How to minimize setting for content site

Analytics and other requirements management are like a cancer: all the time they strive to crawl and devour all the available paper.



We do not like it. Therefore, we are experimenting with the formats of productions: user expectations, briefs, functional requirements, so-called technical tasks, and so on.



For example, now it seems to us that for small sites with an emphasis on content two documents are enough.

1. Questions grouped by visitor roles.
2. Life situations, grouped by the same roles.

With these two lists, it is already possible to continue to write content, select functionality, design, impose, adminit a bit, shamanize and run a little.



It is possible to draw designer beauty, too. But we are not on this part, so we will not give a tooth.

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Let us show how these two lists look like for the task “Making the site of our wonder studio / young team / digital – agency” that is close to the heart of many readers.

Questions

1. Customer
   
   
   1. Who are they?
      
      
      1. Is it a legal entity?
      2. Is it a living company or a model?
      3. What other firms do they look like?
      4. How can I understand that the site is not a lie?
      5. Who is their chief?
   2. What can?
      
      
      1. What industry does the company operate in?
      2. What exactly does the company do?
      3. Do they provide N service?
   3. How much is?
      
      
      1. How much are their services in general?
      2. How much does a specific N service cost?
      3. Can I afford their services?
      4. How to get their services cheaper?
      5. Are there any special offers and what?
      6. How to calculate the cost of the service?
      7. Are their services too expensive?
      8. Do they have almost the same, but cheaper?
      9. Where to get their compred?
   4. Are you good?
      
      
      1. What have they done?
      2. How cool are their customers (am I really cool)?
      3. How do their customers look like me?
      4. Do they have clients from my industry?
      5. What does the result look like?
      6. Will the quality of the result suit me?
      7. How predictable and transparent is the process?
      8. Can someone from my reference group recommend this company?
      9. What do they say about them?
      10. How much do these people understand what they sell?
      11. How authoritative are these people in their industry?
      12. How do they know what my clients and I need?
      13. They are generally able to complete what they have come up with?
   5. Why do I need this?
      
      
      1. Do I need what they do?
      2. Does this sound like what I'm looking for?
      3. Can I do it myself?
      4. Why hire a separate company for this task, and not get everything from the developers / designers?
      5. What exactly am I buying?
      6. What should I do with the results of their work?
   6. Where they are?
      
      
      1. How can I contact them?
      2. How can I call them?
      3. How do I write to them?
      4. How can I write the most important thing here?
      5. How can I meet them?
      6. Do they have an office in Moscow?
   7. How can I control them?
      
      
      1. What should I expect from cooperation?
      2. How is your work going?
      3. Who will do this? Why exactly these people?
      4. And if I do not like the result?
      5. What if I don’t understand the result?
      6. How many variants of the result will be offered to me?
      7. What guarantees of a normal result will I get?
      8. Who and how will be responsible for my order?
      9. How flexible are they in meeting my expectations?
      10. Will they come to my office?
      11. Will I be able to communicate with the final performer?
      12. Do they have an idea about project management?
      13. Do I get results quickly?
      14. What if I don't like the performer?
      15. What will I do in case of problems and conflicts?
      16. Will they leave me after the end of the project? Or how?
2. Candidate
   
   
   1. How to get to work?
   2. What professions do you work in the company?
   3. What are their jobs?
   4. Where to send your resume?
3. Competitor
   
   
   1. How would suck?
      
      
      1. Who are their customers?
      2. How are their pricing?
      3. How is their work process?
      4. What does their sample contract look like?
      5. What does their commercial offer look like?
      6. What do their typical documents look like?
      7. Who works for them in the Q position?
      8. What can I learn from them?
   2. Can we become partners?
      
      
      1. Are we potentially partners or competitors?
      2. How can they be useful to us?
      3. How are they better than us?
      4. What can I sell them?
      5. Where to send your partnership offer?
4. Observer
   
   
   1. Where are the living people here?
      
      
      1. Where are they in social networks (both people and company)?
      2. How do I write the most important thing?
      3. How can I complain if I see an error-problem?
   2. Where to find what I once saw?
      
      
      1. Where can I download the presentation from the conference?
      2. Where can I see the video from the conference?
      3. It seems that I read their article - where is she?
   3. What they say they write?
      
      
      1. What is there interesting to read?
      2. What parties will they be on?
      3. What interesting things will happen in the near future?
   4. How do I write about them?
      
      
      1. Where to get the logo and all that for publication?
      2. What do they say about themselves, how are they positioning?

Life situations

1. Customer
   
   
   1. I need a website. I am looking for an artist who is ready to make this site.
   2. I have to arrange a tender. I find different companies, I go to their sites and choose who to invite to the tender.
   3. I have a website, but with him, not all thank God. I want to contact the company and "perplex" my problems.
   4. I need a specific service. And I choose a company that is ready to give it to me for reasonable money.
   5. I heard about the company and I think whether to contact her. I want to get to know each other, to anonymously find out different things.
   6. I accidentally stumbled upon a company and I think that it will help me solve the problem. I want to "talk about it" (as long as I do not know what exactly).
   7. I am going to conclude an agreement with this company. Looking for an underwater rake.
   8. I meet with company representatives. I am preparing for negotiations, find out the details of the life of the company.
   9. I work with a company. And I want to contact them urgently.
   10. I clicked on ads. And I want to understand what kind of company is trying to sell the advertised service for me.
   11. I remember something about this special offer. And I want to use it.
2. Candidate
   
   
   1. I am looking for a job. And I want to work in this company.
   2. I am looking for a job. And it seems that the company is in my profile - so I want to make them happy with my resume.
3. Competitor
   
   
   1. I'm looking for employees. And I want to lure people from the company.
   2. I am a competitor of the company. And I want to lure their customers.
   3. I am looking for partners. And I'm trying to understand how this company can be interesting to me.
   4. I watch how competitors work. And I want to learn from the experience.
4. Observer
   
   
   1. I read about the company. I want to know more about who they are and what they can do.
   2. I was offended by the company. And I want to complain about them in social networks.
   3. I'm trying to figure out the market. And I want to figure out how much ("how much is the site").
   4. I'm trying to figure out the market. And I want to read useful tips on topics that are important to me.
   5. I do not like this company. And I'm trying to dig in to something.
   6. I was at the conference and listened to a speech by a company representative. Now I want to find this performance.
   7. I am subscribed to the company's newsletter. And I want to unsubscribe.
   8. I'm going to a company seminar. And I want to clarify the details: where and when to come.
   9. I think the company is working cool. And I want to learn how to work the same way.
   10. I think the company tells professionally interesting things for me. And I want to follow them - read the blog and social networks.
   11. I see an error on the site. And I want to tell her about the company.
   12. I want to meet someone from the company. And I want to know if they will go to the same conference as me.
   13. I want to come to company seminars. And I want to learn about these seminars in a timely manner.
   14. I want to know about the technologies and techniques that they use.
   15. I write about the company. And I want to download a corporate identity.

We usually look at the list of questions at an angle “Which piece of the site (page, functionality, interface solution) answers this question? Do not need to make this answer brighter? How?"



On life situations - and even easier: “Imagine that you are in this situation. What will you do on the site? ”It may be more correct to call these situations user scenarios, but this is more of a place for a boring holivar than a significant question.



The main magic, of course, is that the lists are both quite voluminous and quite compact. That is, all the specialists who work on the project physically deal with two pieces of paper, and not with a pile of waste paper.



This dramatically increases the readability of the discussion. Yes, and evade important requirements are now more difficult. Yet in plain sight, it is difficult to cut the corner and convince yourself that you can not do a specific page - the user's question will remain unanswered then, and it is easy to notice. You can't fool yourself when the list of requirements fits into one sheet.



The second half of the magic is that nothing else is needed. Absolutely nothing. Especially do not need multi-volume technical specifications with passages like “WWW - the World Wide Web” and “The site should work in browsers A – B – C – X”.



Most of all we like to compare with these lists when deciding the question “Is it necessary to create such a page or implement such a functional”.



Well, in the second most popular place - the situation "Let's understand, is a good site or a bad one." Considers situations and answers questions - good. Ignore - bad. Plus, it is immediately clear what and how to fix it.



Of course, we love and know how to write honest user scripts, work out user profiles, build an object – information model, draw a customer journey map and juggle with some OLAP – cubes of requirements. But all these stories are quite expensive for web projects. And when it is possible without them, we try without them.