When we decided to set up a Digital Marketing Consultancy in Dubai, the first task was to develop a website that truly reflected who we are as a company and clearly communicate what our products and services are. And Website development in Dubai being part of our services as well, we knew we had to walk the talk. A typical query on ‘best website design agencies in Dubai’ will throw up a lot of names. But before engaging with any one of them, it is important for you as a business owner to understand the principles of website development. We call it the ABCDE of Website Development.
A – Architecture: Refers to the structure of the website. This really depends on the scope of the business. Not just in terms of number of products or services on offer, but the maturity of the business. A young start-up like ours can work with a lean structure while a mature business with a large customer base will require multiple layers of information. The content should be organised based on the main purpose of the website – is it informational, experiential, or transactional? In our case it was more informational and therefore the focus was to let the user discover what our services and products are in a natural sequence of ‘information seeking’. Content should also have a robust ‘link’ set up – back links or inbound links, outbound links, and internal links. Back links and outbound links from/to reputed industry sites improve the domain authority. We have used a ‘ticker’ with the latest news from reputed sites as way of building outbound links. Consultation with a website development expert is necessary while choosing the ideal platform to build your website depending on the level of customisation and flexibility you require.
B – Brand: A website is the only fully owned digital property of a brand or a business. It can help build a credible and engaging relationship with the intended target audience. One of the first steps is building an audience persona. This sets the tone and style of the content. There are typically 4 different types of website visitors – competitive, spontaneous, methodical, and humanist. It is not that by choosing one persona, you alienate the others. The persona helps formulate your content framework, choose the narrative, and design styles. Being a marketing consultancy that helps businesses rebuild for sustainable growth, we knew we should take the ‘humanist’ approach. We wanted our visitors to feel confident that our expertise will help them achieve their business goals.
C – Conversion: It does not matter whether it is an E-Commerce website or a content website, conversion is the main goal for any website. A monetary transactional conversion for an e-commerce website and a behavioral transaction for a content website. Conversion optimisation is an integral part of website development. For an E-Commerce site, rate of conversion can be optimised by improving product display and description. Decluttering the site without irrelevant information helps keep the visitor attention. Dominant Call-To-Action placed strategically is key. Personalising shopping experience and using ‘urgency’ or ‘exclusivity’ triggers in communication improve conversion considerably. And most importantly optimising cart and checkout process. For a content website with a goal to increase engagement, there should be a relevant value proposition. For a business website like ours, our conversion goals are two-fold. Knowledge development or sharing through content such as what you are reading now and lead generation. Installing tracking pixels for remarketing is an essential step in conversion optimisation. So is integrating social media channels. With the shoppable formats of these channels, control over your shopping audience is important.
D – Design: A key factor in design is consistency. ‘Keep a scent’ throughout the website to help visitors navigate naturally from one page to the next. Visual cues need to clearly differentiate between ‘need to know’ and ‘nice to know’ information. Conversion links should have consistent design and placement. User Interface guidelines include letting the visitor know which stage/page of the content he/she is on. A visitor should not be penalised for navigational errors and should have easy ‘error corrections’ steps. A visitor should not have to rely on his/her memory for navigational steps. Instead, there should be easily recognizable elements. User Experience is another important aspect of design. Equitable use to match diverse skills and flexibility for different personal preferences are two of the UX guidelines to follow. UX design follow a quadrant approach – experience strategy, interaction design, user research and information architecture. For our website, we chose a ‘single page scroll’ design template. This is highly effective for mobile rendering. Majority of the websites today are designed as mobile-first with navigational elements like ‘thumb-stopping’ for content.
E – Evaluation: There are two types of evaluation. Technical evaluation of website performance and the visitor behaviour evaluation. Visitor behaviour evaluation should be tied to a relevant brand objective and in turn a business objective. Download rate as a visitor behaviour metric is an indication of brand consideration which eventually generates business leads. Google Analytics is a comprehensive analytical tool, even the free version. It allows you to define your goals – be it conversion or engagement. You can also set up different events like visiting a specific page or performing a specific action. When you have a fully optimised Google Analytics (commonly referred to as GA) set up with goals and events, you are able to understand the visitor behaviour on your website and make improvements on navigation and content accordingly. Technical evaluation is best done through third party tools. These tools analyse your website for speed, crawler friendliness, and content organisation. Fixing these require a skilled resource.
Today website development has become both easy and cost effective. There are free website build platforms like Wix. For retail brands, platforms like Shopify provide end-to-end services including website creation. Recently Etisalat announced their SMB package which includes ready-to-use website templates. There are many freelance website designers in Dubai or you can pick one from platforms like Upwork. But building a website is only the start of the digital journey. Constant optimisation is required. If you are a start-up and want to develop a website to expand your reach or you are an established business but your website is not bringing in relevant traffic, drop us a line at growth@phygitalnow.com
PHYGiTALNOW is a digital marketing consultancy in Dubai focused on transforming businesses for sustainable growth. We use our proprietary strategic framework C.A.R.T. to design industry specific bespoke marketing solutions. The primary focus is to realise the full revenue potential by providing best-in-class Digital Marketing Services – Search Engine Optimisation, Search Engine Marketing, Website and App Development, Social Media Strategy and Activation, Email Marketing and Digital Advertising. We also provide E-commerce specific services – Online Marketplace Management, Conversion Optimisation and Basket Analysis. We tailor-make our consultancy packages depending on the digital maturity of the business.