Introduction

Some things businesses buy the same items on a routine basis, such as a stationery order, yet for businesses, a website might be something that they purchase, let’s say, once every ten years.

Therefore, the company director may know that the current website looks a bit tired and dated and is in need of replacing.

The company may, therefore, want to redesign the website, yet not know how the web design process works exactly here at W&P.

Some people may say the web design process is straightforward. It is surely just a matter of explaining what you want and letting the web designers get on with the work.

However, most websites require a range of different people and skill sets to design and build the website. You might need new copywriters to write all of the text, a videographer to make the video from the autoloading video on the homepage, a web developer, a web designer, and a U.X, that’s user experience expert all working to build the website.

What type of web design company do you require?

Therefore, how many people you require will often dictate what type of web design company you will need. For example, do you need a freelancer because you have a rather restricted marketing budget?

Would you need the whole hog, everything from a web developer to an expert SEO consultant? If so, you may need to hire a web design agency.

So the first thing we would say is that you have to think about whether the company you wish to hire has all the skills you need to design the website, and whether other companies will need to be brought into the mix.

So, first things first, consider the following:

– Do you need a photographer?
– Do you need a videographer?
– Do you require a copy writer?
– Do you require an SEO expert?

Why do so many businesses come to W&P to get their website designed?

The simple answer is we are a recognised name, a trusted brand, and a trusted set of hands to design the website because of our long standing within the web design industry. With over 10 years of experience, we’ve been designing websites for a very long period, building a rock-solid reputation for quality.

So, in a nutshell here’s why so many companies hire us:

– We specialise in designing WordPress websites
– We also offer SEO services
– We offer very competitive pricing
– We can take care of writing all of the text
– We aim to offer fast turnaround times, whether it’s a brochure website or a large e-commerce website we are building
–
As an agency, we not only design quality websites at speed but also offer long-term partnerships. We can work with you to improve your organic and local search engine optimisation, ensuring your website continues to grow and evolve.

Do set timescales

So the next thing we would encourage you to think about before the web design process even begins is to ask how fast the company can design the website. If your waiting an eternity to get a brand-new website built, well, you may have wished you had gone else where.

And sure, there are web design agencies quick to send you the link to make a deposit payment, but before you do just that, do enquire how long it will take to complete the wireframes or the design.

As we have heard of companies waiting over 6-months for a basic 10 page brochure website to get designed and built.

Now, it’s all good to get a website designed for as cheap as chips, but if the website is put on the back burner for, let’s say, multiple months, it’s worth paying a bit more for a company that can design the website faster?

Well, we think so, this is always why, when our web designers get super busy, which normally is during lead up to Christmas as the peak of summer, we always honest and transparent with customers, before taking a deposit. We always try to honestly estimate how long it will take us to complete the website, rather than those web designers, where sales agents on commission and just want to take a up-front desposit, then having you hanging waiting for months for website to be designed.

Speed and quality

Then you have to balance speed and quality; the last thing you want is an overly basic website, so you need it designed fast, but don’t settle for an over simplistic website.

Kick-off meeting

Sometimes, a relatively simple website needs to be created; let’s say there will be an up-coming event in Cardiff, or a famous comedian is coming to town, or a music event; therefore, a rather simplistic website is needed to promote the event.

In this case, the client might state to our web designer over the phone what they want, and with a few emails, they can start writing the code that PHP to design a fantastic website for that business. So sometimes, we don’t need multiple meetings for the more straight-forward type websites.

However, more often than not, a much more intricate website is needed, a website this going to have to last the test of time, let’s say, the next 10 years it may well be serving that business. So often, they need to be a kick-off meeting, and when we say that we’re not talking about football, we’re talking about starting to whittle down what the client wants in a meeting with our web designers and the client.

So, in this meeting we often talk about typography and how many pages will be needed, the site structure, and brand guidelines, as well as discuss who will be writing the content marketing for each page.

Design the website

So often, before the designer even starts to write one piece of code or add a paragraph to the website, a lot of conversation is going on beforehand to make sure us web designers and the client are singing from the same hymn sheet.

Again, if it’s a rather simplistic website and sometimes our web designers can get on with that after, let’s say, a phone call or a few emails.

However, if the website is more technical, with many pages and complex features are needed, then many meetings will be needed. We’ll need your input and feedback at every stage. Your understanding of your business and your audience is invaluable and this will need to be incorporated into the design, and we’ll work closely with you to ensure the website meets your expectations.

We will also need to talk about which CMS, that’s short for content management system is right for your business
There is a huge range of content management systems out there. You’ve most probably heard of Squarespace, WordPress, and Drupal, to name a few?

So, there needs to be a conversation about which content management system you want, which will work best for your business, what will suit your businesses needs now, and in the foreseeable future.
Often, most brochure websites we build, so that’s a website that doesn’t take online payments, normally most of the time we recommend WordPress.

With that said, WordPress is now so well known, that many company directors will have owned several WordPress websites, and want the same CMS used. Often this is because, they find the WP Dashboard really well designed and laid out, plus, often the business may have had this CMS for say the last decade, so they now want WordPress again, as its served that business well.

Hosting

One of the next conversations is about hosting, as hosting prices can vary quite massively depending on the website’s speed.
So, depending on the budget, we can recommend different website hosting we can offer. We would recommend paying more for fast, reliable hosting.

Low quality, cheap hosting, we think is a false economy. If the hosting so slow, it is holding your businesses organic SEO back, well, we think this is not good, and the business should pay more for better quality hosting.

Copywriting- who’s going to be writing the text?

A considerable part of the web design process is getting the text right- or as web designers call it adding the content marketing. This too much text can be off-putting to the shopper, so much so that they leave the website and are overwhelmed by large blocks of text, this causes a sharp increase in the companies “bounce rate”.

However, on the other hand, if you don’t provide enough text information, which might not answer the customer’s query, leading to a high bounce rate again.

So its about getting the balance right, not too much text, its over whelming too the reader, not too little, that it doesn’t answer the customers questions.

Google E-EAT

So, because of the “Google E-EAT” update, copywriting, that’s the content marketing needs to be written by an expert, and we here at W&P are a web design businesses like ours work closely with the company to ensure the content marketing is high quality.

Final design
Once you’ve added the content marketing, added the photos, and worked with the videography company to the homepage,

it’s often then time to hand a temporary link to the customer.

A temporary link will then show what the website looks like, and the customer can request any adjustments they may want made.

Sign off and then the new website goes live

After the customer is happy with the final draft of the website, and then it’s just a matter of launching a website and placing it live so your customers can see it.

This means our web developers can then put the website live on that domain name.

Have you designed many websites?

With over ten years of experience, we’ve been designing content management systems for many local businesses, for a very long period of time.During that time, we’ve accumulated solid organic SEO skills, making us a reliable agency to work with.

In terms of designing websites, we’ve worked on a huge variety of websites ranging from large online retailers, retailing product lines in excess of 1000 products, right through to working with smaller construction-related businesses.

I haven’t got much time. Can you handle most of the web design process with little input from us?

This is a question that is really important to answer because it’s a situation that a lot of company directors find themselves in. Often, when you need a brand-new website designed, the website needs to look absolutely amazing, but it is often needs to be designed at a time when a director is starting their business, so they haven’t got much time.

The company director might, for example, be looking for suitable office premises, interviewing a lot of staff, or just setting up a shop and adding stock to it, which can be hugely time-consuming. So, this often comes a time when they deal with everything from shopfitters through to estate agents.

So often, the customer hasn’t got the time to work that closely with the web design company to finalise the design or even be able to write the text. Therefore, the client needs a web design company that listens carefully during an initial meeting or phone call and then can translate that into wireframes of designs the customer can look at and improve.

Thankfully, at this business, we pride ourselves on our ability to quickly grasp your business, its DNA, and its culture and start to come with design ideas.

Many clients like this because they are often so busy with other tasks that they want a web design agency like W&P to start making decisions and implementing ideas without going through multiple meetings.

Meetings are often needed, such as a kick-off meeting and multiple other meetings, if we designing larger e-commerce websites, using WordPress and Woocommerce.

What about website hosting and updates? Who takes care of this?

Here at this web design company, we can offer managed hosting via A2, we can charge a monthly or yearly fee for this service. We recommend managed hosting because we can make regular website backups, but this is more expensive than just regular hosting.

Again, the customer needs to carefully consider how much they’re willing to spend on website hosting.

How long an average does it take to design a brochure website from start to finish?

So, somebody might be just taking the plunge into self-employment or starting a new business venture, and often, they quickly learn that a lot of web design companies, they often make them wait a minimum of three months to get the website designed.

Often this is due to back-log of work, or that the company hasn’t got enough web developers in, to work on starting your website.

However, because we have such highly skilled PHP web developers working for us, we can sometimes, and this is more often than not, design a website in less than four weeks from start to finish.

What CMS does your business use the most and comes highly recommend by your web designers?

Like many web design agencies, we highly recommend WordPress. We’ve used this type of CMS for a long time now, so we have an excellent working knowledge of how WordPress works.

How much does a seven-page website cost?

We can offer a quote of £950 to design a seven-page website.

Does writing the text cost extra?
Yes, we can write the text as part of the where design process, but this does cost extra. Generally £75.00 per page, where our copywriters are required to write the main pages.

What type of businesses have you worked with in the past in Cardiff?

We work with everything from leading dental practices to well-known solicitors to construction companies. We work with a massive range of businesses because we’ve been designing websites for over ten years and have worked with diverse companies in that timeframe.

If we want amendments made to the website later, is this possible?

Most definitely, we charge a fixed hourly fee to amend the website if needed at a later date. For example, the customer might want a new product page added, so we can charge a fixed hourly fee and offer an estimate before we start any work.

Are you able to design an e-commerce website using WordPress?

Yes, many e-commerce websites use WordPress and Woocommerce, we can design a quality WordPress site for your business.

Why should we choose your marketing agency?

There are hundreds of different web design businesses located all across Wales. These businesses may well be freelancers, right through to an agency employing more than 80 staff. The reason why so many people choose us is because we aim to make the web design process as simple as we possibly can for our clients.

We keep things simple

We know that many companies use a lot of marketing jargon, which clients often don’t like. Many businesses also don’t like it when an agency hides extra charges within the fine print, such as making a website responsive or charging high costs for monthly hosting fees.

So, there are two main reasons why people choose our business: we make the web design process simple and straightforward and are very transparent with our prices.

For example, our website hosting costs are some of the most affordable available in Wales, and then there’s the fact that we design all of our websites for a fixed price and we always make them responsive for that set fee. This is quite unusual because many web designers charge extra for making the website mobile friendly.

So, break down the web design process into four simple steps for us?

The first stage is a kick-off meeting

This is to understand how many pages are needed, who will write the text, which website hosting you want, and then get a good idea of the design you want.

The second stage is for the designers to start designing the website

The designers can begin adding the text code and new pages to design the website

Can you create a website and write the text in Welsh?

We are often asked by the client who wants a combination of the English language and the Welsh language translation added to the page. Therefore, we can add the Welsh language to any page you like, and you can do this for everything from the About Us page to writing the legal text at the bottom of the website.

Have you worked with many large Welsh businesses?

We most certainly have are working with some well-known companies and brands right here in Wales.

These brands work across the U.K and are, therefore, national companies, and we have experience working with them.

Do you have experience improving a businesses marketing from start to finish and helping it grow over a sustained period of time?

We most certainly have taken businesses which have more or less started as self-employment-type business structures to help them grow over a very long period.

Therefore, we pride ourselves on partnering with the business in the long term to help it grow. Web design is a stand-alone service, yet what often happens then is often the company wants to come on board with us for us to improve the companies organic SEO, we can offer this service, which is charged monthly.

How can we obtain a web design quote?

We can provide you with a web design quote quickly. We often aim to turn around quotes within three working days. For a brochure website, we can usually offer a quote immediately on the phone.

If you would like to obtain a quote for any of the following services, then do contact us today:

• Local SEO,
• Organic SEO
• Web Design