Web design is all about selling: A business that has an impressive website, one that looks professional and which stands out from the crowd, is more likely to generate significant traffic. And more traffic means more opportunities to convert casual visitors into paying clients. It’s that simple!
The question that most small and medium business owners ask today is: What should my website design company be doing for me, in order for my business to prosper? Let’s explore this point in more detail.
First Impressions
If you want your customers and future clients to see how different you are from all of your peers and competitors, then you need to show exactly that through their first point of contact with you - which is very often through your website. When clients see a website that’s:
- • Plain
- • Un-inspiring
- • Rigid
- • Displaying out of date content
- • Missing images
- • Broken Links
- • Devoid of originality
They usually associate all of those negatives with the company behind the website. Your web designer must therefore be able to transform a “stereotypical” image of you and your industry, into a web creation that will:
- • Encourages passers-by to stop on your site
- • Persuade them to stick around and browse some more
- • Convince them to make contact or place an order for your goods and services
Great designs are those that work equally for the site owner as well as visitors, clients and business partners alike. And great designers should be able to produce designs that work well for all your stakeholders and all of your different target markets.
With an average visitor stopping by for less than 5 to 10 seconds on a website, before moving on, first impressions about your site dictate whether casual passers-by will become paying customers. And that’s what your web designer must be able to accomplish for you. Using professional website designers will help you accomplish just that. They have these complex discussions with clients every day in the areas of design, usability, content management, web visitor interactions, website calls to action and a USP – a unique selling point.
Making Websites Work For You…And Your Visitors
In a world filled with mass produced goods and services, individuality and personalisation is one thing that can earn significant attention online. So while many firms offer template-based web sites, these just won’t work for you. Why is that?
1) Individuality: With a template, there’s only so much that you can do and change, in terms of differentiating your website from your competitors. If all you have is a rigid web template, your individuality is lost – and potentially many clients too!
2) Flexibility: Cookie-cutter site builders, like WIX or WordPress, may work well when you first go live, but as soon as you decide to make changes – even the slightest updates – you’ll find you don’t have facility on those kind of systems to do so. You’re trapped within that template forever! Of course you can get a web developer to make edits for you but not you have a situation that most updates now have to be done externally and this 'cheap' template website is going to end up costing you a fortune.
3) Look-and-Feel: A template-based web designer is cheap to engage – but the look-and-feel of the products they deliver are “cheap” too. That’s because they are “minimalistic” in what they offer. You pay for what you get! The user experience for your website visitors will be of a lower calibre too. You may want to start your business with one of these but you will be getting a proper business website soon, so why not get it now and let your business benefit from that improved presence and image.
4) Costly: If you want brand differentiation through your website, then you’ll likely have to do a complete redesigning of your cookie-cutter site. To make your site represent your company will mean a full-scale gutting of the template – and that will end up costing you a whole lot more! Cookie-cutter websites are only good if the exact website you want is the one you're looking at right now. But that is rarely the case and even then, you will want to change the website In a few months time.
5) Convenience: If you want to provide your visitors with a convenient and easy to use user interface to work with, chances are that your templated website won’t offer exactly what you want. Your prospective customers may not be satisfied with their experience at your site, and will go elsewhere. You’ll end up sacrificing customer-satisfaction for cost, which will result in loss of revenue.
Web designing also isn’t just about putting up an online presence because everyone else has one. In fact, many would argue that it’s better NOT to have a website at all, than to have one that is restrictive and doesn’t truly represent your brand. In that way, your drab online templated website isn’t harming your image.
Cookie-cutters Won’t Cut it!
In business, your web design is one of the major differentiating factors that will attract (or detract – depending on its design) returning clients, new prospects and business partners to choose you. With so much at stake, why would you even consider using cookie-cutter website design tools?
If you want to give the competition a serious run for their money, then cookie-cutters just won’t do. You need to partner with a professional web development firm that can build truly customised websites that make your business stand out and bring out the personality of your company – NOT something that some of your competitors are also using! If you want to chat about your website feel free to call us on 01-6216866 or email info@myit.ie .
