A site goes live five working days after the brief is signed. Not five weeks, not eight weeks, not “a few months.” Here’s what happens on each of the five days.
We talk for fifteen minutes — phone, Zoom, WhatsApp, whichever's easiest. I take notes by hand. By the end of the call I'll know what the site is for, who it's for, what it has to do, and what won't fit in five days (because that matters too). I write the brief up and send it back the same day. Nothing happens until you confirm the brief is right.
I build the home page and one inner page. Real content where you've given me it, considered placeholder where you haven't. By end of day I send you a link — a working site, not a Figma mockup. You can click round it on your phone. I'd rather show you something half-built that works than something fully drawn that doesn't.
Build the other pages, wire the forms, set up the SEO basics, sort the favicon and OG image, make sure mobile feels right. I'll WhatsApp you anything that looks ambiguous on the way through — better to ask than guess.
You send me your one round of changes — what to move, what's wrong, what's missing. I do them. If the changes will push the launch date, I tell you that morning so we can decide together whether the change is worth the slip.
Final polish, accessibility check, the legal pages (privacy, terms, cookies — Rule 4), Google indexing, the balance invoice. Site goes live by 5pm. I post you the source files on a USB stick if you want one, because some people like a physical receipt.
If you change the brief on Day 3, the launch date moves. I’ll always tell you what slips and by how much, the morning of, so we can decide together whether the change is worth it.
If something fails on my side — I get ill, a tool breaks — I tell you straight, and we move the launch. I’ve never missed a launch yet, but I’m not going to lie if it happens.