Website prototype

In web design prototype — is a simple mockup scheme of the website in the form of a sketch, draft or HTML-document, where all the structural elements of the future website are drawn, such as menus, buttons, forms, and others. A prototype can be a static image or a dynamic HTML document.

Development of a website prototype is, accordingly, the process of creating a website prototype. Its main purpose is:

  • To think  the layout of the necessary blocks and design elements through properly

  • To see the future website’s concept clearly

  • To organize the navigation system on the site better

  • To think of ways of interacting with a visitor of a website

prototype a website

In addition, prototyping a website can significantly save the project development time and shorten the number additional corrections, which discrepancies between the functionality of the website and the customer expectations can cause. After the prototype is presented, the client knows what to expect as a result, and the developer is confident to meet the project goals and requirements.

Read more: Hover design meaning

Create a prototype of a website begins with a content analysis, which determines the structure of the future website. Interface digitalization and other small details are not so crucial here, the main goal at this stage is to build a clear structure for interaction with the visitor.

website prototypes

Main advantages of making a website prototype:

  • The ability to visually see the future interface in dynamics

  • The possibility to test the usability ease level

  • To make adjustments at the initial stage, before the work of the designer and programmer begins

  • The ability to work on the pages content not to miss any details, which can be crucial for the website conversion

  • This is a perfect set of technical requirements for future layout and software development

  • Website prototype design saves you the money to fix a fully developed website

develop website prototype

Website prototype requirements:

  • Making a website prototype quickly
  • The ease to make changes to the prototype

  • Interactivity

  • Availability — the ability to evaluate the prototype by the customer, the programmer, the manager, etc.

  • Digitalization(in some cases)

making website prototype

What we can use the prototypes for?

There are many reasons, why we recommend using website prototypes in the website development. So let’s take a look at these reasons:

  1. Time-effectiveness and quick renewal. The main advantage of websites in prototypes in web design is a significant time-saving. This happens thanks to the fact, that before creating graphic design, the customer makes important decisions about the content location on the page and determines by the structure of the page. One more reward might be the ability to try new ideas and see the result, after spending a minimum of your time on it. Make any adjustments to the website structure and its design at this stage is much easier than when the site is completed.

  2. The ability to look at the website prototype design from a different perspective. The prototype is like a sketch of an Internet project. You can look at the design with the full architecture in perspective projection, which will make it possible to determine and make the best decision on which website layout and structure will be the most convenient to use.

  3. Getting feedback on the project at the early stages of its development. Website prototype design give us a good opportunity for visual communication with people. It allows you to show them to other people and find out their opinion about the prototype variations. By the means of it you can make any adjustments to the project at the initial stages of creation.

build a website prototype

  1. Focus on the functionality and ease of usability. In order to focus on the convenience of using a  website in prototype and its normal functionality, you need to use a content template and deliberately omit some design details. Thanks to prototypes, you can pre-plan the main elements of the website location. By definition, prototypes are one of the most important parts of any web design creation process, but it is not necessary to create a prototype for each website page. You need to make them only when it is necessary.

Read more: UX design and audit

What should you focus on?

Getting directly to the process of making a website prototype, you need to keep in mind a few important things. The first principle — is simplicity. More attention should be paid to the mockup scheme, the content structure, and its functionality, rather than the aesthetic view.

The second important thing is the use of real sizes. The next important detail is working out different concepts. Working with prototypes goes much faster than with the final web project design. This should be properly used as an advantage when trying out different options of a website design. Try to experiment as much as possible with the moqup schemes. This will give you the possibility to find something worthwhile.

making a website prototype

Types of website prototypes design

Prototypes website of design can be of two types: static and dynamic.

Static prototype site

The static website prototype is just an image. You can see the location of the elements, but if you press the buttons, nothing comes out. Such a prototype might contain comments, which will explain, how a particular element will function.

Dynamic prototype

The dynamic prototype is the functional layout of the site. Here you can press buttons or follow the links. Depending on the detailazation, it might be possible to fill in the text fields, send requests, make orders. The dynamic version of the prototype has a more striking effect, but it needs more time to develop and is more expensive.

Read more: Web design development

What website prototype design includes?

In some cases, the website prototype design is confused with web design. The project is just a scheme. It mostly was done in gray shades of color and does not contain images. The prototype gives an idea only about the website structure and the logical pages setting. The prototypes of the websites serve as the basis for design, but are not design itself.

create prototype of website

What is included in the design of the site:

  1. Defining the goals and objectives of the website — these are the functions that the website will have: online ordering, subscription to newsletters etc.

  2. Research of the niche is an analysis of the customer company, its competitors, target audience, defining the advantages and making a unique offer.

  3. Developing a concept is defining the specific features of the website, with the help of which the visitors can do certain actions.

  4. Prototyping — creating mockup schemes of the main website pages.

  5. Validation — the agreement of all the details of the website model with the client.

The project will make it possible to sum up clear project goals and objectives. On the project basis of you can give the exact tasks to the designer and the programmer. Thought-through website prototype designs help avoid mistakes at the stage of developing a website.

The stages of developing a website prototype

  1. Analysis of your business and competitors; defining its strengths and weaknesses.

  2. Elaboration of the main characters and user stories.

  3. The composition of informational architecture (a scheme of the site).

  4. Searching for ideas, interface solutions and creating the project basic concepts.

create a website prototype

  1. Drawing a prototype (a simplified version or the version with a design concept and dynamics).

  2. Testing the received prototype inside the team, editing, details description, and making a project itself.

Order a website prototype

In the KATASIS studio you can order building a website prototype «ready-to-use» or draw up an application for separate stages of work: website prototype design, making a list of technical requirements, website design, programming, maintenance and promotion.

We have huge experience in working with different business niches, we use the up-to-date prototyping tools and conduct an analysis with a marketing strategy because we know that the main task of a commercial website — is to bring profit.

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