When a company decides on a new website, it usually does not ask about colors or technology. It asks how much it will cost, when it will be ready and how much of its own time it will take. All three questions can only be answered once it is clear how the work runs. That is why we describe here, step by step, how we build a website: what happens, what we need from you, which decisions are ahead of you and where projects usually get stuck.
One thing first. Alpinefy is an independent studio from Žilina, Slovakia, and one person leads the whole project. Design, development and project management are three roles, not three people. For you, this means you do not deal with an account manager who passes your requests on. You talk directly to the person who designs and codes the website.
Before you get in touch
You do not need a finished specification for the first contact. A short brief on the Contact page is enough: only your name, email and message are required. Phone, primary goal, budget range, preferred timeline and current website are optional. If you fill them in, the first conversation will be more specific.
During business days, we reply within 24 hours. We get back to you with questions and agree a time for the intro call.
If you want an idea of the price before the call, the Services page has indicative from-prices and a calculator. The base price includes up to five pages in one language, and every extra page and every extra language has its own price in the calculator. It is a starting point, not a quote. You get the quote after the call.
It helps to be clear on three things before the call:
- What the website should do. Bring in inquiries, sell, take bookings, or mainly build trust when someone checks you out after a meeting.
- Who it is for. Who your typical customer is and what they need to know before they get in touch.
- Who decides on your side. Who will give feedback and who will approve the result.
Step 1: Analysis
We start with a free 30-minute intro call. It is not a presentation of the studio. It is a conversation about your business, your customers and why you want a new website.
Then we work through your goals, your audience and what your competitors do. Looking at competitors is not about copying. It is about finding out what customers in your field expect and where you can stand out from the rest.
The most important part of the analysis is agreeing what success looks like for this project. Without it, the website can only be judged on feelings after launch: we like it, we do not like it. With it, a few weeks later you can say whether the website does what it was built for.
What you decide
- the main goal of the website and how we will measure whether it meets it,
- what must be on the website and what can come later,
- what materials you have (copy, photos, logo, price list, references) and what needs to be created.
What you get
A fixed, transparent quote with a concrete launch date. A fixed scope means you know in advance what you get for the agreed price. If you come up with something during the project that is not in the scope, we say so openly and agree whether we add it and for how much, or leave it for later. Nothing gets added quietly.
Where it most often stalls
The most common problem at this stage is the goal “we want everything”. A website that is supposed to sell, recruit staff, inform investors and be a blog all at once usually does none of these properly. It is better to pick one main goal and build the rest around it.
The second problem is when the person who makes the decisions is not on the call. The quote then travels around the company and comes back with changes that could have been raised right at the start.
Step 2: Design & build
Design and prototype first, then the build. There is a practical reason for this order: a change to a prototype is cheap, a change to finished code costs more. In the prototype you see the page structure, the order of the sections and where the visitor is meant to click. That is the right time to say “this is missing” or “our customer doesn’t need this”.
At the start of this phase we define together what should be editable. Some companies only want to change opening hours and prices, others will regularly add articles and swap banners. The website is set up accordingly.
Only what your goals need goes into the site. We are not fans of ready-made templates with dozens of plugins. They often come loaded with extra code that slows the website down and causes update headaches later. We build only what serves the goal from the analysis. The result is a faster, safer website that search engines can read easily and that stays easy to run as the business grows.
What you get
A fully customizable website with a simple admin interface and a short guide. You can update text, headings, subheadings, images, banners, icons and meta SEO settings yourself, without a developer. Meta SEO settings are the title and description shown in Google results. They are among the things worth rewriting from time to time, and you should not have to email anyone to do it.
We agree the scope of editable content in the quote. In the calculator on the Services page you will find it as a separate item, so you can see from the start what costs what.
What you do
You give feedback on the design and the prototype and supply the materials. Feedback works best when it comes from one person and is specific: not “I don’t like it” but “our customer will look for the price first, not the company story”.
Where it most often stalls
Materials arrive late. For larger projects the timeline depends on scope, integrations and how ready your materials are. Copy and photos are the most common reason a launch slips. If you know you will write the copy yourself, start right after the analysis, not once the design is finished.
Feedback from too many people. Five colleagues have five opinions. Collect them internally and send one consolidated list.
A change of direction during the build. If, after approving the prototype, you decide that the website should do something else, that is not a problem, but it is a new decision with its own scope and timeline. That is why we spend so much time on the analysis.
Step 3: Launch
Content and tools go in, SEO and analytics get checked, and the site goes live. Lead and marketing websites are typically live within a few days to one week. For larger projects the date in the quote applies, and it takes scope and integrations into account.
Before launch we go through a checklist. At its core are four points:
- Domain and SSL. The website runs on your domain and over an encrypted connection.
- SEO basics. Titles, descriptions, headings, the sitemap, and making sure search engines are allowed to show the website at all.
- Analytics connected. Measurement works and the data arrives where it should.
- Forms tested. An inquiry sent from the website really arrives where it should.
Point four sounds obvious, but the form is exactly where money is lost most easily. A website that looks great but whose inquiries go nowhere is worse than the old website that worked.
What you get
A live website with measurement in place. We typically connect Google Analytics 4 and Microsoft Clarity. GA4 shows where people come from and how many of them send an inquiry or buy. Clarity shows how they behave on the page: where they click, how far they scroll and where they leave. Together they give enough data for further changes to be based on facts.
Under GDPR, tools that use cookies should only run after the visitor consents. On our own website, both GA4 and Clarity are switched on only after consent, and we recommend the same for every website.
What you do
- arrange access to the domain (at the registrar where you have it),
- decide who should receive the inquiries from the forms,
- click through the website on your own phone after launch and send a test inquiry.
Domain access is a small thing that can delay a launch by days. If you are not sure where your domain is registered or who has the password, find out right at the start of the project.
If you already have a website: moving without losing traffic
Many projects do not start from scratch. If you already have a website, we can take it over, run a technical and content audit and prepare a safe migration plan step by step.
The biggest risk in a move is losing traffic from Google. The old website has addresses that Google knows and that people reach from search, from links on other websites or from bookmarks. If the new website changes these addresses and does not redirect them, both people and Google end up on an error page. That is why we plan the migration to protect your existing URLs and traffic, and we launch the new website with minimal downtime risk.
What you can prepare: a list of the pages that matter to you (for example, the ones you spend advertising money on), and access to Google Search Console and Google Analytics, if you have them. They show which pages bring in the most visits today.
Step 4: Optimization
The work does not end at launch. After launch we watch how the website actually performs and fine-tune it from that. The first weeks show things that cannot be predicted before launch: on which page people leave, which button nobody sees, where inquiries come from and which of them are good ones.
The result is three types of work: speed, tests and new sections. The order is set by real data, not by what someone likes. If measurement shows that most people come on mobile and leave before they reach the form, there is no point starting with a new blog.
We write in more detail about what happens to a website after launch in the article A website is not finished on launch day.
How the fine-tuning after launch will work, and what part of it is included in the price, is always written in the quote, before any work starts.
What you always get
Whatever the size of the project, these rules apply:
- Fixed scope, honest updates and one point of contact. You know what is being done and who to write to.
- A concrete launch date in the proposal. Not “in about two months”, but a date.
- You own the website, content and hosting. No lock-in. If you ever decide to continue with someone else, you are not held hostage.
The last point is worth checking with any provider before you sign. Ask whose name the domain will be registered in, whose name the hosting will be in and whether you will get access. If the answer sounds vague, that is a signal.
Questions to ask before you sign a quote
Whether you have your website built by us or by someone else, these questions will save you unpleasant surprises. The answer to each should be in the quote, or the provider should be able to give it straight away:
- What exactly is the scope? How many pages, how many languages, which features. “A company website” is not a scope.
- What is the launch date and what does it depend on? If the date depends on your materials, that should be written down.
- What will I be able to edit myself? Which texts, images and settings, and whether you get a guide for it.
- How will we measure whether the website works? Which tools get connected and what you will see in them.
- Who will own the domain, hosting and content? And what happens if you end the collaboration.
- Who will I be dealing with? Whether it is a person who works on the website or a middleman.
- What happens after launch? Who watches the website, who fixes bugs and how further changes are ordered.
If you do not get a clear answer to any of these questions, ask again. Vagueness at the start only grows as the project goes on.
Summary: what to expect in the project
- Analysis. What happens: intro call, goals, audience, competitors. What you do: you say what the website should do and for whom. What you get: a fixed quote with a launch date.
- Design & build. What happens: prototype, then the build. What you do: you give feedback, supply materials. What you get: a website with an admin interface and a guide.
- Launch. What happens: content, tools, SEO and analytics check. What you do: you arrange the domain, test an inquiry. What you get: a live website with measurement.
- Optimization. What happens: watching real data. What you do: you read the numbers and decide on priorities. What you get: changes based on data, not opinions.
You will also find the whole process in brief on the Process page.
Next step
If you are considering a new website or moving an existing one, start with a short brief. We will arrange a free 30-minute call, with no obligation and no long presentation. Afterwards you will know what the project would include, what it would cost and when it could go live.
If you would first like to know how your current website is doing, try Webcheck for free. In about 30 seconds it shows what to fix first.
