The Elements of a Website

We provide a complete web design service alongside domain names, website hosting, website management and bespoke online development services.

Our website design service is fully flexible we can work on any type of site from a stand alone brochure site of just a few pages through to a full e-commerce solution and online ordering system.

Our team have designed for small and large businesses so we know the constraints business are working in, we like to educate our customers and give them all the tools to make well informed decisions about their businesses online presence, of course we will make recommendations based on a complete understanding of you and your customers.

We can also help with understanding rapid change management taking businesses online for the first time ensuring you avoid expensive mistakes while implimenting your new systems and protocols, warehouse managment, picking and packing, delivery methods and shipping products as well as picking and packing techniques for ecommerce site.

The Elements of Website Design

Before you start:

The very first thing to do is to look at your website and how it is currently functioning, if you have google analytics installed, check how people are finding you and what areas of the site they are visiting and even look at your customer emails and understand how they are communicating with you.

The idea here is to discover how your site is currently performing in the months before you launch a new site – how many leads are coming from your site? is it just one or two or is it thirty or forty? This is important later on to be used as a benchmark.

We will go through your site before we do anything and ensure that we have a complete site map and every URL the site uses before we get started.

Copywriting: 

We will do some basic work on any copy provided but if you prefer we can write the copy for you based on the technical information provided by you, this can be a sound investment when coupled with the SEO service as this complements each other very well.

Testimonials:

These are really important to support your word of mouth decision-makers as they look for proof that you can do what you say or they have heard you can do. Easily get testimonials when you receive a signoff for a job and before you send the bill.

Trust pilot is great for this as is Typeform.com where you can create your own simple surveys and gather the information.

Domain Names:

Purchasing a domain name is relatively simple and we can either use one you have already purchased by allowing us access to your account or we can purchase a domain name on your behalf and under your name so you have full control.  We can, however, manage the domain for you and ensure that your email and website work correctly.

Domains are purchased every 2 years and can be .co.uk / .com or something more specific.

If you already have a domain name then that’s great we just need to access your account to make changes on your behalf to the DNS. We will, of course, let you know if we need this access as it does depend on a number of other factors.

Hosting:

This is required for every website apart from shared cloud-based websites from large cookie cutter companies or companies with proprietary systems. We build our sites using the latest WordPress as the basis which then allows us the ability to build sites which can easily expand and develop over time. 

A key point is that all our sites are hosted here in the UK which means there are no problems with data storage or data transactions across multiple borders and can be affected by GDPR laws.

Hosting is charged monthly alongside a maintenance fee which ensures we have backups and can respond quickly should your site have a problem either through third party interference or if something goes wrong.

Site Transfers:

It is often the case these days that clients come to us with a website that is already live and they are looking to improve it and update it.

No problem at all. We need tome simple information in order to ensure we transfer everything safely to our services.

• Access to the website itself – so any admin logins you have would be perfect
• Access to your hosting account or FTP Logins would be great but they are not absolutely necessary
• Access to your domain name control panel – or we can transfer the domain into our management

And that’s it. We will take care of the rest, nothing will change until you are happy or if there is a need to move the site before we complete the redesign.

Email:

Email is often the cause of the most concern as it is a business-critical element of the site and quite often the email is hosted on the same server and is entwined with the domain itself.

When transferring a domain it might be the ideal opportunity to take a look at how you are using your email, where it is stored and how it is backed up. Often email is accessed from the cloud through mobile phones and so there is no downloaded email as such. This can cause a significant issue if you are unable to access the cloud or if something changes with your domain.

We will look at how you are currently operating and make suggestions as to how you can improve your stability and your security.

In some cases, we are able to transfer the email to your new server and continue as before but it may be that your email is downloaded and then retained locally on your system. There is however a third way which is to sever the te between the website and your email strategy, this is to use a pop server like Gmail to serve your email needs. 

G-suite is, however, a paid-for service direct from google. We can help you to set up the G-Suite account and transfer your email across – it also allows you to use all the google tools and to use it under your domain name and with your chosen email addresses.

Security:

Every website requires what is called an ‘SSL certificate’ this is a service socket layer certificate which authenticates all the data being dealt with by the server – ok that got technical, essentially it encrypts the information your web browser is asking for so it can’t be tampered with or stolen as you fill in a form or send your details to the site. Most hosting comes with basic SSL certificates which are fine for brochure sites but if you are running an eCommerce site or you are storing a lot of customer data you may require a higher level of a certificate which will have a cost involved.

This then allows your site to run with the https:// which is required by google so your site does not give users a warning before they arrive at the site.

SEO: Search Engine Optimisation

SEO will be considered initially as it will impact how well your new site performs once it is launched. For instance, there is little point in building a complex element to the site that no one is searching for because on the internet the saying ‘Build it and they will come’ has simply never rung true for people searching for something. Creating the market is far harder than following the market, and making the market on the internet does not guarantee that you will be the first choice, quite the opposite in fact. 

To get quality leads we analyse the competition and the services and products you offer to which markets and then we look really hard at the data we can get from google, I mean really hard. We will then come back with some initial recommendations and from there we can build that knowledge into your content and structure so that google likes your site and will put you above the rest in the organic listings.

Beyond the onsite SEO in the copy and as tags behind images and articles there is the world of backlinking – here we discover and register your site manually with paid directories which will give your site the best support. Each backlink should be like a recommendation from a good client – it tells google you are really good. Linking to hundreds of irrelevant free directories may have the opposite effect. Because this all takes time we have a series of packages for SEO services. We recommend that you run your SEO for at least 3 months to start to feel the effect.

SEO services are monthly with no contracts as they require monitoring the data and tweaking the site continuously in order to react to changes in the search engine, what people are searching for and what your competitors are doing – they will want to try and outdo you once you launch your new site!

Basic SEO is usually included in the sites we build so we will take a look at your competition the locality and what the keywords around your site and what it is your customers are searching for.

Social Media:

Linkedin Twitter and Facebook have very different types of people as users have a different focus depending on the channel.

A couple of things to consider are what is it you are aiming to achieve from the social media and what is the time frame we are working to?

Some goals might be; Do you want more traffic to the current website, attract more customers to the apparel shop? Attract more private students? Secure more corporate contracts and military training?

From this we will help you to target the appropriate segments to achieve the goals using a selection of channels which are:

• Twitter is easy to engage with and make good quality local connections, post a few of your own items and link them into your website to drive traffic but mostly like and re-share other peoples posts, comment and discuss other people’s content.
• Facebook is much more about broadcasting and leaving an easy to follow the trail of content which people will discover over time – posting won’t immediately bring reach and engagement due to facebooks controls which are famously hard to predict and work with. This is more for fans of your products and services.
• Linkedin is much better for finding people and companies who might be interested in engaging your services commercially. Proving your expertise through articles and engagements and most importantly messaging potential contacts – but not direct selling. We will ensure you have a concise personal profile and that you and your staff are all linked to a company page where you can post company updates and articles so that your employees and associates can like and share your content.

We will work with you to take control of the accounts, posting and engaging in your tone of voice – if there is some technical information required, we will be in touch to get your expert opinion.

We can guarantee we won’t be posting pictures of cats on your behalf. You can, of course, do this yourself should you wish to.

PPC Campaigns: Add on service: 

This is similar to the newspaper advertising you may have done in the past but much more targeted than a traditional advert as you can show your advert to people to qualified leads ie people who are already searching for your service. We would recommend a 2-3 week campaign when the site launches ti help push you up the search results quickly beyond that the core SEO in the site will kick in.

Hosting and Doman name is also included for the first 6 months after launch