Getting What You Need and Want from a Website Designer
First, you need to consider what kind of website you want or need. Do you plan to use your website as a digital catalog? Do you want it to be an electronic storefront? Do you just need a way to generate contact info for your sales team, or do you just want to have a portal that describes your products or services and offers customers contact info?
There is a difference between creating a digital catalog and creating an ecommerce store. The catalog usually requires the buyer to contact the sales staff directly, either through telephone or email, but it doesn’t offer any way to buy directly from the website. This is a great model for wholesalers who want the flexibility to offer variable pricing, and for distributors who like to qualify their buyers before providing products. By contrast, an electronic storefront allows the buyer to make a purchase right there on the website. It requires a lot better security measures, and the capability to process credit cards without your interaction. From a cost standpoint, ecommerce is more expensive to maintain than a digital catalog, but the development times are often very similar. The more products or services you want to offer online, the more it will cost to create.
Contact websites are usually pretty simple, but the key to making these sites work is having top quality design, and excellent copy. The idea is that you get the reader so worked up that they are willing to give you contact info in order to get involved in your business. An electronic business card does sort of the same thing, but is usually most effective for service businesses.
Whatever you decide, you should act now. Summertime is a great time for developing a new website, or revamping one that just isn’t working. Business can get slow for some companies in the summer, but having the ability to cast your business net farther and wider through a top quality website can make all of the difference between a good sales year and a legendary one.
Of course, if you don’t have a webmaster on staff, please feel free to get in touch with me for more information on how to get your own website. Unlike the big production houses, I am nimble and flexible, and have less overhead, so I can offer very effective websites at prices starting as low as $500!