A useful website brief explains what the business needs customers and staff to accomplish. It does not need to prescribe every screen or technical component. Give suppliers enough context to propose a suitable approach, expose assumptions and estimate the work on a comparable basis.

This guide covers project goals, page and feature scope, content ownership and comparable proposal requirements. Discuss the relevant requirements through ITZ’s Website Design service.

Objectives and audience

Explain who the website serves and what visitors should be able to do. Describe the business problem behind the project so that proposed features can be assessed against a defined objective.

Name the priority audience and the task the website should support. Replace vague goals such as “more online presence” with questions that can be assessed: can prospects understand a service, can staff maintain branch information, or can customers request a consultation? Distinguish a business ambition from the evidence the website can actually provide.

Scope and references

List the required pages, languages and functionality. Reference websites can illustrate preferences, but specify which elements are relevant and avoid treating another site as a complete requirements document.

Illustration accompanying the guide: How to Write a Web Design Brief in Dubai

List the required pages, languages and functions, then identify the first-release priorities. Annotate references with what you value: navigation, typography or the clarity of a service explanation. A screenshot without commentary leaves suppliers guessing. Record features that are deliberately outside scope so an assumed integration does not emerge near launch.

Build Your Website Project Brief to discuss project goals, page and feature scope, content ownership and comparable proposal requirements.

Content and approvals

Identify who supplies copy, images and business information, and who has authority to approve the work. Confirm review stages and the status of essential content before setting delivery expectations.

State who supplies copy, translations, photographs, product data and approvals. Include any permissions or professional review needed before publication. Assign one person to consolidate feedback and identify who can authorise material scope changes. Content dependencies belong in the schedule, not in an informal list the team discovers after design starts.

Technical and commercial inputs

Record domain and hosting ownership, current systems, integration needs and practical budget or timing constraints. These details help suppliers identify dependencies and prepare comparable proposals.

Record current platforms, domains, external systems and practical constraints. Describe access that will be available without putting credentials in the brief. Ask for assumptions about support, recurring charges and handover. Include acceptance questions for key journeys, mobile operation and enquiry delivery so completion has a shared meaning.

A practical example

Illustrative example: an owner requests a “simple company site” while sales expects CRM-connected forms and operations expects online bookings. A short discovery session turns those conflicting assumptions into explicit requirements. Suppliers can then identify dependencies and suggest phases instead of pricing three different interpretations of the same sentence.

Your review checklist

  • Define audience, tasks and first-release priorities.
  • List pages, languages and meaningful functions.
  • Assign content, review and approval responsibilities.
  • Record systems, recurring dependencies and acceptance criteria.

Frequently asked questions

How detailed should the initial brief be?

It should explain the intended outcome, required functions and known constraints. Unresolved details can be addressed during discovery rather than replaced with assumptions.

References and further reading

Related services and guides

Discuss the next step

Build Your Website Project Brief. Use the form below to discuss project goals, page and feature scope, content ownership and comparable proposal requirements. Share the relevant goals and existing arrangements; do not include passwords, private records or access tokens.

Build Your Website Project Brief ↗

Reviewed and expanded on 15 October 2026. Examples are illustrative; the appropriate approach depends on your business requirements and existing systems.