Process

What Agencies Do Before Design Starts

By Kyle Moyer·11 min read·Updated February 2026

Before any reputable agency opens Figma, they spend 1–2 weeks on strategic discovery. This is the invisible work that determines whether a landing page converts — and the phase that most businesses skip because they don't know it exists or can't afford it.

The answer in one paragraph

Before any reputable agency designs a landing page, they conduct a strategic discovery phase that typically lasts 1–2 weeks and costs $5,000–$15,000. This phase answers four categories of questions: who exactly is the audience, what is the core value proposition, what objections will prevent conversion, and what proof exists to overcome them. Without this phase, every design decision is an educated guess.

If you've ever hired an agency and wondered what they're doing for the first two weeks before you see any designs, this is it. And if you've ever skipped this phase and gone straight to templates — this is what you missed.

The discovery process isn't mysterious. It's methodical. The same four stages show up at agencies charging $5,000 and agencies charging $50,000. The difference is depth, not structure. Understanding these stages explains why most landing pages don't convert — and what it actually takes to build one that does.

The Four Stages of Discovery

Every premium agency discovery process follows the same four-stage arc. The questions change by industry. The stages don't.

Stage 1 — Audience Definition

Who exactly is this page for?

Agencies don't accept "small business owners" as an audience. They push until they have a specific person: job title, company stage, daily frustrations, buying triggers, information sources. There's a significant difference between a persona document — a fictional character with a stock photo — and a real audience brief built from actual customer conversations.

The audience brief determines everything downstream. The headline language. The proof that gets selected. The objections that get addressed. The CTA phrasing. A page targeting "Series A startups with 15–50 employees scaling from founder-led sales" converts differently than a page targeting "growing teams." Same product. Different page. Different conversion rate.

"Who signs the check? What did they try before you? What would make them switch from their current solution? Where do they go for information? What does their Tuesday afternoon look like?"
Stage 2 — Value Proposition Extraction

Why does this matter to that specific person?

Not what you do — why it matters. Clayton Christensen's Jobs To Be Done framework applies here: people don't buy products, they hire them to do a job. The agency's task is to find the job your product is hired for — from the buyer's perspective, not yours.

A cybersecurity firm doesn't sell "vulnerability assessments." They sell the peace of mind that your next HIPAA audit won't end your career. A project management SaaS doesn't sell "task tracking." They sell 12 hours a week back in your calendar. The value proposition isn't your feature list — it's the transformation your specific buyer experiences.

This stage also surfaces the differentiator: the reason to choose you over every alternative, including doing nothing. "We're the best" isn't a differentiator. "We're the only platform that integrates with your existing EHR system without a migration" is.

Stage 3 — Objection Mapping

Why would a qualified buyer say no?

This is the most overlooked stage — and arguably the most important. Agencies catalog every reason a qualified buyer might not buy: price, timing, trust, complexity, switching cost, internal politics. Then they structure the page to address each one before the reader even consciously forms the objection.

People are more motivated by fear of loss than desire for gain. A page that handles the top three objections in its structure converts higher than one that adds three more feature sections. The objections are predictable. They're always some combination of cost ("Is this worth it?"), risk ("What if it doesn't work?"), effort ("How hard is the switch?"), timing ("Is now the right time?"), and politics ("Can I get buy-in?").

An unmapped objection doesn't disappear — it compounds silently until the visitor closes the tab. Every objection that gets surfaced and addressed in the page structure is one fewer reason to leave without converting.

Stage 4 — Proof Audit

What evidence exists to support these claims?

Agencies audit what's available: testimonials, case studies, metrics, certifications, client logos, media mentions, industry awards. Then they determine how to display each piece for maximum persuasive effect — and critically, which proof to exclude.

Proof should mirror the reader's situation. A Fortune 500 logo wall doesn't help a startup founder feel represented. A testimonial from a 15-person SaaS team does. A healthcare compliance certification matters to a hospital CTO. A G2 rating matters to a SaaS buyer. Generic "trusted by 500+ companies" is wallpaper — it takes up space without moving anyone.

The proof audit also identifies gaps: where do you lack evidence? Those gaps become the sections you hide rather than fill with hollow claims. Better to show three specific, relevant proof points than ten generic ones. Industry-specific proof patterns determine what "relevant" means for each audience.

How Discovery Becomes a Page

The structure

The standard strategic landing page structure follows a seven-section flow derived from the discovery phase: hook with a recognition-driven headline (from audience definition), establish credibility (from proof audit), deepen the problem (from objection mapping), present the solution (from value proposition), prove it works (from proof audit), handle remaining objections (from objection mapping), and close with a clear call to action.

Each discovery stage maps directly to page sections. Audience definition produces the headline language. Value proposition extraction produces the solution section. Objection mapping produces both the problem amplification and the objection handling sections. The proof audit populates the credibility bar, social proof, and case study elements.

This is also where proven frameworks get operationalized. The four that consistently appear in premium agency work:

Buyer Awareness Levels

Eugene Schwartz

Determines page structure. Cold traffic needs story-first. Warm traffic needs offer-first. Five levels, five different openings.

Influence Principles

Robert Cialdini

Determines persuasion elements. Social proof, authority signals, scarcity cues, and loss aversion — placed strategically throughout the page.

StoryBrand

Donald Miller

Determines narrative arc. The customer is the hero. Your product is the guide. The page structure follows the hero's journey from problem to transformation.

SPIN Selling

Neil Rackham

Determines the consultation extraction process. Situation → Problem → Implication → Need-Payoff mirrors how strategic intelligence gets surfaced.

These frameworks aren't theoretical — they're the standard operating procedure at agencies that consistently produce pages converting at 8–12%. The challenge has always been access: knowing about these frameworks requires either hiring an expensive agency or spending years studying conversion methodology.

Why Most Businesses Skip This

If the discovery process is this valuable, why do most businesses skip it? Three reasons — and none of them are "it doesn't work."

Cost: $5,000–$15,000 per page

The discovery phase alone — before any design begins — costs more than most businesses budget for their entire landing page project. Independent consultants charge $2,000–$5,000 for a strategy brief. Full-service agencies charge $5,000–$15,000 for strategy plus design. This prices out startups, small businesses, and bootstrapped founders — the people who arguably need strategy the most.

Time: 1–2 weeks before pixels appear

Two weeks of discovery feels like two weeks of nothing. The client doesn't see designs, wireframes, or progress. They see invoices. The pressure to "just start building" wins over the discipline to plan first — and the result is pages that look professional but convert poorly.

Access: Agencies serve budgets, not founders

Premium agencies work with companies that have marketing budgets. A SaaS founder with $500/month for marketing can't hire a $15,000 agency engagement. The strategic methodology exists. The delivery mechanism doesn't scale. The result: the companies that most need strategic guidance are the ones least able to afford it.

The gap

The strategic discovery process that agencies charge $5,000–$15,000 to conduct manually can be systematized through structured AI consultation that extracts the same intelligence in 10–15 minutes. The frameworks don't change — the delivery mechanism does.

This is the exact gap that makes AI-assisted strategy platforms viable. Not replacing agency thinking — systematizing the extraction process so the same categories of intelligence become accessible at a different price point and time scale. The questions are the same. The frameworks are the same. The delivery is different.