How to Build a Professional Business Website that Converts

How to Build a Professional Business Website that Converts

Building a professional website and doing it right takes time, effort and investment.

Unfortunately, there are no real shortcuts to amazing website design. Many small businesses turn to cheap website builders for their websites, which can work fine, but will often stifle growth.

Your business needs a website that is unique to you, can easily grow, and will nurture prospects into warm leads.

In order to do so, you’re going to need support from people with key skills.

Who is involved in building a business website?

Building a great professional website that will do your organisation justice requires skills from three key professions:

Web Designer

A web designer creates the initial magic, refining your brand into an aesthetically pleasing, logically functional website.

They bring together visual elements such as text, graphics, video, imagery and much more into one cohesive concept; a concept that represents your business and serves to perform your key actions, be that converting into sales on site, getting in touch, etc.

Web Copywriter

To accompany your designs, you need carefully constructed messaging – this comes from a web copywriter.

All of your website’s content needs to communicate in your target audience’s language. Without excellent copy, your website’s imagery serves only as vanity points.

Say you sell artisan baked goods – you can have all the high-res, beautiful imagery in the world, but without great copy backing it up, it’s irrelevant.

Web Developer

Once your designs and copy are perfected, your concepts are passed onto the web developer who brings it all to life with careful and clever coding.

Websites need to be coded correctly in order to avoid technical issues and glitches further down the line. It’s essential that this work is done by a highly skilled, experienced developer, as this will have a significant impact on how your website performs and the overall user experience.

Our team of designers, copywriters and developers are on hand to build a website that drives your business’ performance. Get in touch today to find out how. 

What kind of website do you need?

This is an essential question to ask. Many businesses built websites because it was the done thing, and because their competitors were doing so, but now, more than ever, it’s essential that you know exactly why you’re building a website.

  • Are you looking to drive sales?
  • Do you want to warm up prospects?
  • Do you need to educate your audience?
  • Are you looking for an eCommerce platform to sell directly off?

Define your end goal before you get started. If you’re not sure how to go about this, contact experts to talk through your website’s needs.

The website build process

Once you’ve decided you need a website (and what its purpose is), it’s time to build it.

Choose your content management system (CMS)

Getting this right is essential. Your CMS is the platform that your website is built on.

You might choose HubSpot or WordPress for lead generative, content-based sites, or you might decide to choose ShopifyMagento or WooCommerce for an eCommerce site.

Plan out the website

Once you’ve established this, it’s time to get planning.

Your website designer will create a framework (or wireframe) of how your website will look. This might take the form of a flow chart, and is done to determine how the user journey should play out, from homepage to service pages and more.

This is also where the barebones of graphics and content will be planned, and key SEO messaging will be established.

Create designs & copy

This is the stage where everything starts to become a little more tangible.

The designer will put together colour palettes and layouts that are designed to suit your sector, but also to help you stand out from the crowd.

They’ll also develop key graphics and create style guides for your website (including fonts and other key design elements).

The copywriter will also be heavily involved at this stage, crafting your key messaging to accompany your designs, as well as fleshing out key sections of the website with carefully seeded SEO keywords and relevant content.

Website development

Once signed off and agreed, it’s over to the web development team, who develop page templates and program your website to fulfil its specified function.

This is a job considered by many to be wizardry, so we won’t go into too much detail on this occasion!

Final launch

Now that your website has been constructed and is ready to go, it’s time for launch!

Launching your website in the right way is just as important as the build. You’ll want social posts, email campaigns, tailored SEO and targeted PPC throughout the process. What’s the point in having a new website if nobody ever sees it?

This is where your ongoing marketing is key – your efforts don’t stop once the website’s launched. You’ve invested a lot into building your website, it’s crucial that you continue to update it with great content and keep improving it over time, otherwise it’s a waste of money.

How much does it cost to build a website for SMEs in the UK?

Website costs vary dramatically depending on the size and function of your website. Advice that we always give to our partners: you don’t get a good website for a grand.

A great website will drive your business’ growth; think of it as an employee who works 24/7/365. Properly invest in it, and your website will provide a substantial ROI.

Properly constructed websites for SMEs will average around £8,000-£15,000, but can be more or less depending on the size of your website and various other factors.

While this may seem like a lot of upfront investment (and it is), the potential value of your website far outweighs the initial costs.

Take one of our partners, Premier Labels, for example. Following a full website rebuild and a marketing overhaul, they were able to drive a 98% increase in website conversions following a 747% increase in overall website traffic.

This ROI goes far above and beyond their investment.

You can read more about Premier Labels’ success with Catalyst by reading their case study by clicking here.

Build your ideal business website with Catalyst

If you’re looking to build a new professional website for your business, then it’s a waste of money if you don’t commit. Your website needs to outperform your competitors, and the only way to do that is to invest properly.

We highly recommend talking to our team at Catalyst. We have the in-house expertise required to build you a business website that converts, helping to meet organisational growth targets.

Get in touch with our experts today. We’re on hand to talk through your unique requirements and to help you build a website that generates the business that you deserve.

The longer you wait, the further behind you get.

Don’t like filling in forms?

Email us at: hello@wearecatalyst.co.uk

Or call us on: 0121 296 5275

Need more information? Download the ultimate guide to creating a website that delivers leads by clicking the link below.