Website Design
In today’s world, great web design is increasingly becoming a crucial part of any business.
However, it’s not just people that you need to impress, it’s also the search engines that you need to think about too.
Did you know that MOST websites today aren’t meeting up to Google’s requirements of what a good website should be? Here’s why…
Many sites are using old technology, old site builders, old themes, old image formats, as well as outdated ideas about what Google actually looks for in a website.
In addition, people expect more from a website these days than what they used to do. If your website isn’t up to date, you could be loosing a lot more sales than you think. Read on to find out why…
The Need For Speed
Did you know that almost half of web users expect a site to load within 2 seconds?
If it takes more than 3 seconds, 40% of users will abandon the site altogether. This is huge…
Every 1 second delay results in a 7% decrease in conversions. BUT… it gets even worse…
If someone quickly abandons a site, this is known as a ‘bounce’. Google will LOWER the search rank of any site with a high bounce rate.
So not only are you loosing customers who have abandoned your website, you’re also being punished by Google who will now demote your site. This in turn means even less customers and less sales.
This is why having a fast loading website and good web design is vital.
But that’s not all…
Responsive Website Design
Have you noticed that some websites don’t look very good on a mobile? The layout is all over the place, the fonts are too big or too small, and it’s painfully slow to load.
This is usually because the web development was done on a desktop and isn’t able to adapt to a mobile environment.
However, there is a solution to this and it’s known as ‘Responsive’ Website Design. This means that the site has been designed in such a way that it responds and adapts to the type of device that it’s displayed on.
It doesn’t matter if it’s displayed on a desktop or on a mobile, it’s still loads fast and it’s still looks reasonably good on any type of device.
This means that consumers are more likely to stay on your site for longer and Google will reward you with a higher search rank.
Want to know what Google thinks of your website?…
Test Your Website
Fortunately you don’t have to guess what Google thinks about your website, you can test it yourself.
The developers at Google have a free to use tool that gives valuable insights into issues with your website.
We ran our website through it and were pleasantly surprised by the results. It’s almost impossible to score 100% across the board, so these results are really impressive.
By contrast, we found an ‘Award winning’ local competitor and ran their website through the tool. They only managed a performance score of 41 on mobile. Another ‘top’ agency only got 27, which is EXTREMELY poor.
If you are looking for a web designer, it’s well worth testing their site and see how they fair. If they can’t even sort out their own site, do you really want them to build yours?
In case you want to test your website, our website, or any other digital marketing agency’s website, you can use the free Google Page Speed Insights tool. To get an accurate picture you should run the test several times and ignore any outliers… https://pagespeed.web.dev/
Hopefully, after checking our web design against the competition, you’ll see why only we can build you a website fit for the 21st century.
Below is a small selection of example sites to show what is possible. We can either build you a site from a template or build a whole new site from scratch.
Don’t worry if you don’t like what you see, we can change ANYTHING you want. For example, the first website below is based on the same template as the seventh one, but as you can see, we gave it a very different look. (Click images to view the sites)
To the left is the home page of our own website in full from top to bottom.
Below is a small selection of example sites to show what is possible. We can either build you a site from a template or build a whole new site from scratch.
Don’t worry if you don’t like what you see, we can change ANYTHING you want. For example, the first website below is based on the same template as the seveth one, but as you can see, we gave it a very different look. (Click images to view the sites)
If you have an example of a website that you like the look of, we are happy to build something in the same style. Or we can show you more examples to give you some ideas. Just contact us and we’ll be happy to discuss your requirements.
Our Website Design Process
Our Website Design Process
Every business is different and what might be good for someone else might not be right for you.
That’s why before we even start anything, we talk to you about your needs and requirements. Do you only need a basic website with just a page or two, or do you need something a bit more fancy?
Who are your customers? What are your key products or services? How do you wish to present your company persona? Etc, etc.
Do you already have a brand identity and are you happy with it? If not we can help you with your branding, so that you are creating the right impression and making yourself memorable to both customers and potential customers.
Once we have a good understanding of what you want we’ll get to work. As well as building your site we’ll do keyword research to make sure that the website contains words and phrases that people are actually searching for.
Basic
• One page website
• Mobile responsive
• Basic logo
Silver
• Up to 10 pages
• Mobile responsive
• Comprehensive branding of your website including logo, colours, fonts, and imagery.
• Content creation (up to 500 words)
• SEO (On-page)
Gold
• Up to 15 pages
• Mobile responsive
• Comprehensive branding of your website including logo, colours, fonts, and imagery, plus tone of voice.
• Content creation (up to 1000 words)
• SEO (On-page + 3 months Off-page)
Can you fix my existing website or do you build a new one?
It depends. As explained above, most websites are running on old technology which isn’t suited to the modern web. This means that in many cases it’s difficult or even impossible to resolve certain issues. For that reason we’d prefer to build a new state of the art site from scratch so that you get the fastest website and the best possible experience. However, if you have an old WordPress site that you would like us to look at, in most cases we can probably speed it up and make it load faster. If we can’t speed it up by 20% or more, we’ll give you your money back.
Which website builder platform do you use?
Our websites are built on WordPress. WordPress powers most of the world’s internet sites, which means that many of our customers are already familiar with it. Sites built on WordPress often rank highly in search engines due to it’s strong SEO characteristics. WordPress is also highly flexible due to a large range of plugins that are readily available.
Who writes the content for the website?
With our silver and gold packages the content creation is included, but if you would prefer to write your own content that’s ok, If you decide to write your own though, we can suggest tweaks that you can make to optimise your site for the search engines.
Will my website be optimised for search engines?
Yes, if you chose either our gold or silver package we will make sure that the content and configuration of your website is optimised for ‘On Page SEO’. Although your website is ‘search engine friendly’ this is only half the story, in order to really make it fly it will usually also need what is know as ‘Off Page SEO’. This is a separate service which is NOT included in our web design package. However, if you wish to learn more about our ‘Hollywood style Off Page SEO’ then please check out our SEO page… https://olympusdigitalmarketing.com/seo/
Is the website mine or do I rent it?
Once we’ve built it the website it’s yours. However, we do offer monthly maintenance packages which range from basic maintenance and security, to writing high quality blog posts for you. These maintenance packages are optional but if this is something you are interested in please ask us for details.
What about domain names and hosting?
It’s up to you. You can purchase you own domain name and hosting or we can do it for you. If you do decide to purchase your own it’s often best to avoid the big names like GoDaddy, they aren’t very good and they’re also usually expensive. We can give you recommendations if you need them. If you purchase domain names or hosting through us, there will be an annual renewal fee to cover our costs.
Are there any additional costs?
If your website is fairly basic, once we’ve handed it over to you there are no additional charges. However, if you need something a little more complicated such as search filter options, booking forms, or other fancy widgets, we may need to install additional software plugins on the site. Many of these 3rd party plugins charge a subscription fee, so obviously we would either have to charge you an ongoing subscription fee to cover these, or you would need to make arrangements to pay this yourself. We would of course discuss any additional 3rd party software costs with you before going ahead with anything.
(If you have purchased domain names or hosting through us, there is an annual renewal fee for these. See previous question)
Have Questions About Our Website Design?
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