If you’re evaluating website development for your business we’ve written this guide to help you know how to define professional website development.
Unfortunately, there are many who claim to offer professional services and very few resources to help you confirm and identify the good from the bad.
This is, without doubt, the most critical component of the process. The proposal you receive and agreement you sign will impact every aspect of your project – especially your budget and satisfaction with the end result. Checkout our detailed guide on what a professional marketing proposal or website development proposal looks like.
If you don’t have a strategy for the website design, you’re probably going to end up with something generic and less effective in reaching your unique goals . We require our clients to work with us to develop an 83-Point Preliminary Marketing Strategy which informs our design decisions and the subsequent points.
3. Competitive Landscape Research
Great design isn’t simply something that looks pretty. We research who your competitors are, including industry leaders, and then audit their websites to understand what their strengths and weaknesses are as well. We aim to improve upon the weaknesses and implement the strengths in your website.
4. Identifying Industry Trends
Design trends don’t simply refer to “what looks cool today?”. Rather, it means that a designer is thinking about data visualization (how visitors understand your message through the design instead of by reading it’s content). Being current with design will directly effect your conversion rates, among other things.
5. Identifying Industry Utility Trends
Apart from analyzing the competition and their design, we also analyze the current trends in your industry to help you identify features and functionality that should be included or have an optimized experience. For example; if you operate a pediatric dental practice we may include a call to action for children to download a coloring book in preparation for their visit. This invites your visitors to engage with you through your website and makes an distinction among your competition.
6. Developing a Brand or Style Guide
We believe there are over 21 different components that have to be considered in the design of a website. If someone is offering website design services and they’re not including a style guide or brand guide, then you’ll end up with components of the website that are inconsistent with itself and the rest of your brand (such as social media accounts, print materials, etc…).
7. Evaluate and Develop Brand Identity
Whether you’re starting a business or the VP of Growth: the person, or organization, you employ for your website development will impact, even define, your brands identity. We’ll define or enhance brand colors, logo, fonts and other reusable elements for your other marketing materials (such as business cards, brochures, social media assets, etc…)
8. Consider and Plan for the Future
Whether you employ us for marketing strategy or not, it’s the foundation of success in marketing to plan for your future. It’s the parent of website design and website design and website development. We’ll put together thoughts and recommendations for A/B testing opportunities, conversation rate optimization strategies, additional landing page development and potential calls to action.
9. Consider Application Development to Streamline Business Operations
Many businesses need their websites integrated with other aspects of their business – and vice versa. Such as sale systems integrated with CRM’s, accounting software, point of sale, and more. Not only can we advise you on your options and develop those solutions for you… but we can create web apps from scratch for your needs. This includes custom WordPress Plugin development .
10. Financing Options
Fair and reasonable financing options are not necessarily an indication of whether or not a company is professional. But it is certainly something that helps with the process for many. We offer a variety of financing options to help focus the forefront of funds on marketing that generates revenue as early as possible rather than front loading it with things that don’t.
