Frequently Asked Questions

Get straight, honest answers about how we work, what to expect, and how to get started. No fluff. No guesswork.

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How We Work

How our strategic, user-first approach delivers clarity, consistency, and results.

Many studios treat websites as visual projects. We treat them as commercial systems designed to support buying decisions, reduce friction, and scale with the business.

Our work begins by understanding how customers discover products, compare options, and move through the purchase journey. Design decisions follow that understanding—not trends or personal taste. The result is a site that not only looks refined, but performs reliably over time.

We work with eCommerce brands in furniture, home décor, and lifestyle that have clear products, real customers, and long-term growth goals.

We don’t take on vanity sites, personal brands, pseudoscience, or projects where decisions are driven purely by aesthetics. Specialisation allows us to go deeper, move faster, and deliver stronger outcomes for the brands we partner with.

You work directly with an experienced strategist. This ensures fast decisions, high standards, and a consistent vision throughout the project.

Before any paid work begins, we start with a 30-minute Strategy Call.

You work directly with a senior strategist throughout the engagement. There are no junior handoffs or layered account teams. This keeps communication clear, decisions fast, and quality consistent from start to finish.

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Our Discovery-First Approach

Why every successful project begins with defining the problem before designing the solution.

Before any paid work, we start with a 30-minute Strategy Call. This conversation helps both sides understand high-level goals, challenges, and fit. It’s a practical alignment step—not a consultation—and ensures Discovery is the right next move.

For eCommerce brands, the biggest risks come from building before there is shared clarity on customers, buying behaviour, content requirements, and technical constraints.

Discovery provides that clarity. It allows us to identify what’s actually limiting performance—whether that’s UX friction, product presentation, mobile experience, site structure, or technical debt—before committing to design or development.

Example:

A brand may believe they need a visual redesign. Discovery often reveals that improving navigation, product clarity, filtering, or load speed will have a far greater impact on conversion than changing the look of the site.

No. Discovery is a standalone project, paid in full upfront, and not credited toward implementation fees.

This keeps the work objective and ensures you receive a complete strategic blueprint you can use regardless of who executes the build. Many clients continue with us, but Discovery stands on its own as a valuable outcome.

Its cost is not credited toward the website or implementation fees.

This protects the quality of the work, ensures unbiased recommendations, and allows you to take the Discovery findings to any vendor if needed.

Discovery concludes with documented requirements, user flows, priorities, and a clear roadmap. If you proceed with implementation, Discovery naturally becomes Phase 1 of the project, allowing the build to move forward without rework or assumptions.

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Our Phased Approach

A structured, step-by-step method that keeps your project controlled, predictable, and on track.

Pre-Phase — Strategy Call
Initial alignment on goals, challenges, and fit.

Phase 1 — Discovery (Standalone Project)
Customer insights, UX analysis, requirements, constraints, success metrics, and implementation cost.

Phase 2 — UX Foundations
Sitemaps, navigation, mobile flows, product hierarchy, filtering logic, and content structure.

Phase 3 — UI & Design System
Refined layouts, scalable components, brand application, accessibility, and interaction design.

Phase 4 — Build & Integrations
Development, platform setup, migrations, apps, automation, and performance optimisation.

Phase 5 — Launch & Optimisation
QA, analytics configuration, CRO groundwork, training, and launch support.

Because eCommerce sites touch marketing, operations, and revenue. A phased structure ensures decisions are made in the right order, risks are identified early, and progress remains visible at every stage.

Each phase has clear deliverables and approval points, keeping timelines and budgets under control.

  • Clear visibility into progress and next steps
  • Fewer revisions and less rework
  • Faster decision-making
  • Better alignment across teams
  • A site that’s easier to optimise and scale

This approach protects both performance and long-term maintainability.

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Payment Terms, Deposits & Refunds

Transparent policies that protect your investment, timeline, and project momentum.

  • Discovery: Paid in full upfront
  • Implementation:
  • 50% deposit to secure your build phase
  • Remaining 50% paid across agreed milestones

This structure allows us to allocate senior resources and schedule your project reliably.

No. Payments are non-refundable.

Strategic work, planning, scheduling, and research begin immediately upon engagement. All work completed to date remains valuable, even if a project does not continue.

To maintain project momentum and protect scheduled resources, the following applies when delays are caused by the client. This includes delayed revisions, approvals, content delivery, asset submission, or payments.

Delays exceeding 60 days If the project remains inactive for more than 60 days due to client-side delays, the engagement is considered terminated by the client. All fees paid to date remain non-refundable, and any future continuation will require a new agreement and a new project schedule.

Delays exceeding 30 days If the project is paused for more than 30 days due to outstanding client responsibilities, a 10% project restart fee will apply. This fee covers project re-planning, team reallocation, and the time required to re-engage with the work.

Yes. For multi-phase projects, payment plans align with phase deliverables, maintaining predictable cash flow.

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Platforms, Technical Work & Integrations

Clear guidance on the tools and systems behind your eCommerce experience.

Yes. Platform selection is based on business needs—not preference.

Shopify is ideal for streamlined eCommerce operations and scale. WordPress is suited to more flexible content or hybrid requirements. We recommend the platform that best supports your catalogue, workflows, and growth plans.

Yes. Performance and usability are built into every project. This includes clean structure, optimized assets, logical navigation, and accessibility-aware design.

Accessibility is an ongoing improvement practice — not a one-time checkbox — and we design with that mindset from the start.

Yes. We handle product, content, customer, and metadata migrations carefully — while avoiding the transfer of outdated structures or UX issues that no longer serve the business.

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After Launch

What happens once your site goes live and how performance is sustained.

Yes. You receive tailored walkthroughs and documentation so your team can confidently manage products, content, and day-to-day updates.

Yes. Many clients continue with ongoing support focused on CRO, UX improvements, performance tuning, and analytics-driven enhancements as the business evolves.

Success is defined during Discovery and tracked through metrics such as conversion rate, engagement, add-to-cart behaviour, returning customers, and site performance. Decisions are guided by data, not assumptions.

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Fit & Expectations

Ensuring alignment for a productive, high-performing partnership.

Brands seeking quick aesthetic updates, trend-driven design, or projects without strategic alignment are unlikely to benefit from our approach.

Clear decision-making, timely feedback, defined goals, and a willingness to align decisions with customer behaviour and data. Momentum and clarity are the foundations of strong outcomes.

Request a Strategy Call. It’s the simplest way to determine fit, clarify next steps, and decide whether Discovery is the right move.

Ready to Elevate Your eCommerce Experience?

If you are ready to create a shopping experience that feels seamless, trustworthy, and shaped by real customer behavior, let’s build it together.

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PLATFORMS WE SPECIALIZE IN

  • Shopify logo featuring a shopping bag with a bold S on it, next to the word shopify in a modern, lowercase font. The design is simple and uses dark gray on a light background.
  • The image shows the BigCommerce logo, featuring the word BIG in bold white letters inside a dark triangle, followed by COMMERCE in gray capital letters on a light gray background.
  • The word woo is written in bold, rounded, lowercase letters in dark gray on a light gray background.
  • The image displays the Commerce Layer logo, featuring a stylized icon resembling curly brackets and a colon, followed by the words commerce layer in lowercase gray letters on a light background.