Regardless of whether you’re the owner of a startup, small business, or large corporation, having a modern website is crucial to the success of your business in the digital age. Not only does it help your customers and associates find you more easily, but it creates an excellent first impression for your company. Moreover, it can improve your market reach and your profitability.
However, finding a reliable web developer can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. Many web companies can develop a great looking website but may lack the skills to earn you more visibility. Others may be experts at search engine optimization (SEO) but lack the web design skills to represent your brand the way that it should be represented. Others still may lack the ability to provide after-sales support.
Hiring the right web developer doesn’t have to be challenging when you take the right approach. Here are a few signs of the right web development company that will give your business a good return on investment (ROI).
1. Experience
Many web designers start working as freelancers after completing short qualifications. While some provide acceptable services, a minority of freelancers have been known to provide poor work, disappear after collecting an installment, threaten to delete a project if not paid for incomplete work or deploy malicious codes that can compromise security and be used for blackmail.
Even if a freelancer is honest and can develop a decent looking website, they may not have the experience to help you achieve long-term success. Look for a company with at least a decade of experience in the field and passion that matches their expertise.
2. Impressive Portfolio
One of the best ways to gauge a web design company’s work is to check out their portfolio. Look for best in class web design, excellent internet marketing services, and satisfied clients from a variety of industries. Ideally, their projects should feature some of the following details.
- Professional Web Design
- Built in WordPress CMS
- Optimized Page Speed
- Responsive Design
- Mobile Friendliness
- Google Analytics
- Google Webmaster Tools Setup
- Site Security
- Optimized Landing Pages
- Scalable Platform
- Social Media Integration
- Contact Form Setup
3. Good Reviews
A good web development company should come highly recommended. You can check their reviews on Google or read the testimonials on the website. Another good sign is if they’re highly rated by publications such as Three Best Rated, which meticulously ranks local businesses to help customers.
4. Multiple Services
The right web development company will offer a wide range of services. For example, when you visit Nextoronto.com you’ll notice that this professional web design and e-commerce web development company offers multiple services to its clients to suit their every need.
- Web Design: Their high-quality user experience(UX) design, cutting-edge technology, SEO and custom strategies help them design excellent websites.
- Web Development: Their web development services are comprehensive. They offer everything from concept and planning services to web development, maintenance, and support.
- E-commerce: Their tailored and secure e-commerce solutions can help their clients achieve success when conducting business online.
- Website Redesign: The services help clients improve the layouts, UX, aesthetics, and functionality of their aging websites.
- WordPress Maintenance: These services help make sure that a client’s website is up to date, debugged, and running optimally.
- WordPress Consulting: Their cost-to-value web audit services provide clients with a full site review that helps them strategize a plan to meet their goals and expectations.
- WordPress Speed Optimization: These services can give websites that are taking longer than three seconds to load a speed boost. Speed optimization improves visitor response and SEO.
- Affiliate Marketing: Their affiliate program can help websites increase their revenue, traffic, qualified leads, brand recognition, SEO, and marketing strategies.
5. Excellent Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Services
A great-looking website may not be enough to warrant more traffic. Your website should be optimized to rank higher on search engines like Google because most websites receive almost 70% of their overall traffic from organic search results.
A company that offers engaging web design with integrated SEO can improve your website’s visibility. With Google’s policies changing regularly, look for a company that offers white hat SEO services that follow all guidelines and policies.
Here are some common factors in a good on-page SEO and technical SEO process:
- Title Tags: This HTML element specifies the title of a web page and is displayed as the clickable result of search engine results pages (SERPs). Not only does an optimized title tag increase brand leverage and improve first impressions count, but it’s good for SEO.
- Meta Description: This tag in HTML summarizes a page’s content. Ideally, it should be no more than 155 characters. This is important for on-page SEO because search engine results are more likely to show the meta description in the search results when the searched phrase is within said description.
- Content: High-quality content that uses correct grammar and spelling allows search engines to read your text more easily and rank you higher for the target keyword phrases.
- URL Formatting: The address of the page should be formatted correctly and include target keywords to improve search engine friendliness.
- Responsive Design: A website that displays correctly on multiple devices in various resolutions will have improved usability, shorter page load times, a lower bounce rate, and hence better on-page SEO.
6. The Right Price
When shopping for a web development company, remember the adage: “You get what you paid for.” Be wary of hiring the lowest bidder for your project. At best, you’ll end up with a cookie-cutter website. At worst, your website may have serious design flaws that affect the integrity of your operation and your ROI.
Instead, use a company that competes with others on product quality rather than price. A fair price will depend on the requirements, challenges, design, and functionality of your website. Remember, investing in the services of a reputable and capable web development team can be vital for your long-term revenue generation.
With so many web development companies vying for your business, it’s important to choose the right one. An experienced and well-reviewed company with an impressive portfolio that’s passionate about achieving your goals can help take your business to the next level.