Website design and build FAQs
Answering your website design and build questions
We have put together answers to the frequently asked Web build related questions we receive from local small business owners whether they are building the site for themselves or looking to have the site built by us. If you have a marketing question, take a look at our digital marketing specific FAQs or email us with your question.
You can also check out our getting started guide for more tips, 'how to' articles and video tutorials.
What is a content management system (CMS)?
Traditionally, when ye olde t’internet was born, websites were only created by those magicians who could code. But as it grew up and business owners wanted greater flexibility to amend and add pages to their websites, Content Management Systems (CMS) arose. These are essentially a bit of software that provides a user-friendly ‘front end’ to the website – giving non-techie folks a 'templated' way to design and create web pages in a similar way to how we create word documents.
We have been through a few iterations of CMS tools, but now we have what they call the 'Web War of 4'. The competition between WordPress, Wix, Weebly and SquareSpace. The other companies that have risen to become household names – like GoDaddy – will use one of these four bases.
Which CMS tool do you build on?
Predominantly we build on Wix a user-friendly Content Management System (CMS). But if we feel it would suit your needs better, (or your site is already built) we will also work in Weebly, SquareSpace or Shopify. Please note we do not use WordPress. All of our sites will include basic on page SEO and Google Analytics tracking.
​Do I need to purchase a domain name?
We can do this as part of the build. Often the CMS tool offers inclusion of the domain name free for the first year. Alternatively, you may decide to purchase this separately through a domain registrar, this can be a preferred option as it allows you to simply ‘point’ to a provider and if you choose to move away from one provider to another (e.g. WordPress to Wix) it saves having to ‘unpick’ your domain from the CMS provider. We will discuss this with you as part of our first ‘kick off’ meeting.
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I've bought the domain name already - what happens now?
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​That’s absolutely fine. All you need to do is ‘repoint the DNS’ from the IP provided with your domain host to the IP of the CMS tool you have used. This is the online equivalent of setting up the ‘I have moved’ post redirect.
How do I
​re-point the DNS?
This is really simple. Go to the website of your domain host provider and log in. Then access the ‘control panel’ and select the ‘DNS’ option. This will display around 5 records (or lines in a table). Of these, one row in the table will have 'www' in the first column and an IP address in the next (this looks like e.g. 12.123.12.123). Another row will have an '@' or * in the first column, with an IP address in the next. You simply need to amend the IP address in these tabled entries. But again, we’ll talk you through all of this, or if you prefer to give us access, we can make the changes.
What about business emails?
Depending on your set up, you may get 'Pop' email accounts as part of your domain purchase set up, and we can help you with this. We recommend that you keep your domain and email hosting with your existing provider and simply repoint the DNS for the web hosting.
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If you don't already have email, you can add 'G-suite' to your website. Having a branded email and hosting it will come at a monthly cost (from the provider not us). It’s very hard to generalise about this, so again, we will talk through all of this when we discuss set up.
​I don't have a logo yet, is that a problem?
Not at all. If you require a logo, we use a fantastic designer, who charges a fixed fee to create a logo, including the whole brand experience from website to brochures and business cards.
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In order to get the best result when creating a logo, it helps to provide the designer with as much information as possible. We will charge a small fee to write the creative brief, which you will need to approve and we will submit it to the designer.
You will receive 3 different variants of your logo for you to choose from. You will get one round of amends to your chosen logo included within your fixed fee. After that, you will be charged at an hourly rate to make changes, which is why we help you with the original brief. We know what information to provide up front to reduces the cost (and work) later on.
What if I have my own writer or want to produce my own copy?
​That’s absolutely fine. Some of our customers prefer to write their own copy or use a writer who is used to producing articles for them, this is particularly used when the subject requires specialist knowledge. In this instance, we simply provide the copy framework and word count for each page. If you want to write your own copy, we take that into account when we provide our costs to you.
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Equally some of our small businesses are happy just to be 'interviewed' by us and then ask us to provide copy for them to approve.
We are more than happy to accommodate either of these options.
How many pages can my site have?
The page number is limitless. It just affects the build and also the cost.
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If you have an extensive product range, then we would utilise Wix Dynamic Page Module to reduce the time and allow you to 'add' product pages but completing a simple form.
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Similarly, if you have a big team in multiple offices, or have a lot of user case studies we would again use the Dymnamic Pages functionality
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Future proofing the site design
When we meet with you, we may discuss launching e.g. an initial range of products, but if your plan is to eventually have a really large range of products, we will do two things:
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Breakdown your online build journey in to appropriate phases (and costs) and,
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Most importantly - future-proof your site structure and page layout to accommodate the growth.
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What does that mean in basic terms?
Let’s say you’re launching an ecommerce website that will sell high quality branded footwear. Initially you think you want to launch with women’s party shoes to see how the market responds. If this goes well, you will launch a women’s work-shoes range, then maybe a men’s range and then perhaps when you get a ‘name’ for selling high quality footwear, you might expand into offering a range of high-quality sports footwear - trainers, walking boots, wellies etc.
Having chatted with you in our initial meeting, we will provide you with a proposal that provides a phased approach to launching each range, both in times of build and marketing.
Then, when we begin to design the customer journey, we will consider how this journey will readily adapt in future to add the greater product range. We will design the website structure and page layout to easily switch from your launch range to your full range. We will give this information to you so that if you choose to take on the management of the site after initial launch you have the tools to hand to build out your product range.
I have photos on my phone will they do?
We will discuss this with you when we meet. If the photographs you have are good quality high res images (e.g. not a Facebook download) then we should be able to adapt it for the website. When building websites, we can use Wix Stock photography in the build and Wix iconograpy at no extra costs.
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However, if something requires a very specific image and it’s not something we can easily access (e.g. by taking photographs of the product) then we will have to ‘source’ these pictures from an alternative resource – either by purchasing an image from Shutterstock (via Wix) or Getty or by asking our lovely designer at Design by Pie to create us an image.
Images from ShutterStock or Getty will be 'royalty free' e.g. there are few limitations on the images use. These will come at an additional cost, but we will make you aware of this and get agreement on these costs before going ahead.
What if I need to make more than one round of amends during the build?
When we meet with you, we will provide an accurate quote for your website build based on your needs. This quote will include one round of amends on each aspect.
To explain further, following approval of our proposal and costs, we will supply you with a structure of the site and an initial wireframe of each page which gives you the pages structure along with key headings. On approval of the wireframes, if you have opted for bespoke design, these will go to our designer.
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On approval of the wireframes, we will then move on to producing the copy for the site (if that has been requested). This will be sent for you to amend and/or approve - again allowing for one round of amends. If you are providing copy we will have agreed timings for you to provide this to us.
We then move to the build stage which means we’ll create the website – based on the approved wireframes and design – and drop in the approved copy.
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You will then be sent a completed test website to review and provide comments of any changes you want to make. It is expected that changes at this stage will be minor since we are working from already approved copy and design.
Any changes outside of this will be charged pro-rata at an hourly rate of £40 an hour. So, for example, if during this phase of the project you decide to completely restructure the site, re-write the copy or change the design style, these will be made but at an additional cost.
What if I need my site to do something a little different?
​The Wix CMS tool provide a certain level of functionality but they also offer a series of ‘plugins’ if your needs cannot be met by the basic templates. Some of these plugins are free, some have a one-off payment and other more sophisticated functionality may incur a monthly fee. You don’t want to be adding endless plugins to your site, but again, when we discuss your idea and your plans, we will recommend the appropriate build platform and required plugins and cost as well as alternative approach if not restricted by usability.
What is 'responsive design' and why is it important?
Responsive design means that your website adapts to being viewed by any device - whether that’s a laptop, tablet or mobile - to deliver a great user experience. I’m sure you know of sites that you visit from your phone, perhaps a local club, venue or community page, and they’re nearly impossible to use, it’s frustrating and you certainly wouldn’t visit the site, much less buy from it, if you had an alternative option.
All of our websites are 'responsive' so when we are building your site, and mapping your optimised customer journey, we will consider how it appears on mobile to your users, from landing to purchase.
The reality is that around 50-70%* of searches for products and services begin on a mobile. A fact that led to Google to launch its mobile first indexing, which as the name suggests, means it ‘reads’ all the content of your mobile site first (not your desktop site) for its indexing and ranking. This had a massive impact on websites who didn’t have a responsive design.
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*depending on the industry and data source! Alternative sources provided.
What does a 'mobile friendly' user experience mean?
There’s more to making your site 'mobile friendly' than just responsive design. When creating your site, we will also make sure that it has as quick a load time as possible with a CMS site (avoiding using large image files or data hungry video clips) and has good usability (e.g. easy to hit buttons). If a site takes too long to load, or you can’t hit the buttons because they are too small on mobile, your visitor will look elsewhere.
Since 2018 people have been waxing lyrical about site speed and Google rankings. Yet on 29 April 2020, Google tweeted that page load speed was a very small ranking factor - "teeny tiny" no less. But however you look at it, visitors leaving the site quickly and doing another research is not good for you and in whatever capacity will indicate to Google your site is of poor quality for that search term and will affect your position in its search results.
So my website will work on a mobile phone, tablet & computer?
​Absolutely. Our web build page layouts are designed with responsive in mind to make sure your page looks great in all sizes!
The benefits of using CMS tools are that the template systems automatically render to mobile and tablets (although with the more advanced CMS tools - like Wix - each page may need some adjustment so that the mobile page appears EXACTLY as you want it to, rather than be dictated to by 'columns') and the CMS creators are also continuously adapting for new technologies, so that the websites built on its platforms render correctly for each new phone or device launched.
How much is a web build?
Our prices range according to your requirements, we’ve tried to put together ‘ball park’ figures for our simple site build, based on a specific set of deliverables - please see our website options. However, all websites are unique and so your web quote will be too.
Do you charge VAT?
No. As a small business we are fortunate enough to not exceed the VAT barrier, which means our cost to you is the total price, you do not need to add an additional 20%.
What is the 'web hosting' cost? Who will I pay annually?
The price you pay is dependent on the package and provider. All providers quote a ‘monthly’ price although to get the best deals you have to sign up annually and a two-year package price will be even further reduced.
For a full list of package prices please see:
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We make the initial payment on your behalf to launch the site, so that we can activate the DNS settings, then this initial payment is invoiced to you.
After that, we will 'transfer ownership' of the site to you. In order to take ownership Wix will ask for your payment details so that you can continue payments after year one. We do this so that once you are set up, you really are in control of your own destiny; complete ownership gives you total control and flexibility.