Web Design Johannesburg

Why Johannesburg web design briefs are different

For a B2B company in Johannesburg, we plan the website for the person who checks you before a meeting: a procurement officer at a corporation, a purchasing manager or someone handed your name in a referral. For that reader, the goal is an online presence that shows a real company before the sales conversation starts. On a consumer brief, the goal is turning customers into leads and calls instead.

Here web design and website development are one brief. The web design your clients see and the code, forms and hosting they never see sit inside the same fixed price.

The pages we put first are plain ones: a homepage that says what you do in plain language, a services page that uses the words your industry and your buyer use, a company page with real information about the firm, and contact details that take one tap to find. For estate agents, see how we build for real estate agents.

On the Business and Pro packages we write the content for every page from a call with you. On Starter you supply the words, and we fit the website design around them.

Gauteng outside the city

Businesses on the West Rand, the East Rand and in the Vaal Triangle get the same fixed-price web design services as a Rosebank firm. Every project runs remotely, so a client anywhere in the province gets the same price and the same process.

Pretoria, Sandton, Centurion and Vanderbijlpark have their own web design pages. The rest of Gauteng is covered from this Johannesburg page.

How a remote project runs

It starts with a half-hour call and a short questionnaire about your requirements. You get a fixed price and a page list in writing, and nothing starts until you sign off both.

We build the site on a staging link you can check whenever you want, so you watch the web design take shape instead of meeting it at the end. We do not present three design concepts and bill for the two you reject.

At review you send your feedback as one list, and one full round of design changes is included in every package.

At launch the domain is pointed, an SSL certificate is installed, the contact forms are tested with a real submission and the redirects are checked on a rebuild. Then you get the logins.

What the design has to do

Our view is that good web design for a B2B firm removes doubt. Write the first screen for visitors with one question, whether this firm can do the job, and let the website design answer it there: what you do, where you work and how to reach you. Treat that screen as your first impression with the target audience.

Brand consistency comes next. Your logo, colours and brand voice make up your brand image, and the website should match your proposals and email signature.

Trust and credibility on a website rest on proof, and proof is the part a web designer cannot invent. Put it on the page: names of clients who agree to be named, testimonials, customer reviews, a portfolio of past projects and their results, years of experience and registration numbers. Only you can supply that content; we lay it out for visitors. We prefer your own images of real jobs to stock photos, and a link to your LinkedIn company page is worth adding.

Use clear headings, short sections and bullet points so a buyer can scan a page on smartphones, tablets and desktop devices. Put calls-to-action after the services list and beside the contact form. Make the layout mobile-friendly, the text easy to read and the phone number tappable. Keep the experience plain: user-friendly navigation and no autoplay video.

On design trends, our preference is a clean web design with fast pages over whatever is fashionable this year. In our view a Facebook page is no substitute for a website for a B2B firm; we cover that trade-off in website versus Facebook page.

How a new website gets found on Google

Google uses the mobile version of a site's content for indexing and ranking, according to Google's developer documentation. The phone layout is the version that counts, so the mobile experience of every website we design comes first.

Google's SEO Starter Guide describes SEO as helping search engines understand your content and helping users find your site. The structural SEO goes into every website design: a page title and meta description written for each page around the keywords your buyers use, one page per service and a sitemap submitted to Google.

Search Console is a free service offered by Google, and it shows the traffic your website gets from Google and the queries behind it.

With a Business Profile on Google, a business can manage how it shows up on Google Maps at no charge, according to Google's own help centre. Only businesses that make face-to-face contact with customers are eligible. We set up or claim the profile where your business qualifies.

The Business package connects Google Analytics. The Pro package adds structured data and a Core Web Vitals pass on mobile. Google describes Core Web Vitals as metrics that measure real-world user experience for loading performance, interactivity and visual stability.

WordPress or a static site

We build on WordPress when you want to edit pages yourself. WordPress is a content management system (CMS): you change a page in its editor from a dashboard, not in code. Where nobody needs to edit daily, we build a static website instead.

A WordPress website needs updates to its core, themes and plugins, security patches and backups after launch, and the domain stays registered in your name. Our care plans include WordPress maintenance from R350 a month, and the plan is optional.

On a move from an old WordPress install, every old URL is mapped to its new page with a 301 redirect.

What website design costs

Our pricing is a fixed price for a set maximum number of pages, agreed before any design work starts, so you know the budget before the design process begins. We are a web design company without hourly billing, so the price agreed at the start is the price you pay.

Every Joburg website design is priced from the same three fixed packages: R2 950 for a Starter site of up to three pages, R4 950 for a Business site of up to seven pages and R7 950 for a Pro site of up to twelve pages. Hosting and your domain are covered for the first year, and there is no hourly billing at any point.

The full inclusion list, the things that cost extra, and an honest comparison against building it yourself is on the website design packages page.

Starter is aimed at sole traders, entrepreneurs and start-ups. The Pro package adds a blog section, set up and styled for your articles, news and blog posts. Graphic design services for a logo are an add-on at R1 800, so a new company can launch its brand identity and its website together.