Company website FAQs
Company website FAQs - answers to questions about company website design, hosting, search engine optimisation and online marketing.
I cover many of the common questions that clients have asked me about website design over the years.
If your question remains unanswered please do email me. I am happy to help.
Learn about websites and SEO
Online marketing, search engines, social media and how it relates to your website.
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How much does a website cost?
It is difficult to provide an answer to the question ‘how much does a website cost’, with no idea of current requirements. I have outlined some ideas of cost below. I do not charge VAT.
If you would like a more detailed answer do email me for a quote.
I provide either custom, search engine focused websites or affordable, quick sites for startups.
Startup websites are limited in design (I mainly follow the theme style) and start at £390.
Custom website design begins at £576.00. This is for fully bespoke web design either in WordPress or using HTML/CSS and the Bootstrap framework, which is the best option for those looking into SEO.
I then charge per web page, which starts at £96.00 depending on function. So for a standard 5 page site I charge around £1000.
A custom website design by me is built for search engines. Each page is optimised around a chosen key term. This gives a great platform for the early days of your website.
What information should be on a website?
What information should be on a website by law?
All businesses, e-commerce or not, must provide minimum information which should be easily accessible at all times:
- The company name, which may be different from the trading name – e.g. "Kaydee Web is the trading name of Kaydee Web Limited";
- The geographic address must be included. Not a PO BOX.
- Full details including email address, allowing fast, direct contact and effective communication. A contact form is not sufficient.
- Any registration details, including registration number.
- Confirm membership of trade registers available to the public and display registration numbers.
- Any professional body or institution the company is registered with.
- A VAT number, if a business has one – even if the website is not being used for e-commerce transactions.
- Prices on the website must be clear and unambiguous and state whether prices are inclusive of tax and delivery costs.
Limited companies
By UK law, limited companies must include on their website:
- The registered number.
- The registered office address.
- Where the company is registered (England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland).
- Make it clear it is a limited company by spelling out the company’s full name including Limited or Ltd.
If you want to include directors’ names, you must list all names of directors.
What information should be used in website layout?
To determine the information that should be used in a website, first decipher what type of business you run. Businesses can generally be split into three areas 'service businesses', 'merchandising businesses' and 'manufacturing businesses'. Sometimes a business can be a combination of all three.
Use the information below to deduce your type of business.
Service business
A service business sells products of no physical form.
Service businesses offer professional skills, expertise and advice.
Examples of service businesses are: photographers, beauticians, mechanics, sports clubs, accountancy firms and coaches.
Merchandising business
This is a buy and sell business model, whereby profit is made by buying products at trade price, and selling the products at a higher price. The product does not change form.
Examples are: goods shops, toy shops, clothes shops and distributors.
Manufacturing business
A manufacturing business buys products and use them as materials to make a new product.
Manufacturing labour and factory overheads will be included in the final product price.
The manufactured goods will then be sold on.
Combination business
Some businesses, for example tourist destinations, hotels and restaurants could come under all three categories.
For example, a restaurant buys products and creates a meal from them (manufacturing), then offers waiter service (servicing) and also buys and sells drinks (merchandising).
Local or international?
Also take into consideration whether you intend to sell locally, nationally or internationally. This will give you an idea of areas to target your content.
Advertising or ecommerce?
- Would you like to simply advertise services or products online?
- Can you sell the services or products online?
Local or international?
- Does the business offer services or products locally?
- Can the business sell services or products internationally?
Once you know your type of business and targeted markets, planning the company website will be easier.
Now write down which products or services you would like to advertise or sell. Do they come in different formats?
Pages to include on a website
A services page and/or products page are always very likely to be included.
For transparency Google likes to see an ABOUT page, offering background information on the business owner or company itself.
Include a contact page with company information and contact details, to make it quick and easy for users to make contact with you.
An FAQ page can often help an audience and provide search engine content.
What information should be on a website for search engines?
Websites should not be programmed with search engines in mind, websites should be built and created to provide the best user experience. Google will then naturally reward the site in page rank.
Therefore, the information you should include on your site should be informative and good quality to rank highly.
There are on-page search engine guidelines that should be put into place when creating web pages, such as meta-tags, page elements and schema markup. Websites should be kept clean and code-light.
Blogging or informative articles greatly increase chances of being well ranked.
How many pages should a website have?
The more information included on a site, the better chance it has of survival. However, many small businesses need to start small and build.
When planning pages for a new site, ask yourself:
- Are you a one man band?
- Are you a large corporate business?
- What do you do?
- Who is your target audience?
- Have you got the resources to keep the site up to date?
I recommend an 'about' or 'background information' page that includes a good photo of you or your team, and the story of your company.
Every company has a story and background information helps you to connect with your audience, and gives clarity. Google rewards company websites that are transparent.
If you offer a number of services you could choose separate pages for each service or put them all one page according to your budget and content.
Companies that sell a product might require a shop area. A full eCommerce solution with an online basket can be provided, with secure payment facilities.
Or simply display the product example and use an enquiry form.
If your service is very visual, like an architect or a photographer, the website may be mainly a gallery or have a prominent portfolio page.
Accommodation businesses or restaurants usually include an online booking form and calender, so visitors can see availability.
It is recommended to include a contact page with an enquiry form and, for local businesses, a map.
Data collection forms, linked to a newsletter are a good idea, so that you can capture visitors. Try to offer something for free to encourage sign ups.
I can help with the structure of your website. Just email me with your general ideas.
How much does it cost to host a website?
To own and run a website each website owner needs hosting for that website. It is like renting space on a computer.
Website hosting varies from ISP (internet service provider) to ISP. There are very cheap ISPs, which can be as low as £30 per year. After a lot of experience with hosting companies, I avoid the cheap ones. They often have terrible technical support.
A realistic figure to host a website is between £60-£100 per year for a small website. ISPs can charge more if there is high traffic on a site, or many files.
Do be aware that there is an additional charge per year, or multiple years, for the domain name (aka website address).
I charge £72.00 per year to host a site for one year, please click here for hosting details and prices.
What is responsive design?
A responsive website is a site that will respond to any device it is viewed on, be it smart phone, tablet or computer. It is imperative that your business website is responsive for easy user access.
A responsive website is mobile friendly which is important for search engine rank, as Google will show mobile friendly sites first when users search on mobile. That is over 60% of searches.
How to get your website to show up on Google
Achieving a high rank generally requires time, effort and a host of tools.
Once your website is live you should regularly check search results, analytics, key terms, generate inbound links, consistently provide good content, encourage others to share your content and much more.
Once your site is live, it should not be left to run its course. It needs help throughout it’s life.
Without time and effort your site will not necessarily be at the top of Google search results, depending on your competition.
I use MOZ Pro to analyse websites, and from that we can continuously improve the website and write quality blog posts around your industry, to encourage a good page rank.
What does SEO mean?
SEO means 'search engine optimisation', or 'optimization' in the US.
The term SEO can actually umbrella a few things, like on-page SEO, off page SEO and search engine marketing.
When people use the term SEO, they are generally talking about the art of programming a website so that search engines understand and rank it.
Both layout and programming have an effect on the way search engines rank a site. Ultimately Google wants websites to be easy for users to navigate, fast, content rich and programmed so that search engine crawlers easily understand what is on each page.
Any more questions on website design?
I'm very happy to help, if I have not answered your question here. Do email me to ask.