Congratulations!

Now that you have won a contest, you are ready to begin working on the website portion of the contest.

Next steps

1. Consult the brief and talk to the customer to find out more about their website needs.

The contest brief may have template suggestions, other websites to use for inspiration, and text and/or images to utilize on the website. Take notes of their requests and contact the customer to see if they have any other questions or suggestions for their website.

 

Focus on fully designing and preparing the 3-5 main pages of the website so the customer can then copy any pages you make to fill out the remainder of the website when it is turned over to them.

2. Create the website by clicking on the button in handover.

This will make a new website on the Jimdo platform that you can access and edit by clicking on this button in the future.

3. Select the right template for your project.

When you first arrive at your new website, you will be presented with the template options. Preview any of the existing templates or template variations and save when you have found the right one.  You can change templates at any time by clicking on the template icon in the Site Admin if you decide the one you selected is not working out well. 


If you are looking for particular things in a template, you can look at the Jimdo Template Filter to sort the templates based on features.

4. Upload a version of the winning logo into the website.

Replace the placeholder logo on the website with a web-friendly version of the one you created. Jpgs or Pngs (with transparent backgrounds) will give you the best results.  There are limited options for resizing, placing, and aligning the logo depending on the template you are using.  

 

Tip: Sometimes, you can fake the system by rendering the logo right onto the background image to give yourself more flexibility.

5. Change the background image or color.

Replace the existing background image. All content on the starting page is only there as an example. None of it should be on the final deliverable. Select a new photograph from one of the free photo websites, or delete the image and use a background pattern (how you make a solid color).  The background options are dependent on the template you selected. 

6. Use the style editor to set the primary color and fonts, and then override any styles you want.

Match the colors and fonts from the winning logo on your website by clicking on the style editor. Start with the general tab where changing the color and fonts will cascade across many items of your website. Then switch to the specific tab if you need to override any colors or fonts for specific types of elements like the body text or all large headings. Watch the styling video if you need an example of how this works. 

7. Edit the navigation to create, delete, rename, and rearrange pages within the website.

For website starters, you do not need to create all the pages for the final website. We expect you to create 3-5 pages to show the customer how the main pages should look.  You can create more if you like, but please make sure to put at least some placeholder content on any page that you create.

8. Update, change, and rearrange the placeholder content on every page of the website.

Replace all images and structure the content to make a good looking website. Please use lorem ipsem (gibberish) text, but make sure the website gives the customer a good idea of how they can arrange the content on the pages. After the site is transferred to them at the completion of handover, they can then log in and just click on the headings, text, and images and edit them on their own.

 

Tip: Please make sure to replace ALL existing placeholder content (images and text) and ensure that every page of the website has some content on it.

9. Make sure the website looks good.

After completing all of these steps, how does the website look?  Would you be comfortable showing this website to potential new clients? Would you use the website yourself?  If you think it could look better, contact Jimdo support and ask them for some advice.

If you have any trouble along the way, please contact Jimdo support and we can help you through the process. 


Note:

If you have trouble logging into your website from the 99designs contest page at any time during the website creation process, please contact support. Do not create a free Jimdo website for your client from www.jimdo.com.

Common pitfalls

  • Did you change the template, background, fonts, and placeholder images?
  • Did you use the style editor to set the general styles? This is an easy way to very quickly update lots of fonts and colors in one step.
  • Do your colors and fonts match the logo?
  • Does some text look odd after copying and pasting from an external source?  If so, you probably copied some styles over. To undo this, click on the text in Jimdo to edit it. Highlight all the text and click the remove formatting button.
  • Are all images used in your website free and legal to use? 
  • Most templates have a spot for header text that appears on all pages. If you don't need this for your design (often it is redundant with the logo), then simply leave it blank.