Want to have a website made for your company? Then of course you want it to look professional and be well put together. Having a good website is very important.
If your website does not look professional or is very slow, website visitors will turn around and go to a competitor's website. Of course, you don't want that! In this blog, we will guide you through the world of websites, tell you what to look out for and what options are available. In short, you will find everything you need to know in this blog.
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Online website makers
There are a lot of online website makers these days that allow you to design and put a website online yourself. This might cause you to run into the dilemma: make it yourself or outsource?
What are your expectations for your website?
Of course, as a web agency, we might be a bit biased in that choice, but we have to admit that it is not impossible to create a website yourself. You just have to carefully consider what your expectations are for your website and whether it is feasible to do it yourself. You shouldn't forget your competitors in this decision either. If they have a very good and professional website, you should be able to compete with them. Will you be able to live up to it yourself, or would it be better to have a website made by an external party?
If you want more than a somewhat simpler website that serves as an online business card, then we definitely recommend you go for having your website created. Simply because a web agency has the specialists for that. They can create the website entirely according to your wishes and ensure that your website can hold on to visitors.
Want to invest time or money in your website?
You may be thinking of going ahead with a website yourself to cut costs. But remember that a lot of time goes into creating a professional website. So will you go for time saving and have a good professional website made? Or do you get started yourself and invest a lot of time in it?
Having your website maintained
After having a website created, it also needs to be maintained to keep it up-to-date and secure. This is fairly easy to do yourself, but can also be outsourced if you don't want to do it yourself.
At Monkey Vision , you can take out a monthly maintenance package. When you use this, we will maintain your website for you. We check your website weekly to make sure there are no problems. We make sure your website is safe and fast. We also make sure your website is secure. You do not have to worry about possible hacker attacks. If your website does get hacked, we will make sure it is fully restored.
Besides these standard maintenance tasks, we will give you a monthly report of everything we have done for your website. Do you run into problems? Then we are always available for all your questions and problems. Feel free to contact us.
What should you pay attention to?
Okay, you've tied the knot on whether to make your own website or have it made. But what do you need to know when creating a professional website? In other words: what do you want your website to do?
The readability, user-friendliness and attractiveness of your website is very important. After all, your target audience should be able to use your website easily and should also like your website. If your website does not meet these requirements, your target audience will turn around again after they have landed on your website.
There are 10 elements that contribute to these aspects. These are what you should pay close attention to when getting a professional website created:
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Have a brand identity and logo created too
A brand identity with a good logo ensures that your brand becomes recognisable to the target group. It shows who you are as a brand and should also be continued beyond your website. So include this in all other expressions, such as on social media.
Still looking for a party to create a logo and brand identity for you? Our friends at Heroes & Weirdos are rock solid at this!
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Provide a strong intro with slogan and mission statement
The introductory text is the first piece of text that appears at the top of your website. With this piece of text you can immediately show your website visitors who you are and what you stand for. It is important that the headline of the text appeals to the reader, that it contains a good slogan and that your brand and its mission are clearly conveyed.
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Use call-to-actions
You have a goal with your website. Of course, part of that is to be able to show who you are, but most of all you want conversion to occur. By that we mean that you obviously want readers to buy something from you, purchase a service or contact you.
A call-to-action helps get these conversions. It is urges the reader to proceed to a desired action. Think clear buttons and clear text such as: read more here or become a member now. Make your call-to-actions stand out by using good text and striking colours.
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Use strong colours
Good colour use may be more important when getting a professional website created than you think. After all, colours can make your website easier to read. It can also contribute to the attractiveness of a button; thus improving the call-to-action. Many studies have been conducted into the effects of colours. Not quite there yourself? Our web designers can help you!
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Ensure good navigation
It is very important that your website is well put together and also easy to navigate. Your menu should be visible and in a clear place, at the top of your website. It is also important that the pages on your website and the page titles are made in such a way that visitors know where to go and what information can be found on a page.
When you have a professional website made, this will be taken into account immediately. Are you going to do it yourself? Then it is a point to keep a close eye on while creating the website.
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Choose suitable photos and/or illustrations
To make your website and the texts on it more attractive, you should use photos and illustrations. It is then wise not to just use photos that are pretty, but that they match your brand and message. For example, a picture of a sweet puppy here would be very nice, but of course it says nothing about Monkey Vision or the information from this blog. So not recommended.
For good photos, you can use an online photo bank (stock photos) or have photos taken by a photographer. By having your own photos taken, you immediately create a personal touch to your website and content. Do illustrations suit your brand? Then they can certainly be used as well.
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Prove your strength: prices and testimonials
Visitors to your website are not easily convinced these days. They like to see proof of what you promise to do. Do you hold important certificates? Then show them on your website as well. It immediately gives your website a professional look.
Customer reviews can also contribute to this. Potential customers like to hear from others what they think of products and services and will make their choice accordingly. So be sure to ask your customers to leave a nice review. You can read exactly how reviews work and how to get them in the blog that two of our online marketers wrote for Frankwatching. You can read it here.
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Choose a suitable font
This point partly ties in with the one about brand identity, but is incredibly important for the readability of your website. When choosing a font, make sure it fits your brand identity and logo, but is also easy to read. If your website visitors have to work very hard to see what is written, they will leave the website. For the text font, go for simple and clean.
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Provide information about products/services and the team
When you go to have a professional website created, you most likely have a service or product you want to sell. Tell your website visitors about this too. Give them information about what it entails, what the benefits are and what the price is. And to make your brand even more appealing, tell a bit about the brand and the people behind it. People often like to know a bit more about a company.
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Provide contact details
Show your contact details! This is probably one of the most important of these 10 points. You need to give your website visitors the option to contact you. Put your phone number and e-mail address on the homepage, at the bottom of the site and on a contact page. Preferably show the address as well. Want to make it even easier for your potential customers to contact you? Then have a contact form created on your professional website.
What are the possibilities at Monkey Vision?
Now comes the next point: what is possible for a website? You obviously want your website to stand out and be prettier and better than those of your competitors, but how?
At Monkey Vision , we have many options, both in website design and functionalities, and in everything else. The options we have at Monkey Vision:
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Have a (professional) website made
When you have your professional website made at Monkey Vision , we work on it together until the website is absolutely perfect. With many sites under our belt, we have gained a lot of experience to make sure your website is just the way you want it.
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Creating an online shop
Want to sell your products directly from the internet? Then an online shop is a must. At Monkey Vision , we have had the pleasure of creating many effective online shops, so we know exactly how to apply the right techniques. For example, we ensure that all necessary payment methods are linked and that the online shop works optimally.
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Search engine optimisation (SEO)
Having a professional website created is the first step, but then your target audience also needs to know how to find your website. Search engine optimisation ensures that your website can be found more easily in Google. The better you apply search engine optimisation, the higher your chances of ranking high in Google. And that is useful, because just think about how you use Google yourself; you probably don't look much further than the first page of search results.
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WordPress support and maintenance
We've talked about this before. It is incredibly important to also maintain your professional website after you have it created. It ensures that your website remains secure and up-to-date. Would you rather outsource the maintenance? Then read more about our maintenance package here.
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Link building
Link building contributes to getting a higher position in Google. It is one more step in addition to optimising your website and posting content. Link building is actively placing relevant links to your website and contributes to increasing the authority of your website. The higher the authority, the better Google understands that your website is a good contributor within certain topics.
You can choose to start link building yourself, or you can outsource. At Monkey Vision , we have an enthusiastic marketing team that would love to get to work on that for you!
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Hosting and domain name
Your website cannot just go online, you need to have it hosted. Hosting parties provide you with space to store information, images and other content for your website. A good hosting environment ensures that your website is optimally accessible. Of course, every website also needs a unique domain name, the address where your website can be reached. At Monkey Vision , you can not only have a professional website created, but also have your domain name registered and your website hosted.
How long will it take?
Is everything clear to you now? Do you have an idea of what you would like for your website? Then you probably want to know how long it will take for your professional website to go online. We will give you a brief insight into the schedule for having a professional website made. On average, this takes 9 weeks, but we should make it clear that there are many variables that affect this.
Preparations
Before we can start making a website for you, we need a few things from you. We will ask you in advance for the necessary data and content, such as images and texts. Once we have that, our web builders can get to work.
Getting started (weeks 1-2)
After the preparation is done, a web builder from Monkey Vision will get to work. Within two weeks, he/she will build a homepage and several other key pages, to give you a good idea of the design.
Feedback (week 3)
After setting up the homepage and main pages, there will be time and space to give feedback on these. We would like to hear your feedback on the first pages so that we can then tailor the rest of the website to your needs.
Back to work (weeks 4-6)
After receiving feedback, our web builder will continue working on your website. After three weeks, there will be a final version of the website and all requested pages will have been created. Before we actually put the professional website you've commissioned online, we once again ask for some feedback from you.
Feedback (week 7)
This is basically the last feedback moment we schedule as standard when having a website made.
Final version (week 8-9)
In the last two weeks, we will dot the i's and cross the t's and get the website ready to go live. We plan two weeks for this to ensure that all feedback can be incorporated and the website is completely satisfactory.
Do you want a website at Monkey Vision?
On our website, we give a lot of information about the different options and possibilities you have with us. Do you have any questions or would you like to get started?
Then contact us. We will be happy to help you!
