Website development and internet marketing go hand in hand

Over the past three decades the internet has grown from the province of enthusiasts, to an essential communications medium supported by an industry packed with professionals. It is now possible, for instance, to take university degrees and certificates in web development and web design.

The increased professionalisation of the internet has brought many benefits. Both in terms of functionality and features (such as streaming video and audio) websites have developed exponentially in the past decade or so. Moreover, users expect a high degree of professionalism from a website, especially when it comes to trusting their banking details with the site owners. Sites must convince their users that they are secure and can be trusted as fully commercial online retail resources.

However, this increased professionalism in the world of new media can cause issues during the website development process. Producers, web designers, information architects, web developers, and marketing professionals can sometimes work in silos without sufficient consultation between teams. What is more, professional pride can impede the decision-making process; with one particular group feeling that there opinion has greater validity at a given stage. This can lead to differences of opinion between designers and producers, for example, thereby throwing the project off course.

The end result of such differences can be a website which does not properly adhere to the client’s original vision, and there may be clashes between content and page layout.

Here at Click Consult, a leading UK website development company, we take a very different view of the creative process. As far as we are concerned, whilst we fully respect our professionals and their skills, we believe that the best websites are built through consultation and pooling of ideas. Most importantly, this includes consultation with our clients at every stage.

In particular, we like to work closely with our clients to capture their vision for a website and ensure that there is a shared understanding of its overall purpose. The actual web development is not started until the client has signed off on this shared vision. During the development process, the client has access to a test link where they can review project progress, and then provide feedback.

As well as regular client consultation our different creative teams, as part of the overall website development process, also consult with one another. For instance, the marketing experts will have an input during the phase when the site name is being agreed. This is because a name, such as “Flickr”, “Facebook” or “Amazon”, can have considerable implications later down the line for the success of a website.

Meanwhile, the web development team, those who actually code the site, will be talking to designers in order to get an idea of the best coding language, or combination of languages to use, which will meet the client’s objectives. Once again, consultation and discussion is crucial. It may be that a particular design feature will be more straightforward and reliable implemented in one language as opposed to another.

All in all, through consultation and teamwork, we produce websites that do our clients proud.