In this article, we pull back the curtain and show you how not all websites are created equal. Good web design not only looks great but also performs well – meaning a positive experience for the user (UX) and web pages that convert to leads for your business. When you set out to build a new website or enhance the one you already have, make sure you are covering all the bases.
The Staggering Cost Of a Cheap Website
Low-cost web development that looks too good to be true is probably just that – too good to be true. Many companies learn the hard way that cutting corners with cheap web design or using cookie cutter templates to launch too quickly can backfire. Template approaches may work in the short term, but they often restrict your opportunity for brand distinction, don’t deliver a pleasant user experience, and aren’t built with growth and adaptability in mind. If your website is slow and error-prone, it will drive customers away. And if it isn’t optimized, potential customers might never find you in the first place.
Even Good Web Design Can be Better
Even if your current website is working just fine, chances are that improvements could still change the way potential customers engage with your company. That’s not a criticism of your website, it’s just a fact. Multiple technical studies have shown that it takes a user just 500 milliseconds to form a snap judgment of your website. And recent reports indicate that you have 15 seconds to capture your visitors’ attention. So, that first impression really counts. If you want to turn those “maybe” visitors into clients, a quality-built website can make the difference. With greater functionality and adaptability, your website will represent your organization accurately and effectively
The Unseen Earnings in Digital Marketing
If you are new to the business side of websites, it’s worth knowing that the benefits mentioned above only cover surface-level possibilities. The rabbit hole goes deeper. We’ve mentioned aspects like good web design and first impressions, but many web development protocols and best practices aren’t easy to see on the surface. Consider, for example:
User Experience
User experience (UX), or the industry way of referring to how the customer interacts with your site, is of utmost importance. It’s easy to think of UX as simply a matter of aesthetics, but in actuality, a good web development agency knows that UX involves so much more. Design layouts, navigation menus, paths, formatting and calls-to-action are among the many tiny details that come together to deliver a stellar user experience. The digital world’s colossal companies invest heavily on streamlined UX to keep clients engaged, so there might be something to it.
A professional web agency’s understanding of UX can turn a good-looking website into a highly effective one. That may involve a nuanced, sleek and simplistic interface to guide the user. For example, Blue Lotus Yoga’s single splash slider with effectively no information is a bold move, and yet in that 500 milliseconds you know what the website is about. Just as yoga is a relaxing practice, the simple three-element menu avoids being overly flashy and guides the user exactly where we want them to be. Compare that to the medical practice Cary Orthopedics, where an abundance of information needs to be available. The use of a mega menu puts the relevant options at the one-click level, right at the users’ fingertips.
Obviously, a yoga studio website shouldn’t feel like an orthopedic website; a professional agency knows how to make your website feel like its own.
Search Engine Optimization
Search engine optimization, commonly referred to as SEO, is meant to appeal to search engines like Google and DuckDuckGo. In a way, SEO is all about getting the search engines to do advertising for you. Some may think this only involves metadata and keywords, but everything from image quality to how your website appears on a mobile device to website security can affect your search engine visibility. A knowledgeable web development agency understands these details that will help get your company in front of the right people. That is always money well spent.
Getting SEO right is a delicate process. It’s easy to hammer out the first few meta tags that come to mind, but it’s usually not that simple. SEO includes researching keyword competition to make intelligent keyword choices, understanding how search engine algorithm changes affect your website’s visibility, and managing all your pages collectively to give you the greatest search authority. You have a website for a reason, and an SEO professional will make that reason clear to your clients.
Web Analytics
Last but not least, data analytics are important for maximizing website performance. There are many good-looking websites that don’t attract new users or convert to leads/sales. How do you know if your site is performing or not? And how do you improve an underperforming website? Intelligent analytics tracking can deliver the answers.
Using industry tools like Google Analytics, Tag Manager, Moz, Ahrefs, CrazyEgg and integrated marketing automation software enables you to monitor customer behaviors on your site. This information can tell how many customers looked at your sales pages, which products or services they were seeking and how they responded. Your website can provide information that you cannot get otherwise. The data can be used internally to make educated and lucrative decisions as your company grows.
Most analytics software tools are available to any company, but it takes a professional to capitalize on them. We utilize analytics to learn about user demographics, device preferences and location of your users and custom tailor strategies with this new information. By heat mapping web pages, we can see where a user goes and they move through a website, where they convert and where they leave your site if they don’t take action. Data also informs us about how search engines perceive your website, pinpointing pages that have search authority and those that don’t. All this information comes together and allows a professional web agency to advance your marketing strategy.
Good Web Design and Development
Most business leaders and marketing execs recognize the importance of their website. In today’s marketing mix, your website is the central hub of your brand and key messages, and it can be an incredibly valuable marketing tool for creating awareness and generating sales leads. But if you are like many professionals, you might not be seeing the results you want. The online marketplace is a vast expanse with many moving parts. A cheap website might seem more economical in the short term, but getting what you pay for may mean lost sales.
Think of your website as a sales rep who is earning revenue for your company. A well-designed website considers client needs and can direct users to the information they need 24 hours a day. A knowledgeable website agency willdeliver not only good web design but a robust marketing machine.
