You need to hire website designer to build a website for you and you are not quite sure what to expect. First it is not as easy as just slapping content onto the internet. It does take an experienced website designer some time, planning along with gathering the customer goals and expectations. Most website designers will never move forward without gaining customer approvals, information and artwork as this would undoubtedly cause unnecessary and costly changes as well as an unhappy customer if for some reason the website designer is not on the same page as the customer.

Part of this process is to locate a website builder and designer who will first listen to your business goals, show you some examples, gain some agreement of the direction and then provide you with an estimate of the “scope” of work that is to be provided along with costs and possible “what if’s”.

What does the website build include?

Your website builder should covers the following items with you before and during the entire process.

1. Set client expectations. This means deadlines, costs, materials needed upfront. Agreement of the design, layout, features and functionality as well as the pages to be included. Also must be discussed the what if’s of not providing needed information, or provide the downside of certain scenarios in case of challenges that sometime do arise. ie. No login to current hosting account.
2. Gathering the credentials. You need logins to current hosting and domain names. Social Media accounts etc.
3. Following procedures.
   • Review everything. All collateral should be looked over including images. Make sure that copyrights are legal and that we have a right to post/publish images.
   • Speed, performance and accessibility. Site platform along with plugins and associated functions will play a big part in how the site performs and functions.
   • Spam and security. Install and test to prevent hacks and hijacking and unnecessary comments.
   • SEO and Google Search Console. Need monitoring of traffic and trends at all times. Implement corrective actions.
   • Social media. In today’s world, a must not only for SEO but credibility and marketing.
   • Favicon.
   • Ecommerce considerations. Is there an opportunity to sell something without having your customers come in? Gift certificates, tickets etc.
   • SSL certificates. Today, more valuable.
   • URL changes and redirects. From old sites to new site pages as not to lose existing position or traffic.
   • Email deliverability. Testing of email accounts.
4. Deploying the site. The day we launch your site on the internet. We will also take down the old site if possible.
5. Handing control over to client. Once all items have been approved and the site is up and running and all outstanding invoices have been paid, the access to hosting, and other new accounts created will be provided.
6. On-Going Monthly Maintenance & Monitoring. Must consider that your website will need periodic updates especially if it is built with a CMS platform like word press and that integrated plugins and upgrades will also need to be updated along with those versions. Along with the maintenance, SEO and other marketing (PPC) can be determined and budgeted for your desired goals. Need leads? More Traffic? All of these can be packaged to a monthly marketing and maintenance package.

At SOS Interactive Marketing, we have built and managed hundreds of websites for small and medium size businesses making sure that the customer’s goals are priority. Based on the information we are provided, we match up the right design as well as build in SEO from the beginning and not wait till the end. All of our sites are automatically responsive ( mobile) and our pricing includes integration of Social Media. We are not just designers but certified and an expert Search Engine Optimizer so that the web sites we build start to move up and rank faster than a website just built by a “designer”. We understand the correlation between good design, traffic and off-page and on-page optimization. We do these things upfront as it saves our clients money and they get a better optimized and higher ranking sites faster and thus better results.

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Stellar Online Services

Owner

Providing over 30 years of award winning Marketing and Advertising experience with Digital Marketing Strategy. Effective Websites and Landing pages for humans and SEO.