How to brief an e-commerce agency (and get quotes you can compare)

To get quotes you can compare, give every agency the same written brief, and make it specific about five things: what the business needs to achieve, what you run today, how complicated your catalogue is, which systems the store has to talk to, and what your limits are on time and money. Two or three pages is enough. The aim is not a technical specification. It is to make sure each agency is pricing the same job.

This guide covers what to put in the brief, what to ask in return, the warning signs in a proposal and how to line quotes up fairly. There is a template at the end that you can copy.

Why vague briefs produce quotes you cannot compare

A brief that says “we need a new Shopify store” or “we want to move off our current platform” leaves almost everything open. Each agency fills the gaps with its own assumptions. One assumes a customised theme and no integrations. Another assumes a bespoke design, a stock sync with your warehouse system and a full data migration.

The quotes that come back can differ several times over, and the difference tells you nothing about value. You are not comparing prices for the same piece of work. You are comparing guesses. The lowest figure is often the one built on the most optimistic assumptions, and those assumptions come back later as change requests.

What a good brief contains

Business context and goals

Say what the business sells, to whom, and what you want to be different in a year. “Reduce the time the team spends rekeying orders” and “open a trade channel alongside retail” are goals an agency can design around. “A modern, fresh website” is not.

Current platform and pain points

Name the platform and version you run today, who hosts it and who built it. Then list what is wrong with it in plain terms: slow category pages, an upgrade that is overdue, a checkout your team cannot change, an integration that drops orders. Mention what works well too, so it is not lost.

Catalogue size and complexity

Describe the catalogue in your own words. You do not need platform vocabulary. Useful details include roughly how many products you sell, how many have options such as size and colour, whether you sell bundles, made-to-order or subscription items, whether prices differ by customer or by country, and how many languages and currencies you need.

This section does more than any other to shape the quote, and it is often what decides which platform fits. Our Magento vs Shopify comparison explains where that line usually falls.

Integrations, with system names

List every system the store exchanges data with, by name: accounting or ERP, warehouse or fulfilment, payment providers, email marketing, reviews, marketplaces, product information management. For each one, say what moves and in which direction, for example orders out to the warehouse and stock levels back.

“Integrates with our ERP” could be a day’s work or two months. The system name and the data involved are what let an agency tell the difference.

Must-haves and nice-to-haves

Split your requirements into two lists and be strict about it. If everything is essential, the agency cannot help you make trade-offs, and you cannot see what a smaller first phase might cost.

Design expectations

Say whether you have brand guidelines, whether you expect a bespoke design or are happy to start from an existing theme, and name two or three stores you admire with a line on why. Say who on your side signs off design.

Content and data responsibilities

Decide who writes product copy, supplies photography and cleans up the data before it moves. State which records need to migrate: products, customers, order history, reviews, blog content. Work in this area is frequently left out of quotes because nobody said whose job it was.

Timeline and immovable dates

Separate real deadlines from preferences. A lease ending on your current hosting, a licence renewal, a trade show or your peak trading season are real constraints. Say when you cannot launch as well as when you would like to.

Budget range

Share a range. Many buyers hold this back for fear that every quote will arrive at the top of it. In practice, withholding it means agencies guess, and you receive proposals for three different sizes of project. A range lets each agency tell you what is achievable within it, and it lets an agency that cannot do the job for that money say so before either side wastes time.

Who decides, and how

Name the decision maker, the day-to-day contact and anyone else who must approve. Set out your selection process and dates. Agencies put more care into a proposal when they can see how it will be judged.

Questions to ask every agency

The brief tells agencies about you. These questions tell you about them. Ask all of them the same ones.

• Who will actually do the work, and will I meet them before I sign?
• Is any part of the work outsourced or subcontracted? If so, which part and to whom?
• Who owns the code, and in whose name are the repository, hosting and platform accounts?
• How are changes in scope handled, and how are they priced?
• What happens after launch? Is there a warranty period, and what does ongoing support look like?
• How do you test? Who tests, on what devices, and what do you expect from us?
• Can I speak to the developers directly during the project?

There are no universally right answers, but there should be clear ones. For reference, our own answers are set out on the how we work page.

Red flags in a proposal

• A firm price with no discovery. An agency that fixes a price for a complex build after one call has either padded the figure heavily or will recover the difference later.
• A fixed launch date before the scope is known. A date promised before anyone has looked at your data and integrations is a sales statement, not a plan.
• Reluctance to give you repository access. You are paying for the code. If you cannot see it during the project, ask why.
• Core modifications. Editing a platform’s own core files, rather than extending it in the supported way, makes every future upgrade harder. On Magento in particular, ask how customisations will be built.
• No testing line. If testing is not listed in the quote, it is either not planned or assumed to be your job.

How to compare quotes fairly

Start by checking that each quote covers the same scope. Read the assumptions and exclusions lists side by side. A proposal without them is not simpler, it is less finished. If one agency has excluded data migration and another has included it, adjust before you compare the totals.

Then look past the build price. The cost of a store is what you pay over several years, and ongoing costs vary far more between proposals than buyers expect.

Finally, weigh what the proposal tells you about how the agency thinks. A quote that questions part of your brief, or suggests doing less in the first phase, usually comes from people who read it properly.

A one-page brief template

Copy these headings into a document and write a short paragraph or a few bullet points under each.

1. About the business: what we sell, to whom, and where
2. Why now: what has prompted this project
3. Goals: what should be different in twelve months
4. Current setup: platform, version, hosting, who maintains it
5. What works and what does not
6. Catalogue: size, product types, pricing rules, languages and currencies
7. Integrations: each system by name, and what data moves in which direction
8. Must-haves
9. Nice-to-haves
10. Design: brand assets, expectations, reference sites
11. Content and data: what migrates, and who is responsible for what
12. Timeline: target date, immovable dates, periods to avoid
13. Budget range: for the build and for ongoing costs
14. Decision: who decides, the process and the dates
15. What we want in your response: assumptions, exclusions, team, ongoing costs

What to do next

Draft the brief using the template, then give it to someone in the business who was not involved in writing it. Anything they have to ask you about is something an agency would have had to guess.

Send the same document to three agencies at most, and offer each a call to ask questions before they quote. Share any answers that change the scope with all of them, so everyone is still pricing the same job. If you would like us to be one of the three, you can send the brief to us.