Things have changed. Years ago companies spent most of their budget on their website, leaving very little for marketing and advertising. Some are still making this mistake today. Website design and development are still important to many businesses.
However, these days, a lot of companies or entrepreneurs are making a lot of money without any website at all or with one built on GoDaddy, Wix, etc. Some businesses rely on traffic from Google and need continued search engine optimization and others simply use social media to make them money.
I believe in a hybrid approach for most businesses. I do not believe relying on one source of traffic is a good idea for any business. But that is another topic. Let’s get back to your overall marketing budget and how much is spent on website design vs marketing.
How much should I spend on website design?
I’ve had a lot of potential clients come to me about helping them with marketing and the first bit of info I get is how much they spent on website design and they don’t have much money left over for marketing or advertising or PPC campaigns.
Let’s say you have $5000 to start your online business. Spending $4000 on w website, leaving only $1000 for marketing and advertising, is not a formula for success. It’s also putting the cart before the horse.
“Don’t create a marketing plan for your website. Create a website that fits into your marketing plan” — Chris McElroy
Things to do before thinking about website design
- Competitor Research (Who is your competition? What is the price they give? What are they doing to get traffic? Which social media sites do they target? etc.)
- What is your value proposition? (How are you different from those competitors? What can you offer that they don’t?)
- Who are your ideal customers? (Not just a demographic answer. Create your ideal customer personas. How much do they make per year? Are they married? Do they have kids? What kind of care do they drive? What kind of problems are they facing that you can help with? Be as detailed as possible and even give each persona a name.
- Which social media websites do they spend time on? (In personas, add where they get their information. You can create bob1 and bob2 and even bob3. Bob1 uses Facebook and Twitter. Bob2 uses Google primarily. Bob3 is mostly on LinkedIn. You get the idea)
- What keywords and phrases should you target in search engines? (Remember, a buying key phrase is much better than a generic related phrase. “XProduct Articles” would not be as important as ranking for “XProduct Prices” or “How much does an XProduct cost?”.
Armed with all of this information, you can now make a marketing plan. You know who you’re trying to sell to and where they spend their time. And you have the search engine data you need. Also, You know where, if any, PPC campaigns you’re going to create and what landing pages you’re going to use.
Now you’re ready for website development
The info you gathered in the planning phase tells you all you need to know about how to design your website. While building the site, you need to make sure that, whoever your website designer is, fully understands your marketing plan.
Also, keep in mind, SEO should be done during website development. Your copywriter should be writing content that entices people to fill out a form, call you, subscribe or buy something. Your copywriter should also know those personas you created because that is who they have to have in their mind as they are writing content.
The content should be written as if you are talking to those personas. Explain things as you would explain them to a friend. Those personas are the only people you are writing for. Make sure every page in your website has a purpose that is part of the marketing plan you created. Your landing pages can also be created during website design.
We would be happy to do your website design and development or help you improve your existing website.
After Website Design, What’s Next?
You can already answer that question if you planned everything before you started the web design portion of the plan. You’re already optimized for the search engines. You already have your landing pages. Your content was written specifically to your target audience. Now, you can start the PPC campaigns and other social media strategies that you created in the planning phase.
If you still want help, I offer a free, no obligation consultation. You can also read the article below for more on this topic. I look forward to your questions and comments as well. Thanks for reading!
More articles by Chris McElroy SEO.
