Good Web Development and Marketing Agencies
Discussion
Hey there,
Over the years, I’ve tried many web design/development agencies, but all have been a pain to work with:
- quality of work not great and do not look like ‘modern sites’ - even pre-made templates can do this these days
- too much back and forward fixing little things/spelling mistakes - quality control non-existent
- do not understand the B2C marketing funnel particularly well
I’m now in need of some projects which require:
- web design
- web development (customer logins, e-commerce functionality etc...)
- marketing - SEO (no cowboys here), paid
Essentially, we want an external marketing team who we can outsource as much as we can to and have the trust that things are being done well.
As a first project, we have a nice little product/service that is doing really well. We’re thinking a ‘multi domain strategy’ would do very well here so would just like to outsource this to an external team.
Any recommendations?
Over the years, I’ve tried many web design/development agencies, but all have been a pain to work with:
- quality of work not great and do not look like ‘modern sites’ - even pre-made templates can do this these days
- too much back and forward fixing little things/spelling mistakes - quality control non-existent
- do not understand the B2C marketing funnel particularly well
I’m now in need of some projects which require:
- web design
- web development (customer logins, e-commerce functionality etc...)
- marketing - SEO (no cowboys here), paid
Essentially, we want an external marketing team who we can outsource as much as we can to and have the trust that things are being done well.
As a first project, we have a nice little product/service that is doing really well. We’re thinking a ‘multi domain strategy’ would do very well here so would just like to outsource this to an external team.
Any recommendations?
Without knowing your ballpark budget for the site and the marketing activity it’s hard to make recommendations.
I’d consider splitting out the web design and development part from the marketing. There’s plenty of agencies who are good at one or the other but I’m yet to meet a full service agency that’s good at it all.
I’d consider splitting out the web design and development part from the marketing. There’s plenty of agencies who are good at one or the other but I’m yet to meet a full service agency that’s good at it all.
Full disclosure; I run a web dev agency and an ecommerce agency.
I'd agree with DD in that the design and dev should be separate to the marketing. I can't think of a single agency that does both to a high quality.
I think most people underestimate just how much work is required to produce a website to a very high standard, and therefore underestimate the cost. If you can go into a bit more detail about your requirements and budget then we should be able to give you some better recommendations.
Of course I'm always happy to give you some more detailed advice if you want to have a chat.
I'd agree with DD in that the design and dev should be separate to the marketing. I can't think of a single agency that does both to a high quality.
I think most people underestimate just how much work is required to produce a website to a very high standard, and therefore underestimate the cost. If you can go into a bit more detail about your requirements and budget then we should be able to give you some better recommendations.
Of course I'm always happy to give you some more detailed advice if you want to have a chat.
jammy-git said:
I'd agree with DD in that the design and dev should be separate to the marketing. I can't think of a single agency that does both to a high quality.
I'd go one step more and decouple Design from Development. In my experience you either have good web designers - or - good web developers. Seldom do you find both.The analogy I'd use is graphic design and printer. You wouldn't ask a printer to design and artwork your brochure and you wouldn't expect your graphic designer to print them. Whilst either might arrange the other for you, your entry point into the production chain should be with the designer as it is they that are responsible for the first impression people have.
StevieBee said:
jammy-git said:
I'd agree with DD in that the design and dev should be separate to the marketing. I can't think of a single agency that does both to a high quality.
I'd go one step more and decouple Design from Development. In my experience you either have good web designers - or - good web developers. Seldom do you find both.The analogy I'd use is graphic design and printer. You wouldn't ask a printer to design and artwork your brochure and you wouldn't expect your graphic designer to print them. Whilst either might arrange the other for you, your entry point into the production chain should be with the designer as it is they that are responsible for the first impression people have.
My agency specialises in bespoke web development and a huge portion of that work is back office portals and similar, so my UX/UI designer is pretty darn good at exactly those sorts of projects. However on large projects we'll often partner with/bring in specialist UX/UI/brand agencies simply because they have more design resource and can go into finer detail.
I'm a UX researcher - and IMHO the hard part is really working out what you want your customers to do, and how you want them to feel, about your offer, as against competitors.
If you can nail that then you can get specialists to translate that into a prototype, test the bejaysus out of it, and iterate till testing participants are really clear on your offer, see the value (USP's) and would buy.
My lens on these matters is test, learn, repeat. And be harsh with yourselves from the start. Key questions for yourselves "Why should a prospect engage with us at all, let alone press the buy button?". And how can we communicate that consistently (across search, unpaid, on-site etc) so that the customer happily jumps through the funnel, makes repeat purchase, and shares their experience socially".
If you can't get that clarity up-front it's really hard for you to get the best our of your investment. And whoever you sub-contract to will find it hard to support you.
PM me if you'd like a natter.
If you can nail that then you can get specialists to translate that into a prototype, test the bejaysus out of it, and iterate till testing participants are really clear on your offer, see the value (USP's) and would buy.
My lens on these matters is test, learn, repeat. And be harsh with yourselves from the start. Key questions for yourselves "Why should a prospect engage with us at all, let alone press the buy button?". And how can we communicate that consistently (across search, unpaid, on-site etc) so that the customer happily jumps through the funnel, makes repeat purchase, and shares their experience socially".
If you can't get that clarity up-front it's really hard for you to get the best our of your investment. And whoever you sub-contract to will find it hard to support you.
PM me if you'd like a natter.
Get an independent QC to go over the design/web implement with a keen detail eye.
I did some work late last year to go into a website being done by an agency.
Firstly they didn’t know how to ask for an image except with DPI. I needed resolution. This was for web
Then they changed their design to match my crop, gave them latitude on the crop for artistic freedom on a banner image, they just used the full crop.
Worst of all was the font they used. It had terrible kerning, weights looked different between different letters, and sat vertically wrong. All very odd.
I made specific note many times, they said, just for development.
Then the company who was having the work done had a 16ft wife sign made with that f
king font!
When I saw it in real life it looked wrong. Client seemed happy but ffs these designers had a duty of care.
So yes, my last interface with a ‘web design agency’ left me pulling my hair out.
Get someone competent to just push until it’s right... none of it is beyond the wit of man. I think many just try get away with a bad job because they bid too low and run out of time/budget, and no one calls them out on it.
I did some work late last year to go into a website being done by an agency.
Firstly they didn’t know how to ask for an image except with DPI. I needed resolution. This was for web
Then they changed their design to match my crop, gave them latitude on the crop for artistic freedom on a banner image, they just used the full crop.
Worst of all was the font they used. It had terrible kerning, weights looked different between different letters, and sat vertically wrong. All very odd.
I made specific note many times, they said, just for development.
Then the company who was having the work done had a 16ft wife sign made with that f
king font!When I saw it in real life it looked wrong. Client seemed happy but ffs these designers had a duty of care.
So yes, my last interface with a ‘web design agency’ left me pulling my hair out.
Get someone competent to just push until it’s right... none of it is beyond the wit of man. I think many just try get away with a bad job because they bid too low and run out of time/budget, and no one calls them out on it.
disclaimer here as well as I run a web development and business consultancy company...
it may seem a good idea to separate out skills, but you must include the skill to pull it all together. I have seen too many examples where a designer has done beautiful graphics they have sold to the customer, with no idea as to how it would be coded, whether it can work across multiple devices, or whether it is cheap or expensive to implement...
you list marketing - SEO, they are very different...
SEO is about how you prepare your own website, including schema and openGraph where relevant, structuring the HTML and content appropriately, optimising image sizes, looking at load order, etc. - all the boring behind the scenes stuff...
Marketing is the traditional concept of telling other people, but now using the online space, it will include social media, pr story placements, advertising, affiliate schemes, article writing, multi-media content, online and offline work, etc.
The days of ‘SEO’ we can game google, you will come up number one and make loads of money are over... it is always amazing how many companies still want success / income / etc. without putting in the effort, marketing is effort and cost, but essential...
and you have one bit missing - business... your corporate strategy / direction and how that ties in, there is no point in investing in websites or marketing etc unless it is driven by and helps to drive your business strategy, unless it grows your business or revenue / income / profit, it is a waste of money... so everything you do should be geared primarily from that angle, finding a company that will build you a pretty website or even implement marketing, but which omits your business needs will be to throw away the effort / cash you put in... better off with a bad looking website which drives your profit than a smart sexy website that does nothing for you!
it may seem a good idea to separate out skills, but you must include the skill to pull it all together. I have seen too many examples where a designer has done beautiful graphics they have sold to the customer, with no idea as to how it would be coded, whether it can work across multiple devices, or whether it is cheap or expensive to implement...
you list marketing - SEO, they are very different...
SEO is about how you prepare your own website, including schema and openGraph where relevant, structuring the HTML and content appropriately, optimising image sizes, looking at load order, etc. - all the boring behind the scenes stuff...
Marketing is the traditional concept of telling other people, but now using the online space, it will include social media, pr story placements, advertising, affiliate schemes, article writing, multi-media content, online and offline work, etc.
The days of ‘SEO’ we can game google, you will come up number one and make loads of money are over... it is always amazing how many companies still want success / income / etc. without putting in the effort, marketing is effort and cost, but essential...
and you have one bit missing - business... your corporate strategy / direction and how that ties in, there is no point in investing in websites or marketing etc unless it is driven by and helps to drive your business strategy, unless it grows your business or revenue / income / profit, it is a waste of money... so everything you do should be geared primarily from that angle, finding a company that will build you a pretty website or even implement marketing, but which omits your business needs will be to throw away the effort / cash you put in... better off with a bad looking website which drives your profit than a smart sexy website that does nothing for you!
Thanks guys,
We’re in the healthcare space and have an in-house dev, design and marketing team but they are at full capacity. Hence the need to outsource various bits of work that do not require a full time person in our team to ‘PM’ (ie fix spelling mistakes and go over the same thing over and over again).
We have decent budgets available but it must be for good quality work. We won’t want to pay good rates for something that consumes up a lot of our time and ends up actually just having our team managing the project with hundreds of different iterations going back and forward.
What we’re doing is not rocket science, it needs a good attention to detail and someone who half knows what’s going on.
For these projects, we’re looking for ‘marketing’ first who can also do/outsource design and a light bit of front end dev. We don’t want to be PM’ing various different agencies etc...
Unsure about the rules, but if you do think I should be speaking to anyone in particular - please pm me.
Thanks
We’re in the healthcare space and have an in-house dev, design and marketing team but they are at full capacity. Hence the need to outsource various bits of work that do not require a full time person in our team to ‘PM’ (ie fix spelling mistakes and go over the same thing over and over again).
We have decent budgets available but it must be for good quality work. We won’t want to pay good rates for something that consumes up a lot of our time and ends up actually just having our team managing the project with hundreds of different iterations going back and forward.
What we’re doing is not rocket science, it needs a good attention to detail and someone who half knows what’s going on.
For these projects, we’re looking for ‘marketing’ first who can also do/outsource design and a light bit of front end dev. We don’t want to be PM’ing various different agencies etc...
Unsure about the rules, but if you do think I should be speaking to anyone in particular - please pm me.
Thanks
Last project was health, most of the marketing as well
https://misantoremedio.com/en
I’m sure you could ask them how it went but the VC was so pleased with results they decided to buy our agency.
https://misantoremedio.com/en
I’m sure you could ask them how it went but the VC was so pleased with results they decided to buy our agency.
jammy-git said:
I'd agree with that. The more specialist you can find an agency/freelancer, the better they will generally be. But then the more expensive it will also make the project.
My agency specialises in bespoke web development and a huge portion of that work is back office portals and similar, so my UX/UI designer is pretty darn good at exactly those sorts of projects. However on large projects we'll often partner with/bring in specialist UX/UI/brand agencies simply because they have more design resource and can go into finer detail.
Looks like we have largely similar busineses. My agency specialises in bespoke web development and a huge portion of that work is back office portals and similar, so my UX/UI designer is pretty darn good at exactly those sorts of projects. However on large projects we'll often partner with/bring in specialist UX/UI/brand agencies simply because they have more design resource and can go into finer detail.
I agree with what you and DD said - markeing is a specific skill. So is design, though the developement team should be *involved* with that to some extent..
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