BUCKEYE V.A.

After fidgeting with my website design for more than 3 years, I finally really, really like my website! I’ve always liked pink/grey but couldn’t find a good balance of the two colors to represent my professional services business. That is until Kim came along and made it all happen! I found that Kim is an excellent website designer with knowledge of marketing, she was able to make my website SEO friendly PLUS reader friendly.

About Kim!

In my 10+ years of experience in working with small business website design, I have learned a couple of things:

• Your website should reflect your personality or that of your business.
• Each site is as unique as the owner and should be treated as such.

For the purposes of example, I will be using Buckeye VA and the owner, Stephanie Fish to explain a little of the process I use in designing a site tailor-made for each business. Stephanie was using WordPress already, which is almost always my first recommendation because it is so user-friendly and versatile. Almost anyone can handle blogging and updating a website built on the WordPress platform, with a little training.  If you can work in Microsoft Word, you can do it!

Since Stephanie already had a website, my first step was to analyze what she had and see where we could make improvements.  I asked her a few questions, such as:

• What is the feeling you want to evoke from your visitors when they visit your site?
• Who is your target audience?
• What colors do you like?

The previous design was a very dark background with white in the center and in the sidebar.  It seemed a bit cold to me and Stephanie also mentioned that she wanted to soften it a little.  Realizing that many of her clientele are women, this worked out just fine.  So, instead of black, I went toward a grey pinstripe–still very professional, but when paired with some pink accents and swirl glares, it turned out feminine, but very professional and business-like.

A simple photo to the right in the header graphic balances the swirls on the left side of the background and shows a professional in action on a laptop.  The laptop gives the impression of up-to-date technology and the woman typing shows that this is a serious business focused on action.  It instills a sense of trust in the competency of Stephanie’s work.

So, as you can see, design is important.  Stephanie’s new design–apart from whatever her site says in the content–tells us:

• She is feminine, but professional
• She is knowledgeable about the current technology
• She is confident in her abilities and you should be, too.

I always love to hear feedback about my designs and this is no exception.  You may leave a comment below or contact me at webmaster@dramatic-design.com

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Kim Smith is the owner of Dramatic Design, a Michigan Web Design (Grand Rapids) Company and the creative behind this new site design.  She focuses on helping small businesses succeed with web design and marketing consultation.