the Coup

How to Review Wireframes

Ok. This might not sound like the most exciting topic. But if you’ve committed yourself to building a better website, hear this: it’s an oft-neglected and absolutely essential step in the process.

A Wireframe is a document created for planning a website’s design. It’s a skeleton that gives us a chance to explore and confirm the structure of our site’s primary pages. Skipping this step risks building a pretty website that can’t do its job.

We want to consider how our audience will use the website. Ask yourself, what’s the most important thing for them to see? If we aren’t careful, they’ll be here and gone in 30 seconds. It’s the nature of the web. We need to deliberately arrange your content and figure out how it will keep your visitors moving toward your goals. After we’ve finalized the wireframe, we can sketch the site’s aesthetics, confident that the design will support our content and not interfere.

A few questions to consider as we develop and revise these wireframes:

- Does our menu present clear options that will move rather than confuse our visitors?

- Have we given our menu enough space? Are the names for each of its items a comfortable length?

- What content sits atop the hierarchy to get the most attention?

- Does the secondary content follow naturally? Do the key links? Will these encourage readers to stay on the site longer?

- Have we provided bold options for our visitor making it obvious what they might do next?

- Does the layout steer the visitors to our goals?

- Have we included space for all the types of content we want the website to contain? Do any pieces not have a sensible place in the site’s plan?

- Is the layout flexible enough for growth? Would there be room to add something next year without disrupting the general structure?

Consider these questions and look closely for gaps in our plan. Choice made here will be reflect on your website for years to come.