Top tips of web design and development - How to build and grow your website effectively

What do web design and development make up? What is a potential customer focusing on visiting your website? And most importantly, what should it be integrated with to meet your expectations as a website owner?

How to create a website from scratch?

At the moment, there is over 120 website software on the market. Choosing the right option with such a wide range of offers can be confusing. There are three key points to consider when making this selection:

Software integrations: your website needs to integrate easily with your other software solutions, and the data needs to stay in sync, together with the optimizations related to API requests.

Web design: a website has to have a proper design to present professionally to all customers and that its feature-set grows with time to meet your increasing technology needs.

Project budget: the website needs to meet the budget of your project. You should expect a transparent way of measuring increasing costs together with growing sales and organization.

Characteristics of a good way for web design and development

• intuitiveness
• credibility
• consistency and responsiveness
• functionality
• clarity
  

As you can see, there aren't many points that need to be met to create the perfect website. But is it not just a theory? Well, no. With professionals at hand, creating an intuitive and functional website is not a problem.

Your brand is what other people say about you when you are not in the room Jeff Bezos on building a brand online

Steps for web design and development

Building an intuitive website is a complex process. It cannot be said that the page building step-list is short. But we can assure you that we will do it to you without exceeding the deadline and in the highest quality. Below we will show you the crucial steps of building a website:

Website template

The website template must match your industry, company’s profile, and, above all, the group of potential recipients. The template is a showcase of your website. Website themes can, of course, be customized and adjusted to your needs. Webflow experts can help you with template setup. Webflow offers over 500 templates, and most of them are free. Determining the theme of the website is the first stage of designing a website from the visual side.

Customer’s journey map

You are the one who manages the lead path on your website. A properly planned client’s journey raises the possibility of achieving a business goal - usually is selling a product or service. In this case, you can also use a tool- planning tool like Miro. An easy and intuitive path is always more pleasant for the client. It strengthens positive experiences and increases the desire to buy. Why? The fewer steps, the less time for the client to analyze their doubts. Additionally, customers are more likely to return to simple pages.

73% of people say that a positive or negative customer experience is a significant factor in their purchasing decision-making process.

UI UX design

UI/ UX design focuses on visual interaction with the customer. UX is the basis of website design. User experience design is all about designing the user activity on the website. It focuses on being practical and intuitive. UX design increases the quality of the product and eliminates errors. It is an absolute must-have, as it lowers service costs and improves website operation. A UX design can be built by a verified UI/UX designer. A valuable UX specialist is characterized primarily by skills: analytical thinking and empathy, listening, argumentation, and cooperation. At SoftwareSupp, we also check such skills of our specialists. User experience optimization involves detailed analysis of your user’s journey and optimizing the website to make sure it converts well for your website’s visitors. A UX design is prepared and delivered by using dedicated design software like Figma or AdobeXD.

In turn, the UI (user interface) is responsible for the visual design of page elements such as buttons, icons, or the entire page. These elements enable the appropriate interaction. UI requires analytical visualization.

CSS customization

What does CSS stand for?

CSS (Cascading Style sheets) is used to confer the appearance of the webpage. In other words, CSS is a list of rules that determine how the content of a given element should be displayed by the web browser. At this stage, you create your brand style. Creating your own brand style is a web design and development clue. CSS styling can be done through Webflow by using decent styling modifications or running a custom code modification. CSS is important in terms of SEO positioning because it reduces the size of a website. In SoftwareSupp, you can even order a single task such as CSS styling.‍

HTML customization

HTML is the language of the tags that structure the content of the page. At this stage, you create the conformation of your website and start SEO activities. Skillful use of the program functions (e.g.font color HTML) can help websites position better in search engines. In Webflow, HTML customization is done through the corresponding drag-drop edit process or by using built-in styling edit options. The use of expert services gives you quality assurance.

Chatbot integration

Chatbots improve customer experience. It influences the client's trust in our website. It enables fast issue resolution. Moreover, chatbots are cost-effective, because client stays longer on our website. Providing high-quality customer service is the key to success. Option to transfer to live agent eliminates the part of client's problems.

Web design

We have already decided on- the customer buys with his eyes. Therefore, graphics can not only have good quality. Briefly, it has to match the selected theme and the industry. Graphics should be designed to convince the potential customer that he is in a proper place. Web design complements a total picture of your brand. It is worth taking care of the uniqueness of the images created and the consistency of the message. In short- an unusually dressed brand is easier to sell.

Design can be performed by using 3rd party and user-friendly tools. However, building a fully custom design may distinguish you and your website among companies in your industry. If you decide to improve your brand’s image, let us know. We can find for you the best Web design expert.

Domain connection

It is the last position on the must-have list. It is necessary to launch your website and make it live under a custom name. A custom domain can be purchased through a hosting provider such as GoDaddy, WP engine, or directly through Webflow’s domain integration panel. A software specialist can easily integrate it by adding DNS records in your hosting provider’s admin panel.

Web design and development is a large subject matter. The above, mentioned issues are the basis for setting up the website. However, a developed website should also be suitably optimized. Website optimization elements listed are available below:

• Social proof - information confirming customer satisfaction metrics. The goal of this step is to convince the customer to leave the contact details. It is based on building trust by visually showing the satisfaction of previous customers on the website.
• Page speed improvement- The speed of the website not only influences the growth of positive experiences of your website user. It also impacts your SEO positioning. How to improve website performance? It can be done by minimizing HTML and CSS and reducing the size of the images. One of our experts has described steps for Webflow Page Speed Optimizations.
  

• Google Analytics integration - allows you to measure the statistics, metrics, and conversion on your website. It is a tool designed to analyze broadly understood website traffic and problems occurring on subpages. It allows you to create reports on, for example, conversion rates. Being aware of the need for data analysis can greatly affect your business outcomes. By following your customers on the site, you get to know them.

• Conversion optimization is focused on measuring, analyzing, and optimizing the number of visitors/users going through particular parts of your website. It can be conducted directly or by making A/B tests. A/B testing can be done by using Google Optimize or Optimizely. Drag and drop editor allows you to change particular elements of your website easily. The optimization can be made by changing the button's color making it more inviting. Influence optimization and create additional information in pop-ups, and reduce the number of steps in the customer path.
  

• Mobile optimization. Nowadays, it is a key factor to meet the requirements of mobile users. Mobile optimization might involve building responsive designs and precise positioning of specific items such as graphics or button elements. The adjustment of a version for the website for mobile devices consists of matching all constituents for each mobile screen.
  
  

Creating an account on SoftwareSupp gives you and your team the possibility of developing constantly. Web design and development is an extensive process that consists of many elements. Plan your internal budget and report technical problems regularly. By adding a team to the project board, they will monitor the work or commission additional tasks. An active account on SoftwareSupp enables dynamic development. It means that innovative ideas and technical problems no longer have to wait to be executed. On the project board, you just need to add additional tasks. Afterward, the freelancer estimates the delivery time and completes the assignment at the pace determined by prioritization. Take action and stay ahead of the competition.

What does SEO stand for?

SEO-Search Engine Optimization- are all activities that lead to increased traffic from search results. It consists of adjusting to Google algorithms and raising the authority of the website. SEO influences web development in terms of the number of visitors. Users who have entered your website through a search engine belong to the group of customers who are worth focusing on. It is because they found your page while they were looking for something specific in a search engine. The goal of SEO is to raise your position on the search engine list.

As part of the website positioning activities, we include:

• visibility analysis,
• SEO audit,
• competition analysis,
• technical optimization (technical SEO),
• keyword research,
• content optimization,
• obtaining link/ link building
• monitoring the visibility and position of the most valuable phrases.
  

SEO is a broad subject. It includes many technical factors that can only be performed by an experienced SEO specialist. Working with a SoftwareSupp freelancer, you will get a customized project board where you can view the progress of your work. Our expert can break down all SEO activities into customized operations. For effective SEO optimization, it is necessary to pay attention to the following items: meta title, internal linking, sitemap.xml, robots.txt, and URL optimization. Integration of the Google Structured Data tool, also known as schema, will help you make sure that website information is well-organized and displayed for search engines in a customer-friendly way. Schema requires a specific implementation to match the structure of content on your website. This tool and most other integrations require technical and specialist knowledge. Soon, Core Web Vitals (CWV) will become a ranking factor and will impact search results and full-page visibility. It is a new thing. However, we have an expert in our database that specializes in this area. In this article, Nimesh describes what Core Web Vitals are and how they contribute to getting a better search ranking.

However, we encourage you to also use free tools such as Google Search Console. It enables you to analyze the traffic on the website by yourself. It is worth configuring this page tool to learn about the page's effectiveness and display indicators.

Software Integration as a part of web design and development process

The integration of additional tools is the next step during the web design and development of your website. Integrated software streamlines work, making it more effective. Integration is done by dedicated experts. Determining possible integrations depends on the type of business. E-commerce integration consists of integration between your website and channel to sell online. External integration enables effective sales and management of payment and products. There are many options for growing your e-commerce business. Running an e-commerce activity is associated with the growing needs of customers and employees.

A store created in Shopify may need to integrate additional forms of payment or product delivery. Payment integration can consist of entering the payment by credit card, PayPal, invoice. Research shows that a customer who has various forms of payment available sees a given store/website more professionally. Social media integration will automate marketing work. Additionally, for the company's development, it is worth considering CRM integration, ERP integration, or Google Analytics integration. The main task of the CRM system is to collect data about customers and their activity on your website. In short, CRM software integrated automates the sales management process. When the company grows, it is worth introducing customer service integration. A customer who can contact the company's team will be more trusting. Chat integration, for example, Livechat, will bring you closer to your potential client. Thanks to the chat form, you can easily obtain lead data. Customer service can be delivered by organizing a proper ticketing system, allowing you to prioritize and handle support queries. Zoho is one of the tools that enable the effective management of contacts with clients.

Marketing automation may be a straight integration with ActiveCampaign. Using this software will help in the automation of notifications, sending SMS and emails. It will save time that can be used for further business activities. In case you have a problem with storing and managing data that is collected in several places. Database integration will allow you to manage multiple data points in one place, meaning collecting the information from different data sources (CRM, ERP) and processing it in one place. Data migration requires expert knowledge. The whole process must be carried out wisely, in the correct sequence of steps.

Website analysis

The analysis of the results and customer activity allows for brand development. Many tools enable you to monitor the basic data and information about your websites, such as the number of visitors, traffic sources, and conversion rates. Hotjar is an analytical tool that allows you to analyze your visitors' behavior- as their scrolling patterns, clicks, and heatmaps. It optimizes the user interface and experience. Other tools for analyzing the results are Google Optimize, PIWIK pro, Fullstory.

By purchasing an hourly plan, you can be sure of getting the highest quality service. Thanks to the fact that we have experts in every part of the world in various time frames - we can provide you with specialists in the exact time frame you need. We are not an agency so, we can be flexible, just like a freelancer. However, freelancers will not provide you with secure payment and guarantee the project's continuity as we do.