A web designer needs six things from you before a website can be finished: your business facts, your domain and account access, your brand files, the words for each page, real photos, and the reviews and legal pages that go with them. Gather them into one shared folder before the project starts and a small business site can be live in a week or two. Send them in pieces over two months and the same site takes two months. This is the checklist we send our own clients, with the New Zealand rules on customer reviews and privacy statements that catch people out.
Why does the content decide the timeline?
Because design and build are the predictable part. We publish our own timings: a free mock-up within about 48 hours, and most sites live within 5 to 10 business days of receiving the content. The stage before that, gathering the content, is set entirely by the business, and our post on how long a website takes to build explains that it is the single biggest cause of delay by a distance. A site cannot be finished around blank spaces. What follows is how to make sure there are none.
1. What business facts does a web designer need?
These go on the contact page, in the footer, and in the structured data that tells Google and AI assistants who you are. Get them exactly right once:
- Legal name and trading name. The company name as it appears on the Companies Register, and the name customers know you by if it is different.
- NZBN and, if you are registered, your GST status, so prices can be shown correctly as including or excluding GST.
- Phone number, email address and the hours you answer them.
- Physical address, or the suburbs and regions you serve if you work from home or on site. Say which.
- Opening hours, including public holidays if they differ.
- Payment methods you accept, and whether you quote, invoice or take payment online.
- Social media links you actually keep up to date. An abandoned page is worse than none.
- Qualifications, licences and memberships you can evidence: a Licensed Building Practitioner number, a professional body, an electrical registration. Only what is real and current.
2. What access does a web designer need?
Not your passwords. Every platform involved has a way to grant access to another person, and that is what you should use.
- Domain. Confirm that you, or your company, are the registrant, and that you can log in to the registrar. If a previous designer registered it, sort that out first; our guide to who owns your website explains how.
- Existing website. Admin access if there is a site to replace, so content can be migrated and old addresses redirected.
- Google Business Profile. You stay the owner; the designer is added as a manager.
- Google Analytics and Search Console. Created under your own Google account, with the designer granted access, so the history stays with you.
- Email provider. Whoever handles your email needs to know a new site is coming so nothing breaks when the domain settings change.
Never send a password in an email. If a designer asks you to, ask why the platform's own sharing tools will not do.
3. What brand files does a web designer need?
- Your logo at full size. Ideally a vector file (SVG, PDF, AI or EPS). If all you have is a small image from a business card, say so; it can be redrawn, and if there is no logo at all, ours is a $299 one-off add-on.
- Colours and fonts, if they have been chosen. A brand guide if one exists; a photo of your van if that is where the brand lives.
- Tagline or one-line description of what you do and for whom.
- Two or three websites you like, with a sentence on why. Competitors' sites are fine. This is the fastest way to align on taste.
4. What words does a web designer need from you?
This is where projects stall, so here is the minimum that lets a designer build the whole site:
- A page list. For most small businesses: home, services (one page per main service if you can), about, contact, and reviews. Do not add pages you have nothing to say on.
- For each service: what it is, who it is for, what is included, where you offer it, a "from" price or how you quote, and the two or three questions customers ask about it.
- About page: who you are, how long you have done this, what you are like to deal with, and why you started. Real people, real story, no invented history.
- The ten questions you get asked most. Write the answers as you would say them on the phone. They become the FAQ, and they are the material AI assistants pull from when someone asks about a business like yours.
- What you want visitors to do: call, book, request a quote, or buy. One main action per page.
Write plainly, in the words your customers use. Bullet points and rough notes are fine; the designer or copywriter will shape them. If writing is the thing you keep putting off, hand it over: our copywriting add-on is $49 a page, and it starts with a conversation, not a form.
5. What photos and video does a web designer need?
Real photos of your work, your premises, your vehicles and your team beat stock photography every time, because customers can tell the difference. What to shoot:
- Your best finished work, before-and-after pairs where they apply
- The shopfront, workshop, clinic or van, in daylight
- You and your team at work, if you are comfortable being on the site
- Tools, products, materials: the details that show you know your trade
A modern phone in daylight is good enough. Shoot landscape, send the largest original files rather than screenshots or images pulled from social media, and get permission from anyone recognisable and from clients whose property appears. Google's image guidance adds a small habit that helps search: use short, descriptive file names. In Google's own example, "my-new-black-kitten.jpg is better than IMG00023.JPG." Google also recommends placing images near the text they relate to and using good-quality originals, which is why we ask for the full-size files. We write the alt text and handle compression and sizing. If you do use stock images, keep a record of the licence and who bought it.
6. What reviews, proof and legal pages does a web designer need?
Reviews. Genuine reviews from real customers, copied with their permission, or your Google reviews, which can be quoted or embedded. New Zealand law is direct on this. The Commerce Commission's guidance, quoted in its December 2025 release on The TV Shop case, is that "Reviews must be genuine and presented in a way that does not mislead the reader about the overall message intended by the reviewer." In that case the District Court found that staff had written positive "customer" reviews without disclosing they worked for the business, and that low-rated reviews were withheld from the website, and that this misled consumers under the Fair Trading Act. Google's review policies separately prohibit offering payment, discounts or other incentives for reviews. So: real reviews, no editing beyond trimming length, no cherry-picking that changes the picture, and no rewards for leaving them. Our guide to getting more Google reviews covers how to ask properly.
Proof. Certificates, licences, insurance, awards and memberships, with the documents or the register entries that back them. Anything that cannot be evidenced stays off the site.
Privacy statement. If your site has a contact form, a booking form or a chatbot, it collects personal information, and the Privacy Act 2020 expects you to tell people what you are doing with it. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner's guidance describes a privacy statement as one that "sets out what personal information a company, service provider, or other agency collects and what it will use it for," and says it should tell people that you are collecting information, why, what you will use it for, who you will give it to, whether they have to provide it and what happens if they do not, and that they can access and correct it. The Commissioner publishes a free generator, Priv-o-matic, that produces a statement from your answers; we ask clients to run it and send us the result, or we draft one for review.
Terms. If you take bookings, deposits or payments online, send the terms customers agree to: cancellation policy, deposit rules, delivery and returns. A brochure site with a contact form does not need a terms page, and we will not pad your site with one.
How should you send it all?
- One shared folder (Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive) with subfolders for logo, photos, words and documents. Not a chain of emails.
- Sensible file names. "bathroom-renovation-remuera-after.jpg" rather than a camera serial number, for the reason Google gives above.
- One document for the words, with a heading per page, in the order the pages will appear.
- One decision-maker who signs off the mock-up and the final review. Committees add weeks.
- A definition of done. Agree what "ready to launch" means before the build starts, so the site is not held back for a photo that never arrives.
What you do not need to send
Keyword lists, a sitemap, meta descriptions, colour codes in hex, an opinion on hosting, or a specification. Those are the designer's job. If a designer asks you for them, they are asking you to do the work you are paying for.
Do this today
- Create the shared folder with the six subfolders above
- Drop in your logo at full size and the twenty best photos you already have
- Write your ten most-asked questions and answer each in two or three sentences
- Confirm you are the registrant of your domain and can log in to the registrar
- Run Priv-o-matic and save the privacy statement it produces
Where we come in
When you request a free mock-up, we send you this checklist as a folder template and a short questionnaire, and the 48-hour clock starts as soon as it comes back. Everything on the list that you would rather not do is an add-on with a published price: copywriting at $49 a page, a logo at $299, and the structured data, alt text, privacy page and review embedding are simply part of the build on every plan from $49 a month. If you already have a site and want to know what content is missing from it, the free website audit will tell you.
Frequently Asked Questions
What information does a web designer need from me?
Six things: your business facts (legal and trading name, NZBN, contact details, address or service area, hours), access to your domain and Google accounts, your brand files (logo, colours, fonts), the words for each page including your services, prices and most-asked questions, real photos at full size, and your genuine customer reviews plus a privacy statement. Put them in one shared folder before the project starts.
Do I need to write my own website content?
Not if you would rather not, but nobody else knows your services, prices and customers' questions, so the raw material has to come from you. Rough notes and bullet points are enough for a designer or copywriter to work from. Go Digital offers copywriting at $49 a page, which starts with a conversation about your business rather than a form.
Can I use stock photos on my website?
Yes, under the licence terms of the library they came from, but real photos of your own work, premises and team usually perform better because customers can tell the difference. If you use stock images, keep a record of the licence and who bought it, and never use stock photos of people presented as your staff or customers.
Can I put customer reviews on my website in NZ?
Yes, as long as they are genuine and presented honestly. The Commerce Commission's guidance is that reviews must be genuine and must not mislead readers about the reviewer's overall message; a 2025 District Court decision found that staff-written reviews and withheld low ratings breached the Fair Trading Act. Get the customer's permission to quote them, do not edit the meaning, and do not offer incentives, which Google's review policies also prohibit.
Does my website need a privacy statement in NZ?
If it collects personal information through a contact form, booking form, chatbot or analytics, yes. The Privacy Act 2020 expects you to tell people what you collect, why, what you will use it for, who you share it with, whether providing it is optional, and that they can access and correct it. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner's free Priv-o-matic tool generates a statement from your answers.
The bottom line
A website is built from what you send. Spend one afternoon filling a folder with the six things above and the rest of the project becomes quick and predictable; skip it and every week of delay will be a week waiting on content. If you would like the folder template and questionnaire we use, ask for a mock-up and they arrive with it.