Project Management of Website Designs

Designing a website is complicated. First, we have to come up with a mockup design. Then we set up a temporary domain, host the site, install software, install additional specialized modules and then customizing it all to the specifications of the client. There is a lot more to it and when you add on the logistics of initiating an Internet Marketing plan, it becomes a very involved process that requires communications and cooperation among our team and the client staff.

Up until recently, we have been able to manage all of our projects internally using shared calendars, email and our contact management system. But as we have grown we are doing more and more projects at the same time. So, we decided to look into project management systems. And since all of our processes (contact management, scheduling, faxes and documents) are already in the cloud, we decided to find a suitable cloud solution.

We were already using HighriseHQ by 37Signals.com for our contact management. So, it seemed like the likely choice. But I had also heard good things about CodeBaseHQ.com. So, we took a look at that too. CodeBase is very powerful but seemed to be geared towards very complex projects. And it was not nearly as easy to use as Basecamp. So, it was an easy choice. We chose Basecamp.

We setup a Template that describes all of the steps involved with developing a website and initiating an Internet Marketing campaign. It was a lot of work to get the template designed and to add all of our current projects into BaseCamp. But it only took a couple of days to get everything working right. Then we invited all of our clients to share the Projects. Now, we are all aware of what where we are in the Project, what needs to be done and communicating with each other within the system.

I highly recommend Basecamp for project management because it helps insure good communications, effective management and that makes for happy clients.