Web Design Kent
OA Design Services is an independent Web Design Company based in Kent
We are a full-service Kent based Web Design company. We offer professional web design services that will help you reach your business goals and beyond!
How can a website benefit my business in Kent?
As a web design Kent company, we can help your business increase its sales and leads through effective web design.
Web design is often viewed by many as an expense, but business owners in Kent only view it that way because they do not realise what effective web design is capable of.
Your website should not be purely focused on design. Yes, people like to look at a well-designed website but the most important aspect of a website is getting people to use it how you intend them to use it.
Once you have a website built by a Kent based web development company you need to find ways to get the right people to visit it! This could be through methods such as SEO, Google Ads, flyers, brochures, promotional events, tv ads, radio ads, the list is endless. It’s all about finding what method works best for your business.
Whichever channel you use the goal should be to get them to visit your website where you can present all of your best and most useful information to them. Professional web design services should be able to advise you on what the best solution its.
Once your visitor has got the information they need your website should make it as easy as possible for them to be able to take the action you want them to. This could be them calling you, filling out a form, signing up to a newsletter, purchasing your product and the list of possibilities goes on.
As a business in Kent, you may want to use a local web design Kent-based company to assist you with working out how a website can benefit your business.
Web Design - From Concept to Execution
How do you properly design a website? With the help of our web design in Kent, we can help you understand every step from concept to education. We will be looking into some of these elements in more detail, but we’ll start by looking at your business requirements and website goals to find out how they work together.
We start with the project plan, in which we build the site map, working out what pages and what content you want, categorising and linking the pages as suits. We will build wireframes for the pages, so you get a basic idea of how the website looks and works before the page is populated with content and visual design assets.
What do web designers use to build websites? As a team dedicated to comprehensive web design Kent, we use a variety of tools, including coding software, digital graphics software, and sometimes site-building tools like a content management system (CMS) such as WordPress. These tools we use in the actual construction of the site depends largely on the needs of the client and site.
Understanding Goals For Your New Website
Before, during, and even after the execution of website design, we will put together a list of website goals that we will track and ensure we’re creating the site that you want. An essential part of site design is making sure these goals also meet your business requirements.
However, there are other requirements you have to consider outside of the business too, including essential capabilities, functions, and factors related to how it is used.
For instance, site goals can include things like:
- Increasing sales through SEO, marketing content, calls to action, and conversion rate optimisation.
- Demonstrating brand authority through valuable content, updates, and linking to social media accounts.
- Improving customer relationships through online support, webinars, helpful content, and email marketing linked to the website.
- Create brand recognition by generating the content, working with social media accounts, managing promotions on-site and more.
As a premium web design Kent company, we can ensure that not only will your site design help you reach your site goals, but that we will create a multi-faceted online strategy all dedicated to meet your site goals and business requirements they’re attached to.
Gathering Business Requirements
The goals of your website are largely going to be tied to your business requirements. We’ve helped a variety of businesses nail down the business requirements with our professional web design Kent services; here are some of the steps we take to define them:
- Gathering members of the C-suite, CEOs, CFOs, for marketing team heads, and for IT team leaders.
- Ask them about their perceived requirements with the help of site prototypes, storyboards, brainstorming with them and so on.
- Note different objectives (sales, lead generation, client support, etc.) and the digital channels that will work with the site (SEO, Google Ads, social media) etc.
- Generate a Business Requirement Document, outlining all the different requirements named
- Identify the site goals tied to each business requirement and prioritize them.
- Create key performance indicators to measure how well the website meets the individual business requirements.
- Set targets for website analytics stats that are directly linked to the KPIs you want to meet and document.
- Document all objectives, how they are measured, and how they are reported.
- Talking over the document with the team, making sure they are happy with it, and that any concerns about missing or lower priority business requirements are addressed.
Website User Testing
Beyond content and visuals, what determines good web design is usability, also known as the user experience. This usability is essential. Poor usability means that a visitor will not be able to easily find what they came to the site for in the first place. If that happens, they’re likely to go on to the next site instead.
As a web design agency in Kent, we ensure that this usability is testing time and time again from the prototyping stage onwards.
User testing most often involves having members of the team performing tasks that test different parts of the site repeatedly and marking down any difficulties that crop up during those tests. There are multiple types of user testing, including the following:
- Heatmaps
- A/B testing
- Interactive wireframes
- Sketched prototypes
- Eyetracking
- And more
The site can be tested in a specific location with a moderator present. It can also be tested remotely across the world, with a moderator either watching through screen sharing software or by reading reports generated by the testers.
User testing is likely to continue up until even after the website has been launched, optimising it for visitors as much as we possibly can.
Putting Together a Content Plan For Your Website
The assets and components that make up the individual pages of the website will have been designed by this time. Placeholder content may have been implemented so that both you and your Kent web development company can have a good idea of how content will look when it’s on the site.
Once the wireframe of the site is in place, and the visual assets have been added, it’s time to put together a content plan. In some cases, the content may be planned before the sitemap is put together, with content informing the design. In most cases, the team has a vague idea of what pages are for what content, but the content in itself is planned and implemented later.
As part of a marketing plan, the content will be planned to fit the different parts of the buying lifecycle (awareness, consideration, and purchase decision). As such, there will be content designed to highlight products and services and the needs they fit, content designed to convince visitors why products and services are the right choices, and content that offers support for those who already made their purchase.
The content plan will differ majorly from website to website, so you need to work with your web design agency in Kent to understand what the plan is truly going to look like.
Web Design Quality Assurance
Also referred to as “QA”, quality assurance is often confused or and used interchangeably with user testing. QA’s job is different, however, in that it’s about discovering design issues and development errors when a website is mostly complete, as well as ensuring that the user interface and user experience meet the standards set out by the website goals and business requirements. QA can involve testing various aspects of the site under a range of variables, such as on different devices, with different internet connection speeds, on different operating systems and so on. There are honestly more variables than any QA process will be able to cover, but the aim is to be as comprehensive as possible so that the vast majority of users will have no problems when visiting the website. Quality assurance can also involve simulating live use conditions by having multiple users testing at the same time, simulating the kind of traffic that your website can expect when it’s launched fully. As such, QA is often the last step before the website is ready to launch. However, that’s not where the job of a Kent web development company ends.
Maintenance For Your New Website
Long after the website has launched, maintenance is essential for ensuring that things keep running smoothly. This includes time-sensitive steps such as updating the site’s security to meet new threats and patches to optimise it with browser and operating system changes.
Maintenance can include a wide range of tasks, including the following:
- Continuously checking for and fixing page/asset load errors
- Backing up the website and testing the backup
- Ensuring forms work as expected
- Running updates on website and plugin software
- Check pages for spam comments and posts and removing them
- Checking for and fixing broken links and media assets
- Checking for and fixing any 404 errors
- Optimising website load speed
- Scanning security logs and making sure any noteworthy issues are investigated
- Looking over website analytics and providing feedback based on the data
- Reviewing structure and navigation based on live user experience
- Updating graphics and media based on brand changes
- Tweaking and correcting language throughout the site
As you can tell, maintaining a website can easily become a full-time job. However, not every task will have to be performed as regularly as the others and we will ensure a focus on the core issues first.1
Balancing Your Kent Based Business Requirements with User Needs
As a professional web design Kent-based company, our primary goal is to meet the needs of you, the client. However, sometimes it is our job to tell you when we think your ideas regarding website design aren’t the best suited for all.
Usually, we will bring up and discuss the conflicts that arise between business requirements and user needs. For instance, pop-ups do not match user needs. Most of them would likely prefer they were never included in a website, but they could be a key lead generation tool on your website.
Rather than saying “no pop-ups”, however, we will work with you to balance your requirements with the user experience. This can include looking at the overall user experience and spreading out the aspects of site design that are business requirement based. For instance, we would measure where and when we use pop-ups so that they’re not constantly interrupting the user journey.
We can also use the user data and analytics to see where your business requirements risk getting in the way of your website objectives. If we see that a certain page is where most users stop using the site and that it’s due to a business requirement, we know where to balance in favour of user needs next.
Developing a Marketing Plan
A website is often considered the core of any online marketing strategy. We can advise you on various digital marketing strategies such as SEO, social media, web advertisements, new media channels and more. With that in mind, the marketing plan can work as a direct extension of the website goals, as well.
For instance, if one of your website objectives is to increase sales, then you can use social media ads and Google ads designed to lead people directly to product pages. If the aim is to increase brand awareness, then your marketing plan may lean more heavily in using search engine optimisation and social media presence building in order to enhance the site’s visibility.
Here are the steps we will usually follow when developing a marketing plan for the sites:
- Defining the website goals and finding the marketing methods and platforms that best fit them.
- Nailing the target audience and using targeting methods available in each platform to match them.
- Budgeting aspects of the plan, such as ad buy, in order to meet marketing objectives within a set period of time.
A digital marketing plan can change based on the shifting business goals and how the website plays into them as well, so the marketing plan is rarely a one-and-done affair.
Designing a Mobile-Friendly Version of Your Site
More and more web users are browsing the internet not on standard desktops and laptops, but on handheld mobile devices, such as smartphones, tablets, and even some portable game consoles.
As such, ensuring that your website hits your market means that you have to look at creating a mobile-friend version of your website. If you can provide high-quality website design on mobile, tablet and desktop it will largely improve the experience potential clients have on your website. There are three primary types of mobile-friendly design, they are known as the following:
Adaptive: These are effectively mirror versions of a website that are created and hosted separately. When a mobile user attempts to access the website, the site will detect the device they are using and redirect them to the mobile site instead.
Responsive: There is no alternative form of the website, but rather the web design assets change depending on the device. Different text boxes and visual assets will resize automatically based on screen resolution, and content may rearrange itself.
Responsive plus server-side support: This is effectively responsive design, but it operates much quicker because an already-made arrangement of the side is loaded, rather than loading before rearranging itself.
As a web design agency in Kent, we can look at your website and find the best version of mobile-friendliness that works for you based on size and need.
We Have Great Answers
Ask Us Anything
How much will a website cost?
Different web designers or web design Kent agencies will often price websites in different ways. Some will charge by the number of pages, some will charge an hourly rate, others sometimes charge a monthly subscription.
Whilst none of the above is the right or wrong way to price a website but here at OA Design Services, we price websites slightly different.
We’re committed to helping you to achieve your business goals. We see your website as a tool. Therefore, we implement project-based pricing. Our prices are based on the return on investment we think you will get from a project. That way we know you will be getting good value for money. We build solution-based websites and not just websites that look pretty.
Our web design Kent services typically range anything from £1000 to £10,000 depending on your business goals and needs. There is no hidden cost in our prices and once you have paid we do not ask for more money throughout the project; everything is priced in.
How long will it take to build a new website?
The length of time it takes to build a website depends on many factors. The first and most obvious reason would be the size of the website. Second would be how complex it is. Does it need special or custom features? The third is any holdups that may occur. If the web designer needs information off of the client sometimes this can take quite some time. Business owners are often busy with their business and do not get time to supply the web designer with the required information for the project.
To give you an estimate most projects take anything between 1 to 2 months but can take longer because of the points above.
Does my website need to be maintained once it's complete?
Yes, your website will need to be updated and backed up regularly. This ensures it is always running efficiently and it always has a newly updated back up off-site in case of any outside attacks on your site. A maintenance plan can be set up where we would look after your website for you.
If I want changes after the website’s completion will that cost?
Once your website is complete and is paid for in full the website becomes fully your property and will therefore be handed over to you. If you want to make changes we can show you how to make them or if your uncomfortable with making changes we can arrange a maintenance plan. Maintenance plans vary in price depending on what needs to be done. Usually, they are around £100 per month or if you do not need maintenance regularly it can be charged hourly at £50 per hour.
I’ve already got a website but it's outdated, can you redesign it?
We will always re-build websites instead of redesigning an existing one. Quite often a rebuild would be quicker to do than a redesign. With a rebuild, we can also ensure it has been built correctly and there are no problems. We can use all the existing content on your old website and we would build the new site on an alternative domain using our own hosting meaning there would be no disruption to your existing site whilst the new one is being built.
Can I keep my domain name and hosting?
Yes absolutely. Building a new website does not mean you need a new domain name or hosting. Having an older domain name is also beneficial for search engine optimisation so we would encourage you to keep your existing domain and hosting plan if possible instead of changing or buying a new one. We can, however, advise you on whether it’s worth changing hosting plans in order to get a better service, deal and speed of web site.
Build brand awareness, build Authority and Generate Leads
Are You ready To Take The Next Step?
What happens after you submit a contact form?
Step 1
We will arrange a quick discovery call to find out more about what you’re looking for.
Step 2
We will have a second call to understand your business goals and what you hope to achieve from your website.
Step 3
We send you a proposal and quote.
Step 4
If we’re both happy with everything we get going with the project!
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