The Discovery & Definition Approach to Project Planning

Getting burnt by a project can leave you and your team feeling unmotivated and your agency unprofitable. Using our proven Discovery & Definition approach to project planning you’ll learn how to plan and budget a WordPress project successfully from the beginning whilst keeping both you clients and team happy.

Transcript

1. The Discovery & Definition Approach to Project Planning David Lockie Founder & Director @ @pragmaticweb
2. Hello, can you build me a website?
3. Sure, what’s your budget and timescale?
4. $20k, we need it live next month. I’ll send you the brief.
5. What the agency’s thinking: PayPal WordPress WooCommerce Canvas Theme Some CSS 30 day warranty
6. What the client’s thinking: With a bit of Facebook That thing that Youtube does Search like Google Unlimited lifetime support Amazon Related products like
7. Client brief Client budget
8. Sales Production Weirdish, wild space
9. Sales Production Discovery & Definition Aligns vision, requirements and expectations to bridge the gap between sales and production.
10. Discovery & Definition structure Discovery Definition Playback 1 2 3
11. 1 Discovery Meeting with stakeholders Q&A interview Challenge assumptions Pre-discovery
12. Pre-discovery Set up your project docs Choose your team Create D&D project plan Review brief Transcribe answers from brief to your own project docs 1 2 3 4 5
13. Meeting with stakeholders Get key stakeholders in the room Schedule breaks and be comfortable Use workshop tools like post its and flipcharts Run a retrospective about existing site Sketch some wireframes Post its User journeys Flipcharts User profiles
14. Q&A Interview Ask questions about: 1 2 3 4 5 Functionality Ongoing requirements Business objectives Internal resources Integrations Content Design UX Budget Timescales
15. Challenge assumptions The main thing people do on your site Sign up Buy View Book Device majority view the website on Desktop Mobile Tablet Do you require eCommerce? None Products Services Subscriptions Integrations Social media Data Capture Eventbrite Mailchimp Bespoke Key KPIs or targets Visits Members Transactions Capacity planning Mean monthly traffic Peaks Lots of logged in users?
16. 2 Definition Research Prototyping / feasibility Wireframing & UX Tech specs
17. Research Get to know your client and their customers Go to the market to see if an existing plugin and/or theme combination will suit Look at competitor websites, audit and benchmark Use advertising tools to help profile customers - e.g. Adwords for keyword research, Facebook for profiling
18. Prototyping / feasibility De-risk the tech Install WordPress and throw a default theme and some key plugins together Perform gap analysis against requirements Zoom in on missing components and interfaces and specify / assess
19. Sitemap, wireframes, user journey planning Product Adds product to cart Yes No Continues to checkout £ Product Add to cart
20. Tech spec Types of product: Simple Capacity planning: Lots of logged in users Shipping rules: Download-only Currencies: £ Taxes: EU VAT Payment gateways: PayPal 1 2 3 4 5
21. 3 Playback Present wireframes Demonstrate user journeys Discuss risk register Full project brief & proposal
22. Present wireframes £ £ £ Cart 1 2 3 5 3.2.1 Cart Mobile/Tablet/Desktop /Cart 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. Messaging hierarchy
23. Demonstrate key user journeys £ £ £ Cart £ Product Add to cart Thanks for your order Click here to download your products Success email
24. Discuss risk register Risk Likelihood Impact Mitigation You miss your deadlines High High The go-live date may need to be pushed back You ask for something out of scope High Low Depending on the request, we may need to adjust cost and timings or push the request to a backlog for another phase of work
25. Full project brief & proposal Proposal and brief comprising of: UX Spec Tech spec Risk register Cost Project plan by Proposal and brief
26. What are the outputs? Soft Ways of working Trust Understanding Hard Wireframe specification Technical specification Full project plan & proposal
27. Sign on the dotted line?
28. Tips for running successful Discovery and Definition meetings This is consultancy, bill for it Maintain pace, take breaks Go wide, then deep if time Bring cake Ensure key people attend Tailor D&D to project size
29. Thank you & questions by David Lockie Founder & Director @ @pragmaticweb d@pragmatic-web.co.uk