It is often said that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line… If only that were true. Imagine getting in your car to drive to work in the morning. Although you have done it countless times, there are many variables that influence the outcome if your arrival. Sometimes, for no reason you can think of, traffic just seems to move at a crawl, or you may, unfortunately, get a flat tire. Although these events may happen, you have contingency plans, alternate routes, a spare tire, and hopefully, road-side assistance.
At CMS Matters, we have adopted methods which provide us alternate routes, a spare tire, and road-side assistance as we work to arrive at the finish of your project on-time. Our thorough and tested software development methodology encompasses the best-practices we have uncovered in our many years of building successful web applications and products. Our methodology is coupled to the workflow available inside our powerful CMS solutions, providing you the smoothest, most intuitive project management experience available.
A typical project workflow is as follows
Communication Session
During this session, we consult with you on the scope and timeframe of the project, getting explicit instructions down to the smallest detail. Agreement between our party and yours on what the function, necessities, and content of the website is the most important factor. We want to know what direction we are headed in, and that you fully understand what we are about to do for your company. All the necessary resources and requirements for the entire project will be discussed and agreed upon here as well.
Session Goals:
- Come up with timetable for the length of the project
- Estimation of the cost of developing the website.
- Summary of your business needs and priorities, and how the website will satisfy them.
- Initial draft of the project plan.
Blue Print Session
At this time, all prices, timeframe, and resources needed to develop your website should be ironed out and agreed upon by both parties. The technical staff will start to work on thinking up the conceptual designs and templates that will later become the foundation upon which we build your website. You will be given general ideas of how we envision your website to turn out via reports and briefs.
Session Goals
- Revised project plan with more details of the process and procedures written in
- Brief on the technical aspects of creating the website
- Brief on the design layout on your website
- Outline of the content to appear on the pages of your website
Visualization Session
Every masterpiece begins with an idea, and every website starts with a spark of creativity from our graphic design staff. To find the look that will best illustrate your company, we envision the translation of your company products and values into a layout and design. Everything, from icons, to the color scheme, will be cautiously thought out and tested to assure relevance, compatibility, and quality. Short term goals such as pleasing visuals and dynamic content are taken to heart, but so are long term goals such as updating complexity and loading time for the website. We want you to approve our prototype before we move one step further in the developmental process.
Session Goals:
- Graphic interface templates and samples
- Flow chart of the overall construction of your website, from the Home page to the Feedback page.
- Content matrix- proposed content for each specific page of your site.
- Testing/Prototype website uploaded on our server for your private review and feedback.
Execution Session
Once the prototype is 100% approved by our client, we then begin the arduous and painstakingly meticulous process of the actual web development. What were merely rough sketches in the previous stage will be turned into fully-realized solutions through both our graphics and programming staff. All the technology we have at our disposal will be implemented into the creation of the final product. From the programming, all the scripting, database development, to the final testing, your website is expertly constructed and seamlessly put together. The spark of creativity will now be transformed to reality.
Session Goals:
- Coding of the website
- Applications integration
- Final design and layout formation
- Finished website
Support Session
Once we reach this final destination, you are presented with your finished website, and we go over the functionality and features within it. We answer any questions you have about operating the website, and can make any last-minute changes or additions at your request. Depending on your plans, we can move forward into a website maintenance program for the website, or simply hand it over to your company.
Session Goals:
- Our client's complete satisfaction!
- Consultation of site maintenance
