With 97% of all consumers now researching products online, it is important to differentiate your business offerings. The benefits of custom website design for any business seeking to build an online presence are numerous.
Read on to find out how a custom website can help your business improve and succeed.
Custom Website Design 101
Most websites are developed from a WordPress template or theme. These templates are easy to use and can help people set up a website in minutes, but they often lack in functionality and are too much like each other.
Enter custom website design. As most of your potential customers will be browsing online, it is important to distinguish yourself from the hundreds of competitors in your market. Custom website design aims to do just that.
By hiring a web design specialist or teaming up with a web design and SEO firm, you can craft a website that is tailor-made for your business needs. Custom web design allows you to build a site that stands out and best promotes your products or services. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Let’s see all the ways custom web design can help your business thrive below.
How Can a Custom Website Help Your Business Stand Out?
Optimising Conversion
One of the main benefits of a custom website is that it’s designed to boost your business. A good website will encourage visitors to engage with your brand and reach out to your business through call to action buttons.
Depending on your goals, your website can direct visitors to take action. For example, if you need visitors to fill forms, your website can feature a funnel page with an attractive call to action button to increase conversion.
In the same vein, custom ecommerce stores engage with customers by showing different offerings that might interest them. This increases sales and also builds a portfolio of reviews that future customers can access.
Presentation and User Experience Design
Adobe reports that as many as 38% of all users will leave a website if they find the layout or content to be unattractive.
Many sites try to boost conversion so much they become ugly, and therefore ineffective. There is a fine balance between optimising conversion and having an attractive website.
The essence of this fine balance is User Experience Design (UXD). UXD focuses on user-friendliness and ensures the site is pretty while also being usable.
UXD focuses on four aspects of web design:
- Readability
- Navigation
- Loading Time
- Clean Design
By adhering to these aspects, a web design expert can create attractive websites that will boost conversion.
Build Trust with Your Customers
As we have seen above, good web design can help you engage with visitors. It can also help build trust between your business and your potential customers.
Poor design choices like popup advertisements or tiny letters can drive customers away by giving your site a shady impression. On the other hand, a clean design can affect how visitors view your site in a positive way.
For many good examples, check some of the most prominent websites, including the official website of Apple, which is hailed for its user-friendliness.
Enhance Branding and Marketing Goals
Your website is your window to the online world. A custom website design can help boost your brand visibility.
By using your logos, brand colour combinations and taglines, your web design expert will convey your branding message throughout your website.
Moreover, web design elements can help boost any marketing campaigns you might be running. This works by developing a sitemap in a way that aligns with your marketing goals.
For example, if you plan to promote specific products, your website can be adjusted to showcase them prominently for your clients. In a similar fashion, a custom website can be integrated with social media for extra engagement, or use feed from other sources, which might include your Amazon page.
Rank Higher in Search Engine Results Pages
A good custom website design can contribute to your search engine optimisation efforts. A site’s design directly impacts its SEO potential, and responsive web design allows web pages to rank higher.
Additionally, custom web design affects meta tags, keywords, external links and various other aspects that are essential to a successful SEO campaign.
Mobile Friendliness
Directly related to SEO, mobile friendliness is here to stay. With more than 50% of all users accessing the internet through mobile phones, it is crucial for your website to be displayable in mobile.
Custom website design can make your web pages adapt and resize to fit mobile screens, which can enhance the overall user experience.
Ability to Customise and Tweak
While boilerplate templates are easy to use, they offer little in terms of customisation. On the other hand, custom websites are easy to customise even further.
If your business needs to shift, so can your website, which is built to adapt to new demands.
Ability to Accept Payments through Your Website
Another obvious benefit, custom websites give you the power to accept payments in any form you like through your own website. Instead of relying on third-party solutions or external sites, you can have all payments done through your own site.
Things to Consider When Planning Your Custom Website Design
When planning your custom website, there are several considerations you have to take into account. Let’s see the most important below:
Brand Alignment
If you already have a brand presence online, your new website should be built to reflect your branding focus.
Mobile Access
Any modern website should be optimised for mobile view. This gives you access to more clients and also benefits your SEO efforts.
Responsiveness
A site with a high UXD will appeal to both customers and search engines. A positive user experience can help you outrank competitors and keep your clients happy.
Cost and Scalability
Finally, your custom website should be scalable as your business grows without the cost rising exponentially.
Taking Your Website to the Next Level
If you’re interested in upgrading your website and taking advantage of all the benefits of custom design, we can help!
Here at OONIE, we specialise in custom website design and professional SEO services. Our SEO experts, web designers, marketers, software developers and IT architects can help turn your vision into reality.
Contact us today to find out how we can help improve your online presence and beat the competition with an amazing custom website!