Website briefs tend to come in two sizes. There's the one that's three paragraphs long and says "we need a modern site that reflects our brand". And there's the forty page one with a spreadsheet attached that specifies the colour of the buttons.
And they cause the same problem, which is that neither of them tells the person quoting what the project is really made of. So you get back five quotes that range from four grand to forty, all for something that sounds like the same job, and no way of working out why.
Which brings us to the awkward bit at the centre of this: how do you describe what you want when the whole point of hiring someone is that you don't know how it should be built?
That's what I'm going to help with in this hour. I've been on the receiving end of hundreds, if not thousands, of briefs over nearly 25 years, including some very good ones, and the good ones have almost nothing to do with technical detail.
What we're covering
This is built for the person buying, not the person building.
You'll come away understanding:
What belongs in a brief and what doesn't - including the things people put in that make quotes LESS accurate rather than more.
The bits everyone underestimates - if your brief says nothing about these, expect trouble.
Whether to include your budget - people agonise over this. I'll tell you what I think and why, and what to do if you genuinely don't know the number yet.
How to describe what you want without designing it - the difference between telling someone the outcome and telling them the solution, and why the second one costs you more.
Where AI helps and where it doesn't - it's very good at structuring a brief and very bad at helping costs.
What to do with the replies - the questions to ask, and what it tells you when one quote is dramatically cheaper (or more expensive) than the others.
Who this is for
If you're planning a new site or a rebuild in the new year, this is timed for you. Get the brief right in January and 2027 is a much calmer year.
A bit about these sessions
I'm Lisa and I've been making websites for almost 25 years for people such as BBC Two, Sainsbury's and Aardman. Now I head up 18a, a web development agency based just outside Bristol. 18a was named one of the Nation's Favourite Businesses 2026 by Small Business Saturday, and I'm marking that by running a season of free sessions in the countdown to December.
They're all standalone, they're all free, and they're all built around the idea that you should be able to understand what's happening with the most important asset in your business without having to become a developer first.
Register below to save your spot 👇
Can't make it live? Register anyway and I'll send you the recording.
Hosted by Lisa Freeman, co-founder of web development agency 18a Productions.