Peterborough Web Design

In most cases figuring out what you need usually translates to What do my potential customers need, and how can I reach them?

Within that question you'll also be asking what your target audience wants, needs and expects by visiting your website, and whether they're more likely to be searching for your products or services on Google, through one of the many social media channels, or by other means.

If all of that sounds like too much to get your head around, let's talk. A simple conversation might help to clarify where you're at, where you want to get to, and how to get there.

Start with finding someone you can talk to without feeling like they're talking in a different language and losing you after the first few minutes.

That conversation should be a simple one, free from jargon and tech-talk, and it should be honest...

Not all web designers and agencies will be the right fit for you, and remember that you're likely to be working with them for some time, long after the website has gone live.

So if you don't feel that you pick up the phone to them and have a chat about things... even problems... then move on!

A conversation is free, as you'd expect it to be. But your website could, if it's done properly, range from a few £100s to... well well there really is no ball park figure without knowing more about what you need.

Targa does offer a range of fixed price web design packages which provide a very cost effective way of getting a professionally built website, AND addition features and services to help your website succeed in attacting visitors and turning them into paying customers.

Fixed Price Website Packages

Here's some help...

If you want to explore potential costs for yourself in your own time without any pressure, take a look at Targa's online web design cost calculator?

You can select the number of page you're likely need, and a bunch of other features and options which are all explained in layman's terms. Try it, and if you want to talk or more afterwards, just get in touch.

Fixed Price Website Packages Try Targa's Website Cost Calculator

You can make the content updates if you want. You'll need to choose a website platform which will allow you to make your own updates. Such options would typically include platforms like WordPress.

It very much depends on whether you want to learn how to use the system and make your own updates, or get someone to handle them for you.

Where is your time better spent?

Many website owners start off with the intention of managing their own content, but some find the interface a little overwhelming, or realise that their time is better spent elsewhere. Some people simply don't want to risk making a mistake and breaking their website!

Targa has the knowledge and experience to build bespoke websites without using WordPress, Wix, etc., and can carry out most basic content updates quickly and cheaply. All you need to do is mail the changes or new content over, and we'll do the rest.

Sometimes if it's a quick update, we might even be able to do it for free!

Photos/Images:
If you want to have images added or changed, for us it's a simple case of using PhotoShop to produce the size variations needed for all screensizes. If you choose to handle the images, be sure to use a range of versions suitable for mobile, desktop monitors, and screen sizes in between.

If you're likely to be processing your own images, you might find this article about sizing images for websites useful.

Because the requirements for each business differ, it's not possible to come up with an accurate cost for a completely bespoke website without prior discussion. It would be pure guesswork otherwise, which could easily lead to over or under pricing.

Variations in cost:
It would be reasonable to expect that a website containing 5 pages would cost more than a website containing 3 pages, and less than a website containing 10 pages. But that's not always the case... Styling and functionality will also play a huge part, but there is much more to consider when having a website built.

For example, if you're approaching this with a budget of £300-£400, you can certainly get a website built, but you might find that it will be built by a part time web designer with limited technical and design skills, limited business or industry knowledge. They might not be able to provide ongoing support, SEO work, competitor analysis and other forms of analytics work either.

At the other end of the scale it's not unusual to find web designers and agencies charging upwards of £1000 for a single page website, and £2000-£3000 for a 4-5 page website.

So you might be wondering whether those who charge more are ripping you off, or are cheap websites not very good?

Cheap Websites:
A cheap web designer is more likely to cut corners which could result in your website being slow, poorly displayed on mobiles, difficult to find in search engine results, and if it goes wrong you might need to hire someone with experience to fix it.

That might cost you more than your cheap website cost you in the first place, and in the mean time you might be stuck with a website which doesn't work, which could be losing you business.

Read more about web design costs before you commit. You might be glad you did!

Fixed Price Packages:
A fixed price option can work well, because you'll know in advance what the cost will be, and what you'll get for your money.

Targa offer fixed price website packages, but feel free to check out our web design cost calculator and explore a wide range of options without any pressure.

Try pricing up your own website:
Feel free to check out our web design cost calculator and explore a wide range of options without any pressure.

There are many factors that it is almost impossible to say how long a website should take to build. For example:

Size, purpose and features:
How many pages will the website contain? Will it be used to promote your services or to sell products and handle secure online payments?

Will it require a CMS (content management system), or a searchable database of content. You might require a list of subscribers to be generated which will grow as more people fill out their details on your website?

Will you be providing your own website content and images, or will you be relying on the web designer to do source suitable images on your behalf?

Will you require your website to tap into your social media feeds such as Twitter, so it displays your latest or selected Tweets?

Average time period:
There are many other variables too, but websites for the average small to medium size business can typically take between 1 and 8 weeks to produce.

You can certainly find some web designers who will produce websites quickly and cheaply, but that's another story! Cheap websites often have many corners cut in order to speed up the process and keep costs down, but the results, performance and reliability can be poor, and many such website owners end up having their websites rebuilt. In the mean time it could be costing them money in lost businesses and brand reputation.

What about AI?:
You might have heard that websites can now be built using AI. That's true, but you need to anticipate the lack of control, styling, editorial input, the ability to update content, add or change images, and make it mobile friendly.

What if it goes wrong? Can it be fixed? Who will fix it? How much will that cost?

So bearing those points in mind, just be careful and do some research before diving in!

1: Introductory call:

• We can arrange a short phone or Zoom call to enable us to learn about you and your business, and what objectives you have for your new website.
• Phone and Zoom calls can be very effective, but there may be good reason to meet face to face.

2: Down to detail:

• We can discuss the details of what each page of your website needs to contain, as well as styling, colours, and other visual aspects of your website.
• If you have any content for your website, whether it be paragraphs of text describing your business and services, photos, logos, etc., you can send them over by email or via DropBox.

3: Content for your website:

• Your website needs to have relevant quality content for the benefit of your customers and also for success with the search engines.
• It is advisable to give serious thought to your website content, but we understand that not everyone has the time or feels comfortable producing website content.

4: The design stage:

• If you already have some ideas or can suggest some existing websites that you like the look of, that would be great.
• Maybe you would like us to put forward some suggestions. That's fine too.
• So before coding starts, we'll discuss some visual ideas with you, get your feedback, and then we can begin developing your new website.

5: Keeping an eye on things:

• You will be able to check in with us to see how your website is shaping up, and you will be given access to each page for your feedback and approval.
• Your new website will only go live when you give us the approval to do so, and we will work with you until you're happy with it.
• Of course there may be the need for us to meet a specific deadline that you have, and so we will work to a project plan to meet that deadline.

No, your website doesn't have to be built using WordPress. Let's explain...

Website builders such as WordPress and other tools can be really good to get to online cheaply, and even allow you to make some of the updates to the website yourself. But there are limitations, many of them can be slow on mobile phones, and depending on your needs and what you want to achieve with your website, you might find those limitations hold you back or cause problems.

WordPress is a very well established platform which has made it far easier for people without any knowledge of web code, such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, etc. However, despite WordPress being known as a no code tool, that is from the perspective of the user, but in many respects its own codebase can make the final product... the website... very code heavy.

There is also a reliance on 3rd party plug-ins to perform certain tasks and add features, and some of those can introduce reliability problems which are outside of the actual WordPress platform.

Pros and Cons:
The up side to using a platform like WordPress is that it can make the process of building a website quicker and easier, but it can be at the expense of flexibility, scalability, functional limitations, and slow websites.

Slow websites can be especially problematic for mobile users, and with the proportion of mobile v’s desktop users on the increase, it is becoming more and more important to have a fast loading website.

In the right hands WordPress can be great, but there are many web designers out there who use WordPress to fill the gaps in their skillset, and that can... and does... lead to problems which they’re unable to resolve without further help from someone with more experience.

Another thing which made WordPress popular is that it can also provide the option for the website owner to make their own content updates via it’s CMS (content management system).

Other options:
Alternative no code options to WordPress include tools such as Wix, SquareSpace, Ionis, and others. They all provide a means of building websites without having to employ the expertise of an experienced web developer, but all have their limitations which you ought to be aware of before making a choice.

Does Targa use WordPress?
No. We did try WordPress but found that the skills and knowledge which has been acquired over 28 years (since 1996) meant that for us the benefits of using WordPress, Wix, etc., did not outweigh the downsides. In fact many people have approached Targa with problems on their sites which had been built with such website builders.

You can read more about the pros and cons of website builders, but another option is to get a quote from an experienced web developer, such as Targa.

With our website packages starting at just £595, and with a wealth of other experience in SEO and website management, it’s definitely worth checking out what this level of experience could provide in addition to the actual website itself. You thought it would be more expensive, right?

Yes, provided that it has been designed correctly.

The term Responsive Website is often used, and this refers to websites which are designed to work on all screen sizes and devices, including mobile phones.

More information can be found in this article about mobile friendly websites.

It depends. Let’s consider this from two perspectives...

In one respect we could say that to update a website involves changing content, adding or removing sentences or paragraphs, correcting spelling mistakes, and other similar non-technical updates.

We could then make a distinction between these kinds of minor updates and those which require adding new pages, making structural changes to existing pages, adding or changing functionality, etc. Those would be considered major updates

Minor Updates
To make content updates on a website which Targa already manages for you, provided that you’re able to help us easily identify the page and content which needs to be updated, AND provide us with the new or revised content that you want it to be replaced with, we might even be able to handle those updated free of charge.

Of course if there are multiple minor updates, there would likely be a small charge based on the time it takes to do them.

Photos/Images
Image updates usually take a bit more work, because besides getting the image to the right size, we also need to consider other variations suitable for use on mobile, tablets and desktops. But costs can be kept to a minimum due to the efficient way we're able to use tools such as PhotoShop.

Major Updates
If the changes are extensive or require us to physically type new content on your behalf, then a reasonable charge would apply, but we can discuss the detail beforehand. The same would apply if we are required to actually produce new content for you.

If you need require new pages, structural changes, etc., the cost of that work can only be determined after prior discussion.

Some people feel that because they’re paying someone to build a website for them, the web designer should also produce the content. After all, that's part of building a website, right?

Well let’s look at what’s important here...

Knowledge of the subject:
Your website content needs to represent your business and the services or products that you sell. So if you want that content to look like it was expertly written, and indicate to potential customers that you and your company are worth doing business with, then you as the expert are going to be far better placed to produce quality content for your website.

As a web designer, I have been asked to write something along the lines of... or been instructed to come up with a few words to describe what we do etc.

Well if I’m currently building a website for a window company, and my last few websites were for plumbers, electricians, and an accountant, how much of an expert in those professions would I need to be in order to produce acceptable website content?

In fact, if you want to differentiate yourself from your competition... which, ideally, you do... is your web designer the best person to produce the content to show why you're THE go-to business in your field?

So it makes complete sense for you to prepare your own website content, but if you’re not sure what to write or feel uncomfortable writing content, your web designer might be willing and able to read through your draft content, identify spelling errors, ask you about anything which looks ambiguous, and collaborate with you until you’re happy with the final result.

What about using AI to write web content?
You could, of course, use AI to produce your website content. But you need to give that process the attention it deserves.

Some people will openly admit that they're no good at writing, or their spelling is rubbish, and so when they see what AI can produce for them at the press of a button, they might think Wow, that's far better than I could have come up with myself!

But what does that mean? AI knows more about your business, products and services than you do?

By all means use AI to generate ideas, but make sure you personalise and verify the content before using it on your website. After all, you wouldn't want your website to be making false or exaggerated claims about what you do, and nor do you want to look like your competitors who have taken the easy path to use AI to write their website content.

You might find either of these two articles about writing quality website content and creating content that your customers want useful.

It is a legal requirement that any business which processes personal data must have a privacy policy.

If you are a website owner you will need to provide access to a copy of your privacy policy at the time you collect people's personal information.

If your website does not have a privacy policy page, speak with your web designer.

Even if your web designer insists that you do not need one, if you capture and process personal data it will be your responsibility to provide a privacy policy.

MVP stands for minimum viable product.

In website terms this could apply to a large project which will take a long time to build, but very often the company cannot wait before every requirement has been implemented and all fine tuning has been done.

So to answer the question Can we at least get something live in the mean time? we can consider the minimum we would accept... the MVP.

Some of the functionality, styling, sections, integration with other systems, etc., may all be required on completion, but those may take time and might not all be ready for the target launch date.

Decisions:
To enable you to get the project live sooner, discussions can be had to determine which features of the website are launch critical and therefore MUST be in place before the first version of the website can go live.

Other features can therefore be assessed and prioritised, and the project can be broken into phases. These phases may or may not have critical dates to go live, but the MVP (Minimum Viable Product) is the version of the website containing the features essential for the initial launch.

Budget:
Budget management may also be a reason to split a web development project into phases, as this could not only spread the cost, but it could allow the first version of the website to start generating income whilst the overall project development continues.

What about testing?
Testing is not only carried out to ensure that the new website, page, feature or function does what it is supposed to do, but also to ensure that there are no bugs (errors) in the new feature, or which have been caused by the introduction of the new feature.

So even though deadlines are usually tight, it is advisable not to risk cutting corners on testing, because it could turn out to be a costly mistake. Read more about website testing for an idea of what things should be included.

A tricky one to answer in general terms, but think of things from a customer's perspective...

What would a customer want or expect when they arrive on your website? Do they want to buy a product, find a service, research a subject, make comparisons, be educated or entertained?

Once you have a clear idea of why people would come to your website, then ask how easy it is for them to find what they're looking for. In fact do you actually have what they're looking for on your website?

What you want to avoid is making people leave your website due to a lack of quality content. The general feeling is that if a potential customer wants to find specific information, they'll find it. If they can't find it on your website, they'll go elsewhere to find it.

This article on creating content that your customers want could provide you with some useful ideas.

Until quite recently, Targa used similar methods to many other web designers, which involved the CAPTCHA method. This often required the user to follow instructions to click on all of the squares containing a bicycle, traffic lights, bus, etc., in the photo which was displayed when the user submitted the form.

It was a pretty good way of ensuring that a real person was completing the form, but it could lead to frustration for users of a website who were being asked to carry out additional tasks, some of which were slow or didn’t work properly.

A different approach:
Targa decided to use bespoke method which generates a random 4 character code each time the contact form is loaded. This code is then represented on the page as an image, making it harder for automated screen readers to identify the code.

The user then has to simply enter that 4 character code into a field before submitting the form, which makes it far less likely that a robot (or non-human visitor) can enter the correct number.

Malicious content:
Obviously not all human visitors who submit forms on websites are legitimate. Some will manually submit forms with links, code, scripts, or obscene or malicious content, and others will use robots to automatically complete and submit forms in seconds.

This, of course, can be really frustrating to the website owners, and also concerning considering some of the malicious intent behind these submissions.

Targa's response:
Targa has applied steps to handle such activity, which includes a sanitisaton process. This will identify and treat links, prevent certain characters and code from being submitted, and identify and filter out obscene language.

Very importantly we are able to identify the IP address of the computer which was used to submit the form, and add that IP address to a blacklist, thus blocking that same computer from making further form submissions.

For a more in-depth view on how Targa handles contact form submission, take a look at this article on web form security

It’s a fact that there are some very unscrupulous people out there who will try by all means possible to spam and scam any target they choose, whether it’s a bank, social media platform, clone an account, or target the phones or laptops of individuals like you and me.

Where online contact forms are concerned, Targa takes many steps to reduce spam and malicious communication by people who attempt to send things through web forms which could be potentially harmful.

Our methods include ways designed to stop malicious robots trawling websites to find online forms and automatically filling them out and submitting them, often with junk, links and scripts added to the fields.

Capturing IP Address:
Behind the scenes, the forms on the websites of Targa clients also discretely capture the IP address of the sender.

Each web form on ALL websites produced by Targa is checked against several hundred IP addresses which are known to have previously been used in a suspicious or malicious way, and if the IP of the user’s computer matches an IP address in our blacklist, the form will be disabled on their computer to prevent them using the form.

Sanitisation:
Certain types of web form content are monitored and sanitised if necessary before being delivered by email to the owners of the website. We make it an ongoing policy to continually improve the security, functionality and stability of all new and existing forms that Targa creates and manages.

For a more in-depth view on how Targa handles contact form submission, take a look at this article on web form security