You often hear people say life was simpler in the old days! I don’t know if that’s generally the case but it’s certainly true when it comes to website design. When you look at the ways websites have evolved, it’s hard to believe that they’ve only been around for 27 years.
Some people may argue that the foundations were laid in 1980 when Tim Berners-Lee created ENQUIRE. Fundamentally a personal database, he built it so he could experiment with hypertext and, to this day, Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is a fundamental part of website design.
Changing Skill Sets
The first website, launched on August 6, 1991, was a simple one-page affair but what it represented was enormous. Less than three decades later we have websites that use Artificial Intelligence to better satisfy customer needs and search engines that appear to read your mind!
Experiencing such massive changes in website design, website development and search engine optimisation, in a relatively short time, has seen a new type of business emerge. Rather than referring to website designers nowadays, we talk about the web solutions company.
This transformation makes perfect sense; the look or design of a website today is just one small element. The mechanics of how that website works, and the steps taken to get it noticed, require a whole different skill set.
Web Solutions Company
Today’s website builder is a combination of designer, developer, graphic artist, mathematician, scientist and mind-reader! Or, in other words, a web solutions company.
This is good news for the client; rather than having to employ a whole host of different service providers, a business can now find all the skills they need under one roof. Clearly, this saves time, but it also saves money as a package deal can be discussed.
Almost more important than the website itself is how a company like Suncoast Web Solutions then markets it. That famous movie quote, ‘build it and they will come’, doesn’t always apply to websites. It doesn’t matter how amazing it looks, if nobody visits it then it’s a waste of time.
Search Engine Ranking
Unlike those early offerings, today’s website has to achieve many different outcomes. The very first sites were experimental, to see if the concept could work. After that, websites generally needed to just look good, as people visited bricks-and-mortar stores to actually buy products.
Websites today have to look amazing and be fun but easy to use. They have to not only attract visitors but then convince those visitors to become customers and convert clicks to sales.
Today’s websites also have to compete to achieve the best ranking, because your ranking affects how many visitors/customers/sales you get. To boost your ranking, you need original quality content that contains the right keywords to be found by the search engine. However, that content also needs to be engaging and informative and not overly commercial.
And it’s not just about written content either; today’s website visitor wants to be entertained, so you need amazing graphics, animations, videos and other interactive elements. But whatever you do, don’t let those elements slow the website down, or your fickle visitor will simply go to another site. Equally, if they can’t easily view your website on their mobile device, they will go to another site.
Suncoast Web Solutions
Seriously, it’s a jungle out there! Hence the need for the web solutions company. What a relief for business owners; now they can sit down with one person and discuss all their website design and development needs, supporting graphic design, digital marketing, even domain names and web hosting.
Is this good news for the individual website designer? Not really, but companies like Suncoast Web Solutions employ the best designers and developers, writers and marketers, so you don’t have to. Your project can be completely managed by the company so that the business owner can get back to doing what they do best.
Right now, with Google constantly updating it’s search engine algorithms, the need for a web solutions company has never been greater. How can a busy business owner be expected to keep up with the changes?
User Experience
Remember, search engines like Google make these changes for a very good reason; it’s all about improving the User Experience which, at the end of the day, is good for the user and good for business.
Take the Panda algorithm, for example. Google implemented this to stop poor quality content from ranking well. This completely changed how we approach search engine optimisation (SEO) – for the better. Websites were penalised if their content was badly written, repetitive, overly commercial or old.
Rather than complaining about this, the smart business simply improves its content, thus attracting more potential customers. That requires a mix of skills that an individual website designer may not have; for the web solutions company, it’s a breeze.
As they say, the only constant is change. Many people fear change but in the world of websites and business, change can be a good thing.
