Where to Start Series: Webbros on website design and development
For 2023 my monthly photo chats email has been taken over by the ‘Where to start’ series, a monthly Q&A with different creative professionals across Aotearoa. In this series we chat with copywriters, videographers, web developers, designers, and more about what you need to know before bringing them onboard in your business.
Join the monthly photo chats newsletter here to get notified when the next Q&A is released. Monthly photo chats = insightful + creative + a bit of a laugh.
Getting to know Webbros.
Hey! We’re Webbros - a local tauranga team working in the wordpress and shopify space. We’ve been offering web design and digital marketing services to small-medium businesses going on nearly 10 years.
In a nutshell what do you do?
We work with two popular content management systems Wordpress & Shopify - we do web design, development, maintenance and website hosting for the Wordpress side of things.
What do clients need to know/prepare before contacting you for scoping a website build?
The biggest things are probably functionality requirements (both current and future potential), content availability and your budget range.
Having an idea of the functionality that your website requires (now and in the future) helps us choose the best way to build it and therefore gives us an idea on costs involved.
Every function that your website has, has to be built in somewhere - it doesn’t know how to do something without being told! So things like your portfolio content, filtering options, or user experience goals, is important for us to understand if it varies from the basics.
Content matters! Have you got a brand in place that can be used through your website? Have you got high res imagery that aligns with your brand? We require content to be supplied, so be prepared to supply your imagery and words before we start on the design process of your website. If you need help with these things, we can recommend a bunch of great locals who can assist with them.
Knowing your budget upfront can help us build around this key factor instead of working backwards from what you want.
In regards to website builds, when would it make sense to bring on a web designer/builder over building a website themselves with a drag & drop builder?
If you have a specific way that you want your website to function or even look, the drag and drop builders, like square space, can potentially limit you.
If you’re relatively tech savvy, happy to work within what the platform offers, just need the basics and have the time to put into it and learn how it all works, then a D&D may suit your needs.
When you start having requirements outside the box or specific design requirements, then it’s worth seeking out a more custom solution. The most common time we see customers move from D&D builders is when a more custom user experience is required - like complex subscriptions or more elaborate portfolios.
Or if you’re afraid of technology… then it’s best to hand it over to someone who knows what they are doing!
We use software within Wordpress that functions like a drag and drop builder, but also allows for custom development. Which makes it easy for our clients to make edits to their own content while having custom functionality.
What do you wish more clients knew before they went down the path of getting a website developed?
Content is key - it’s important you have the imagery and copy to back up your brand. We recommend engaging with a copywriter and photographer if possible. It makes a world of difference!
Getting your website live is only the first step in building your online presence.
Consider your plans and your budget for how you will be getting traffic to the website, it’s all good having a website but if you’re not marketing it you won’t get traffic.
Let’s chat $$$, don’t be surprised to see X service costing anywhere between . . .
Builds: upwards of $3k for a multi page informative site and upwards of $6k for e-commerce.
Hosting: Starting at $60 p/month
A golden nugget of web developer wisdom:
Simplicity is underrated. Don’t let your message get hidden by trying to fit too many things into one screen. The average user doesn’t have a long attention span and they don’t want to filter through things that aren’t relevant to them. KISS!