The first project meeting should not be spent discovering that nobody knows who can approve the work or where the required files live. Use this playbook for a website, brand, content, or marketing project. Adjust the details to the actual scope. If you are planning a website with Scayver Graphix, our process explains the broader sequence from discovery through launch and care. The steps below are a practical way to prepare for the first handoff.
1. Translate the agreement into a working brief.
Start with the signed scope, not a new wish list. Record the intended outcome, the named deliverables, what is out of scope, and the decision that will show the first milestone is ready. Write the primary audience and the action the finished work should support. Separate confirmed requirements from ideas that still need pricing or approval.
Ask one question early: Who can make the final call when feedback conflicts? A project can have many contributors, but an unclear approver creates rework. Record the decision maker, project contact, and backup contact where appropriate.
2. Build an access and asset list.
List the systems the work actually needs: domain and hosting accounts, CMS, analytics, advertising platforms, brand files, content, photography, and existing documentation. Assign each request an owner and due date. Give the minimum access needed for the job. Do not send passwords through an ordinary email thread or paste them into a shared brief.
Collect assets with their source and usage rights. A file named “final logo” is not enough if the team cannot tell whether it is the approved version. Record which images, testimonials, client logos, or results can appear publicly. A missing permission is a reason to hold that item, not a reason to improvise another one.
3. Prepare a focused kickoff.
The kickoff should resolve the few decisions that shape everything else. Confirm the audience, offer, conversion action, success measures, current constraints, and known dependencies. Review what the existing site or process already does well. Identify what must stay stable during the change.
Keep the meeting agenda short enough to finish with clear ownership. A useful order is outcome, audience, current state, constraints, scope, roles, immediate inputs, and first milestone. If the team cannot answer a critical question, name the owner and date for that answer. Do not let an unverified assumption quietly become a design or copy requirement.
4. Establish the review path.
Decide where drafts will live, how comments should be submitted, and when feedback is due. Ask reviewers to distinguish a factual correction from a preference. Require one consolidated response from the client side when several stakeholders are involved. That does not silence anyone. It makes the final instruction unambiguous.
Record what approval means at each stage. Approval to explore a direction is not approval to publish. A copy draft, design candidate, staging page, and live release each need their own decision. If a change alters scope, schedule, cost, or legal risk, handle it as a new decision instead of burying it in a comment thread.
5. Define the first milestone and handoff.
End onboarding with a visible next step. State what the team will produce first, what the client must provide, and what would block progress. Confirm where the current source of truth sits. A simple tracker with owner, status, due date, and link is often more valuable than a long kickoff deck.
Before work begins, check that the brief, access, assets, and review path agree. If the website will need a later transition to the client’s team, website pre-handoff QA shows questions worth planning for now. If the project includes continuing updates, discuss the responsibility boundary before launch, not after something breaks.
The purpose of onboarding is not to collect documents for their own sake. It is to prevent an avoidable pause once specialists are ready to do the work. If your current intake leaves those decisions scattered, bring the process you use today to a conversation. We can help map a cleaner project start.
