specified in the TK, and then his work is considered completed. The terms of reference serves as a kind of protection from additional customer requirements, which were not even discussed initially.
Who prepares the terms of reference?
Since at the first stages the customer knows much more about his project, it is he who must draw up the terms of reference. If the customer has difficulties in drawing up a technical assignment, then the contractor can help him with this for a separate fee. But at the same time, it is necessary to agree on the documentation, which makes it possible to take into account all the comments and requests of the customer.
How is the technical specification for the development of the site drawn up?
A correctly drawn up technical task should consist of the following points:
- Important information about the project… Here it is extremely important for the customer to tell in detail about the company, its features, goals, clients, target audience, etc. It is necessary to tell in detail about the main areas of activity. If the company already has a website, then you need to talk about the problems it has (why a new website is needed). The more information the better.
- Technical features… The main technical features of the project that should be mentioned in the TOR include:
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Adaptability. Whether the site should be displayed on mobile phones.
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Control system. If the customer has independently chosen a suitable CMS, then this should be indicated.
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Cross-browser compatibility. Minimum browser versions to display the site. Some older browsers significantly curtail the site development capabilities, with less than 1% of all users using them.
- Site structure… The structure means how the site should look “in the context”. At this point, it is necessary to specify the main elements using a hierarchical model. That is, the customer is required to indicate the approximate structure of the sections, taking into account their importance. The correct structure of the resource will provide the site with site links, the trust of search engines, and the behavioral factors that are taken into account when ranking sites will only be beneficial.
- Unique pages… These are a kind of site layouts, which are used to create and multiply site pages that have some common characteristics. The time and complexity of the development of the entire site depends on the number and complexity of unique pages.
- Through elements… Through elements are those blocks that appear on every page of the site. That is, users see them regardless of which section they enter. There are 4 main pass-through elements:
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Site header – in most cases contains the logo and name of the organization, as well as contact information;
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Sidebars are vertical columns containing a set of widgets;
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Footer or lower part of the site – contacts, privacy policy, “about us” clause, etc .;
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Pop-ups – appear when performing a certain action, for example, it can be a pop-up registration window.
- Main pages… In addition to unique pages, there are a number of other pages that many customers forget about when drawing up a technical task.
List of pages that are recommended to be included in the TK:
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Error pages. These are the pages that users see if something goes wrong. The most famous such page is the 404 error page.
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Typical text page. This is the template by which the rest of the pages will be created, if they are not unique.
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Registration and login page. It is necessary in cases when the site provides users with the possibility of authorization.
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Search results page. The site’s behavioral factors and sales conversion directly depend on the convenience of providing search results. Therefore, this page should be carefully thought out.
- Functional features. This item includes everything that is outside the scope of the standard functionality. For example, the features of the site may be the presence of certain buttons of social networks, a commenting module (how comments are added, whether they are moderated, etc.), sending notifications by mail, etc. In general, this item includes all the important features of the resource that the performer should know about.
Conclusion
The main task of the customer is to draw up a competent and clear technical specification, which will not change much during the development of the site. Given that many points are directly related to each other, even a minor change in the terms of reference can lead to large-scale changes and cause a lot of difficulties for the performer.
