Web Design on a Budget

You have a business. You have a website. Your website is not bringing traffic and a quick look can tell you why but you are being pulled from two ends, you know you’re missing out on a ton of business but you have a budget each month that you have to stick to. 

You’ve dabbled around the idea of getting a new site built but your day is kind of busy running your business and really don’t have the time or desire to sift through the real differences between the “FREE” sites like WIX and 1 and 1 type offers, the crazy amount of solicitation from our friends in India that promise quick, easy and CHEAP website design and the confusion about the $18k price tag that the big design company quotes, leaving you to question what in the world could be the true end advantages or disadvantages of all the above.  After all, you just want to win the race, you only care that you’re in the driver’s seat win that checkered flag gets waving.

“Just get my business site up and bringing me traffic”, right?

So let’s talk about traffic and why “traffic” is maybe not all you care about.  There are an untold amount of “marketers” that really do only care about “traffic”, they have traffic exchange sites that do nothing but send others to your sites and hold them there for a few seconds.  Most of these types of folks are selling visitors on the idea that they could make quick easy money by selling the idea of making quick easy money to others, (did I lose you there?).

Some people only care about traffic because their sites are generating revenue from Ads.  For these sites it’s important that they get a lot of traffic for any reason and there really is no particular product or service that a visitor is asked to consider.  The model behind these sites is all about ad revenue and if you understand how Ad Sense and others work then you know that you get paid per thousand views.  This might mean that the ads that a site like this has set up will pay out $40 for every 1 thousand unique ad views and a bit more for click through.

For those websites the answer is absolutely they only want traffic.  But for genuine businesses, for websites that represent and real product or service, it’s not just about the traffic, it’s about the conversion rate of that traffic. 
If you offer shoes on your website then you really only care about getting visitors that are now or will be in the market to purchase your shoes.  Getting random people to click on your site that have no interest in shoes is really a great waste of your time and efforts.

OKAY, now that we’ve laid the ground work for this conversation about websites on a budget we can clear up some misconceptions about how much a great website really does cost and why a great website could change your whole business.

Wait! Before we go there I just want to clarify that having a great website that is optimized and responsive is NOT the same as a good advertising campaign and does not automatically replace the need to market your business.  You need to understand SEO is all about ORGANIC traffic and organic traffic will not appear overnight.  Getting your business website developed correctly will put you on the road to organic search engine rankings but there are hundreds of factors that need to all be working together to get to your destination.

Will you get better traction from the website you spent $18k or the website you spent $5 a month on?

The answer is:

You’re asking the wrong question.

The web development industry has no regulated MRSP for consumers to judge the deal they are getting.  There is really no way to put a sticker price on websites because each site can be vastly different and be using many different tools, features and technology.

I’m getting close to giving the ingredients for a great website so hang in there.

Since everything about your website is designed to bring attention to your business and the search engines are the traffic cops for search queries, let’s make this easy to wrap our minds around by taking the whole thing off the net and into your life.

Let’s pretend that you have a rare and unique medical condition and for this scenario let’s say that money is no object.  Without the proper treatment you may end your journey on planet earth years earlier than needed. (I know, it’s a bit over kill, but hear me out).

If you needed to make sure you put your future into the best possible hands and if you had just 10 doctors to choose from; you would most certainly do your research.

So all 10 of these specialists have said they are the best in what they do.

9 of them actually spell it out several times and even title their information with your rare medical condition, one is a bit vague.  Out goes that 10th one.  Now down to 9 choices.

7 of those left have lots of follow information about your condition and provide you with many different papers that outline how others have survived, what they have done in addition to treatment, alternative treatments and so on.  Out goes those that didn’t provide this now we’re down to 7 good choices.

Out of those 7 choices, 3 had all their information laid out in a way that told you where to get more education and their reports were clear to understand.  4 of them gave you a bundle of paper and no idea how to move through it.  Out goes those 4, now we have 3.

Now out of those 3 you find that they all included pictures that showed you a visual representation of their success and it’s hard to determine who will be the one you pick.  You notice that 2 of them have been mentioned in 20 industry papers and 1 of them only in 18 so you decide to go with one of the doctors that were better recognized by others.  Overall they both had prior clients that gave them good reviews and you are left with a hard choice. 

Then you see that out of the 2 choices 1 had been around for 5 years and the other had only been on the scene for 6 months.  Given the similar factors for everything else, you really have no choice but to trust the one that has been doing this longer, after all, this is YOUR life!

Take that scenario that we broke down, add 500 million plus choices and a few hundred areas to compare the doctors and you are now sitting where the search engines are.

On top of that, the search engines have seconds to filter all the info and deliver back the top choices.

So what I wanted to bring home is that when it gets down to the final spots on a Google search and you are missing or ignoring even a few factors that you don’t think matter; you should know that they do indeed matter to the search engines. 

There are factors you can control and those that you can’t.

You can’t control the age of your domain.   If your business or domain is new and has no history then you will just have to work on making sure that every other aspect of your website is rolling at full strength.   Google ranks your website and your rank is how Google tells itself and the world how much trust and faith they have in the information you are providing.

You can control how your site is laid out and how the code that sits behind the scene is written to help the search engines understand what you are trying to say and get across to visitors that may be viewing your website.

You can control the type and amount of content on your website.  Each new article, blog, page, and post can be used to convey to the world your authority in any given area.  Using words that are designed to answer questions and solve problems for your visitors is crucial for your success.   Read more about content to get a better and more detailed plan for your content strategy.

You can control, to some extent the amount of people that are talking about your business by providing them with information that they want to share as well as interacting with existing customers and clients and making sure that they will give you the thumbs up when any of their circle of influence needs or wants what you have to offer.

This article was titled web design on a budget and I am sure that many that started out reading have abandoned it long before this closing statement.  The issue here is that your website is everything when it comes to getting a slice of the online business that goes one each minute of each day and looks are not good enough to get the pie to your door. 

There are other factors that are involved.  Dot Web Solutions has several options that can help you to get a professional website on a budget while still looking at the long term goals.

If you’re a current client of ours then you know this already.  If you have yet to find out for yourself what makes us different then what are you waiting for?  Call us right now and see how we can turn your frustration into a solution.  

We are located in Colorado Springs, CO.  Make sure to ask us about our Business Strong Initiative!  Call now 719 302-5029, you have nothing to lose and everything to gain.