The Smart Way to Choose a Company to Build Your Lead Generation Website
BECOME SMARTER THAN THE WEB DESIGN AND DEVELOPMENT COMPANIES YOU ARE INTERVIEWING!
MANY ORGANIZATIONS ARE INTIMIDATED WHEN SEARCHING FOR A COMPANY TO BUILD THEIR WEBSITES, BECAUSE THESE COMPANIES KNOW SO MUCH MORE — OR APPEAR TO — ABOUT THE INTRICACIES OF CREATING AN ATTRACTIVE AND EFFECTIVE WEBSITE.
HOWEVER, IF YOU UNDERSTAND THE KEY ELEMENTS OF BUILDING A WEBSITE AND LEARN THE RIGHT QUESTIONS TO ASK, YOU WILL GAIN CONFIDENCE AND ACQUIRE THE ABILITY TO IDENTIFY THE COMPANY THAT BEST FITS YOUR NEEDS. YOU’LL BE ABLE TO
DISTINGUISH COMPANIES THAT ONLY APPEAR TO KNOW WHAT THEY’RE DOING FROM ONES THAT ACTUALLY DO.
THE RESULT: YOUR NEW WEBSITE WILL BE BUILT PROPERLY AND GET OUTSTANDING RESULTS.
IMPORTANT NOTE: THIS ARTICLE CONCERNS THE CREATION OF LEAD GENERATION WEBSITES. IF THE PURPOSE OF YOUR NEW WEBSITE IS TO GENERATE SALES LEADS, TO TURN VISITORS AT VARIOUS POINTS IN THE BUYING CYCLE INTO PROSPECTS, READ THIS.
When interviewing Web design companies, organizations tend to focus on design. While design is important, other vital aspects of building a website must also be reviewed, specifically:
Read this article to avoid the mistake of hiring a Web design company that looks good in terms of design, but cannot do the other 101 things necessary to make your website a robust, lead-generating machine.
The key elements of a staffing review are breadth, depth and location. Let’s take a deep dive.
How many full-time employees does your company have? As you will see, building a website requires a number of people with a variety of talents. A Web design company with only a handful of full-time employees relies on outside contractors to execute various aspects of the work and lacks control over the project. In contrast, a Web design company with a full in-house staff has redundancy in all key positions, ensuring that the outcome of the project never hinges on the availability of a single person.
What does your content team look like? While perhaps not as glamorous as design, content is just as important to the success of a lead generation website. At the same time, content is typically a project bottleneck and a weak component of the website because Web design companies lack breadth and depth in content-creation resources. An adequate content staff should include some, or preferably all, of the following
How many full-time employees are dedicated project managers? Website projects have a lot of moving parts. They require a careful and detailed project management process to keep these parts in sync and prevent costly delays, communication breakdowns and errors. When asking questions in this area, look for the following:
Beyond content and project management, what does the rest of your staff look like? For lead generation websites, on-site personnel with the following expertise are the bare minimum required for high-caliber execution:
Where is your staff physically located? A picture is worth a 1,000 words … and a visit is worth a 1,000 pictures! Besides scrutinizing job roles and bench depth, give attention to where and how staff members work — this makes a real difference in timeliness, communication and cost. Things to consider:
As mentioned above, visiting a Web design company’s office is an excellent practice. In addition to helping you evaluate the composition of the team, an onsite visit provides an understanding of the company’s style, work ethic and professionalism in a way that cannot be duplicated using the phone or email.
The key elements to review in the area of expertise are responsive design skills, project management skills and SEO skills. Let’s take a deep dive.
Do you build non-responsive websites? Best practices for Web design demand that ALL websites be responsive. If a Web design company offers to build you a non-responsive website, you know that the Web design company is living in the past and has an outdated process that will result in a poor experience for your website visitors.
Responsive websites have enormous benefits over the websites of the past:
What is your process for building a responsive website? Any reputable Web design company should be able to build you a responsive website. However, there are good processes for building responsive websites, and bad ones. Below are critical items to listen for to help distinguish one from the other:
How do you manage multiple concurrent website projects? A responsive design project must be supported with a robust project management system; otherwise, the project will be like trying to build a house without blueprints. Separate the bad Web design companies from the good ones by listening to them explain their approaches to project management. The approach should include:
Can you explain how and when SEO elements are incorporated into your process for building a responsive website? Many Web design companies say they include SEO or create a “search engine friendly” website. The sad truth is that the huge majority of these companies have no idea how to truly build a website for SEO. You can spot these companies by listening for the ones that cannot provide a clear and concise answer to this question.
The response you hear should include each of the following elements:
The key to a review of focus is to evaluate the relative importance of Web design/development to the company under consideration. Let’s take a deep dive.
How strongly is your firm focused on building websites, and what other areas of focus do you have? In terms of focus, a Web design company probably falls into one of four categories:
While option 1 may seem best, option 3 is actually far better for a lead generation website. Here is why:
To ascertain a Web design company’s focus, probe these areas:
As we mentioned earlier, visiting a potential Web design company’s office is an excellent practice.
Beyond a visit, be sure to obtain a list of references and then contact them. Did the Web design company perform as advertised? How would you describe your experience during the project? Would you work with that company again? If so, why? If not, why not? How has your website performed specifically in terms of lead generation?
A best-of-class Web design company has many references and is eager for you to contact them. If the response is hesitant, congratulations! Your selection process has averted a disaster.
With these 10 questions at hand, along with a comprehensive reference check, you will find yourself on equal footing with the Web design companies you are vetting. You will also obtain the information and insight you need to select a partner that can create a website for you that looks good, functions properly and delivers sales leads. Many great firms are out there. Don’t settle for less than the best.
The Smart Way to Choose a Company to Build Your Lead Generation Website
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