Small Business Website Brief: Checklist & Free Template

Use the free editable website brief alongside this checklist, or read the filled-in example before preparing your own requirements.

Start with the visitor’s task

Choose the main action your site should support: requesting a quote, booking a consultation, visiting a location, or buying a product. Describe the information a visitor needs before taking that action.

A site with five pages and no clear task can be harder to scope than a larger site with well-defined behavior. Decide what belongs in the first release and what can wait. A custom customer portal, for example, should not enter the project as a late addition to a simple brochure site.

Turn page names into requirements

For each page, record its purpose, sections, content owner, and any interaction. A contact page may need a form, delivery to a specific inbox, spam handling, validation, a confirmation state, and a privacy notice supplied by the business.

For integrations, name the service you already use and describe the exact workflow. “Connect booking” might mean embedding a link, embedding a calendar, or building a more involved integration. The cost and maintenance can differ.

Do not send passwords in the brief. Describe access needs, then arrange secure delegated access through the relevant service.

Divide responsibilities explicitly

A custom offer can capture a tailored scope, but check that these responsibilities appear in it. A single phrase such as “complete website” is not an adequate substitute.

Include required subscriptions and ongoing costs in the discussion. The business should understand which services continue after the freelance project ends.

Define review checkpoints

Approve the structure before detailed design, and the design direction before broad implementation. Each checkpoint should produce a clear decision rather than an open-ended discussion.

An illustrative process for a consultancy might be sitemap approval, one representative page design, complete staging site, and launch review. This example does not require a particular Fiverr order type; agree the available commercial arrangement separately.

Keep one feedback owner. If several stakeholders disagree, resolve that internally before sending contradictory instructions to the freelancer.

Make acceptance observable

Test the main visitor journey on a phone and desktop. Submit a form with agreed sample data, check delivery, and inspect error and success states. Test navigation, broken links, and the editing tasks your team will perform.

Include basic keyboard access, useful image alternatives, and readable contrast in review. W3C’s Easy Checks help identify basic accessibility issues; passing a short checklist is not a comprehensive accessibility assessment. If you need a defined compliance target, scope the required evaluation explicitly.

Agree what happens after launch

Specify the handover, backup approach, and any support period. Distinguish fixes for agreed requirements from new features and routine maintenance.

Request a list of subscriptions and renewal owners, editing instructions, and an explanation of access removal. A launched site should remain manageable when the freelancer is unavailable. Treat that independence as part of the project requirements, not an optional favor at the end.

Worked example: five pages with one visitor journey

Fictional teaching example: Alder Ledger is an invented bookkeeping business commissioning a new website. This is not a client case study, actual Fiverr quote, or measured business result. The quantities and schedule below are proposed requirements for illustration.

The goal is simple: let a business owner understand the service and send an enquiry. The fictional owner chooses WordPress on business-owned hosting and needs design, development, content entry, form setup, testing, and launch. The owner supplies final copy, logo exports, licensed photos, and privacy wording before production.

The first release excludes a customer portal, payment processing, appointment booking, analytics, and ongoing SEO. Defining those exclusions keeps “small business website” from becoming a custom software project mid-order.

The fictional budget is capped at USD 2,400 including checkout charges and required first-year infrastructure costs. It is a spending constraint, not a Fiverr market-price estimate. The owner proposes a four-week production window after content is ready, with two-business-day buyer reviews. The freelancer should itemize costs and confirm actual dates in the offer. If the budget is insufficient, revise the scope before ordering.

Decide who owns each dependency

For this example, the owner controls domain registration, hosting billing, the administrator account, and the designated email inbox. The freelancer receives delegated access to implement and test the site. The parties agree the theme and editor before ordering, including whether the owner’s intended editing tasks need a paid license.

The filled-in website template turns these decisions into a complete draft brief. It includes review checkpoints, example device sizes, handover requirements, and a proposed support boundary. Replace the fictional details with your actual business facts.

Do not leave performance as “make it fast.” Before accepting the offer, agree the pages, testing tool, device/network conditions, and target appropriate to the chosen platform and assets. Likewise, a request for basic keyboard and contrast checks does not commission a full accessibility audit. W3C’s Easy Checks explicitly frames its checks as a preliminary review.

Normalize website quotes before comparing totals

These simulated offer shapes contain no actual seller prices or rankings.

Compare the cost of the complete required project. A design-only quote may be useful if you already have a developer; otherwise add the missing implementation and launch work to your comparison. An unspecified item stays unresolved until confirmed in writing. Fiverr’s custom-offer documentation describes tailored scope; availability of particular offer types depends on the category.

Resolve ambiguity with one message

Illustrative message:

Our five-page site needs the complete Home → Services → Contact journey, with the form tested to our designated inbox. We will supply approved copy, logo, images, and privacy wording. Please confirm design, content entry, form failure handling, launch, and editing instructions are included. List licenses and renewal owners, the review rounds, and the proposed dates. Which requirements would need a separate quote?

Resolve the answer before accepting the offer. If a promised capability is missing from the written scope, request the correction. Keep feedback and payment within the platform’s supported process.

Use an acceptance sheet that another person can repeat

Agree who performs restore testing and when; receiving an archive alone does not demonstrate recovery. Check the actual order’s review period and communicate defects before it expires. The example proposes fourteen calendar days of post-launch fixes for mismatches with agreed requirements, subject to the offer. New features, routine updates, and ongoing maintenance remain separate. Use the handover guide to prepare the final review.