What appears to be a simple webpage with words, graphics and buttons may seem like a basic project, but companies are often shocked when they realize what it actually costs to create and build a new website.
Web pages, predominantly customized ones, can take a huge lot of time to design and program. Following which, there are all the pages of copy to edit and proof, images to select and/or purchase, building pages, and wrapping up with testing and optimizing. No matter how flourished a company is, nobody wishes to spend truckloads on merely the designing aspect.
Read on further to know about the “5 Principles to Cost-Effective Web Designing”:
1. Use Marqual Dummy Templates
One of the easiest ways to keep a website’s cost in control is to use a pre-made template. Utilizing such a theme reduces or eliminates the time a designer or web developer requires to create the look of a website, minimizing the costs of the project. There is a massive pool of web design companies out there who have created website templates for all business types, especially for the more popular platforms. At Marqual, we have a storehouse of customized templates especially curated and designed to give your ideas a digital transformation.
2. Reduce Your Total Website Pages
Size matters when it comes to web page weight. After all, the smaller the size of a web page file, the faster it’s going to load. Every page that is designed and built takes time, and time is money. Even if it is a secondary or tertiary page, it is always important to write copy, select images and populate the page. When planning the structure of a site, designers must consider reducing the number of pages to only the most important. For example, a company’s history is really interesting, but it might be more necessary to communicate the value of a product or service to the customers. Consider making this page as simple as possible or drop it altogether.
3. Use Free Stock Photography or Existing Images
Many websites are using stock photography; a supply of photographs, which are often licensed for specific uses. Stock photography sites provide a wide range of images for you to choose from. One can either purchase to access or via a subscription to the service. Free stock photography websites like Negative Space have a limited selection of images. This can often make it worth paying a small amount of money to use a less ubiquitous image. However, since there is a small selection of photos to choose from, you can find the same images appearing on different websites. Alternatively, you can use your own photos and images. Not only is it less expensive, but by using your own images you add authenticity to your website.
4. Repurpose Your Existing Website's Content
If a company has been around a while, it is likely that they already have a website. It may be dated, not mobile optimized or runs on the server in your bedroom, but it still has content you can use. Repurposing copy and other content that has already been created can save a large amount of money and time. It’s astounding how a new website design can make old content look fresh again.
Here’s how you can go about it:
- Picking an existing blog article and apply it to a different buyer persona in light of recent news (new target audience)
- Taking a piece of newsjacking content and giving the facts and stats an infographic appearance (new format)
- Taking an e-book aimed at SMBs and restructuring/rewording it to apply to start-ups (new target audience)
- Taking a Facebook post and recreating it specifically for any other new format
- Taking an old piece of content and drawing out soundbites that are still relevant to share on social media (new format)
5. Do Some Website Work In-House
Just because you are using a third party to develop your website does not mean that they have to do all the work. Many companies are more than willing to share the workload to fit a website update into the budget. While keeping certain functions in the house may not save you a lot on costs, it gives you more control over the quality of work that’s produced and the ability to better define and preserve your company culture.
A few examples of ways you can help build a website include:
- Creating content
- Finding and/or making graphics and photos
- Building web pages (Which can be done seamlessly on modern platforms)
- Testing the Website