What should an RFP for website design and development include?

You have decided the website needs to be rebuilt, and someone on your side has said "let's send out an RFP." Good instinct. A clear request for proposals is the fastest way to get quotes you can actually compare. A vague one gets you five numbers that differ by 10x and no way to tell why.

Here is the short answer. A website RFP should explain why you are building the site, who it is for, which pages and features it needs, who supplies the content, what it must connect to, how SEO and redirects will be protected, where it will be hosted, what accessibility standard it must meet, a budget range, a timeline, and how you will pick a winner. Keep it to a few pages. Agencies read dozens of these, and the clear ones get the best people.

If you are buying custom software rather than a marketing website (a portal, a booking engine, internal tools), the structure is different. We cover that in our guide to writing a software brief or RFP.

What goes in the first page of a website RFP?

Start with the business, not the design. Agencies need context before they can price anything, and this page is what they read first.

• Who you are. Two or three sentences: what you sell, where, and to whom.
• Why now. The trigger for the project. "The site is slow and we can't edit it," "we are adding a second location," "leads dropped after the last redesign." The trigger tells the agency what success looks like.
• Goals with numbers where you have them. More quote requests, more bookings, fewer support calls, faster page loads. One to three goals is plenty.
• Your audience. Who visits, what they are trying to do, and on which device. If most of your traffic is phones, say so.
• Your decision maker. Name the person who signs off. Agencies plan very differently for one approver versus a committee of six, and they price the extra review rounds accordingly.

For an online store the list is different (catalog, payments, shipping, migration). See the ecommerce website RFP guide.

Which pages and features do you need?

This is where most RFPs are either too thin or too detailed. You want a draft sitemap and a feature list, not a design.

Sitemap. List the main pages and roughly how many of each repeating type: "home, about, 8 service pages, 3 location pages, blog with about 60 existing posts, contact." The page count is one of the biggest drivers of cost, so be honest about it.

Features. List what the site has to do, in plain words:

• Forms (quote request, contact, job application) and where submissions should go
• Booking or scheduling
• Search, filters or a resource library
• Gated content or member logins
• Ecommerce, even if it is only a few products
• Multiple languages

Mark each feature as "must have" or "nice to have." That one label lets agencies give you a base price and options, which is far easier to compare.

Examples you like. Link three sites you like and say what you like about each. "We like the way this one shows pricing" is far more useful than "clean and modern."

Who owns the content, and what does the site connect to?

Content

Content is the most common reason website projects slip, so put it in writing.

Say who writes the copy, who supplies photos, and whether you need help with either. If existing pages are moving over, say how many and whether they will be rewritten or copied as is. If you expect the agency to write, give them a page count so they can price it.

Also cover ownership. State that you will own the design files, the code, the content and the domain at the end of the project, and that the site will be built in accounts you control. This is not a hostile clause. Good agencies expect it.

Integrations

List every system the website has to talk to. Typical ones for a small or mid-sized business:

• CRM (HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive)
• Email marketing tool
• Booking or scheduling software
• Payment processor
• Analytics and tag manager
• Chat or call tracking
• Any internal system that needs form data

For each, say what has to happen: "new quote requests create a deal in HubSpot with the service type filled in." Integrations hide a lot of cost, and a one-line description saves a round of questions.

How should the RFP handle SEO, hosting and accessibility?

If your current site gets any search traffic, this section protects it. A redesign that drops your rankings can cost more than the site itself.

Ask each agency to describe how they will handle:

• A full inventory of current URLs
• A 301 redirect map from every old URL to its new home
• Keeping titles, descriptions and headings on pages that already rank
• Page speed and Core Web Vitals targets
• Launch checks in Search Console

Attach your top pages by traffic if you can, along with any pages that bring in most of your leads, so nobody treats them as disposable. For the full list of what to check before and after launch, use our website redesign SEO checklist. This is also where it helps when development and SEO sit under one roof, because nobody can blame the other side when traffic moves after launch.

Hosting. Say whether you already have hosting you want to keep or whether you want a recommendation. Ask what platform they propose (WordPress, Webflow, a custom build) and why. Ask what ongoing maintenance costs and what it includes.

Accessibility. Name a standard. WCAG 2.2 level AA is the common target. This is not a box ticking exercise: in the WebAIM Million 2025 study, about 94.8% of the top one million home pages had detectable WCAG failures, with low-contrast text the most common issue. It also carries real legal exposure here. UsableNet's mid-2025 report counted 2,019 digital accessibility filings in the first half of 2025 and named New York the leading state for filings. Ask agencies how they test, not just whether they "build accessible sites."

For what accessibility should mean in practice, see ADA website compliance for New York businesses.

Should you include a budget range, timeline and evaluation criteria?

Yes. This is the single biggest improvement most RFPs can make.

Without a range, agencies guess. Some propose a lean build, some propose everything, and you cannot compare them. A range lets every bidder design the best site that fits it, and it tells agencies outside your range to step aside early, which saves everyone time.

If you are not sure what is realistic, our breakdown of how much a small business website costs in 2026 gives market ranges by type of site. Pick a range, not a single number, and say whether it includes content, hosting and the first year of maintenance.

Timeline. Give the date proposals are due, when you will decide, when work can start, and any hard launch date (a trade show, a new location opening). Explain why the date is fixed if it is.

Evaluation criteria. Tell agencies how you will judge them. For example: relevant past work 30%, approach and understanding of goals 30%, price 20%, ongoing support 20%. It sounds formal, but it makes proposals far easier to compare, and it shows you are a serious buyer.

Ask for the same things from every bidder: a short approach, two or three relevant examples, who will do the work, a price split by phase, what is excluded, and two references. Score each proposal against your criteria before you look at price.

Once the responses arrive, here is how to evaluate web development proposals with a scorecard.

What makes good agencies decline your RFP?

Strong agencies turn down RFPs every week. The common reasons:

• No budget at all. They assume the lowest bid wins and do not want to race to the bottom.
• Free spec work. Asking for custom homepage designs before you have hired anyone.
• A huge document for a small site. Forty pages of legal terms for a 15-page brochure site signals a painful process.
• A two-week turnaround with a committee of approvers. It reads as a project that will stall.
• "Must match the lowest quote." It tells them quality is not the goal.
• No access to a decision maker. If questions go into a black hole, so do the proposals.
• Too many bidders. Sending to 15 agencies means each one has a small chance of winning. Three to five is a better number.

None of these are rules. They are just what makes a busy agency decide your project is not worth the hours of writing a proposal.

A website RFP template you can copy

Paste these nine headings into a document and fill each one in a few lines. When every agency gets the same shape, the quotes come back comparable.

1. About the business. What you sell, who buys, and the two or three goals the new site must serve.
2. The current site. URL, platform, what works, what does not, and the pages that bring traffic and leads today (from Search Console and GA4).
3. Scope. The pages and templates you need, the features (forms, booking, search, accounts, ecommerce) and any languages.
4. Content. Who writes it, what is reused from the old site, photography and video.
5. Integrations. CRM, email, payments, analytics, and anything else the site must talk to.
6. SEO, hosting and accessibility. Redirect plan for every old URL, performance targets, the WCAG level you need, and who hosts and maintains the site after launch.
7. Budget range and timeline. A real range, the launch date, and what is driving it.
8. How you will decide. Your evaluation criteria, the questions every agency must answer, and the decision date.
9. Logistics. Contact person, deadline for questions, deadline for proposals, and the format you want back.

Quick answers

How long should a website RFP be?

Most fit in 3 to 6 pages, plus attachments like a sitemap or traffic report. Much longer and agencies skim it.

How many agencies should I send my website RFP to?

Three to five is a good number. Fewer gives you little to compare. More means each agency has a low chance of winning, so the best ones put in less effort or decline.

Do I need an RFP for a small website?

Not a formal one. For a simple site, a two-page brief covering goals, pages, content, integrations, budget and timeline does the same job.

Should I ask agencies for design mockups in the RFP?

No. Ask for past work and their approach instead. Unpaid mockups are made without real research, so they tell you little, and many good agencies will not do them.

Can an RFP template from the internet work for my website?

As a starting point, yes. Cut anything that does not apply, and add the parts templates often miss: content ownership, SEO migration, a budget range and your evaluation criteria.

Is a web development RFP different from a website RFP?

Mostly in what sits behind the pages. A website RFP is about design, content, SEO and a content management system. A web development RFP usually means a web application: user accounts, roles, data the system stores, integrations with other software, and rules the software has to follow. If that describes your project, add those sections and read our guide to writing a software brief or RFP alongside this one. Both kinds still need goals, a budget range and evaluation criteria up front.

What is different about a website redesign RFP?

A redesign RFP has to protect what the current site already earns. Add three things a new-site RFP does not need: a list of the pages that bring traffic and leads today (from Search Console and GA4), a requirement that every old URL redirects to its new home before launch, and a baseline of current rankings and conversion rate so you can tell afterwards whether the redesign helped. Say whether the content is being rewritten or carried over, since that changes the price more than the design does.

Next step

If you would like a second pair of eyes on your website RFP before it goes out, or you want us to be one of the agencies that responds, we are happy to help. Book a free call, tell us about the project, and we will send you a written recommendation within a few days.