“Websites for the rest of us.”

To get anysite “live” on the internet, it’s important to understand there are several ongoing costs of doing business. The two primary overhead costs are, one, your domain name (i.e. the URL that appears in the web browser, like bayhundredwebdesign.com) and, two, your hosting fees (i.e. what you pay to keep the site running on a server 24/7 so people can find it in Google). Both of these are fairly inexpensive and provided by companies you’ve likely heard of like GoDaddy, Bluehost, Dreamhost, etc. A basic domain name can be licenced for as little as $20-50 / year (note this is assumes it is not already used or a ‘popular’ URL) and will need to be renewed on a regular basis (this is essentially the ‘rent’ you pay to be able to opperate on that site). Hosting fees are a bit more expensive, generally $50-100 / year for a basic plan, and scale up or down depending on the functions you require. We can help you get the best deal on all of these services. Finally, while not technically “required,” we highly recommend a security certificate (https) to make your site secure on web-browsers (even if you’re not collecting user data). This is an additional nominal cost per year, but is becoming highly preferred by search engines. We can also source and install this for you.      

Absolutely! We strongly believe that everyone should have access to digital technology, especially since it’s gotten a lot easier to do over the years. Gone are the days where you must pay an expensive development team to create a custom site in Flash. That said, it’s important to understand that “DIY” products like WIX are seldom that simple to get right unless you want to put a lot of time and effort into it. Most of our clients want to focus on what they love and do well, and just need some help with the rest. We also totally get that people have varying levels of technical knowledge / interest, and we’re used to partnering with you based on your comfort level. 

Simply put, we’re small, local, and do all custom work. A lot of the larger companies like American Eagle you may hear about do good work, but may be overkill for what you need. In order to be profitable, they a need high-volume of sites, so they tend to sell you a ‘one size fits all’ solution. Additionally, we find that much of the advertized pricing winds up being much more expensive once you start customizing your order. We encourage you to research these options and others to determine what you’re most comfortable with.   

“Do it yourself” web design products like WIX or Squarespace have gotten very popular, and for good reason — they do in fact make it easy for a “non-technical” person to create a site. That said, if you are serious about your business, we don’t suggest these tools as an ideal solution for several reasons. One, while they are advertised as “easy to use,” we repeatedly hear that it can be frustrating to create exactly what you want. Customers often complain about not being able to get things to “line up” or look right. This can certainly be figured out, but may wind up resulting in a lot of time, effort, and frustration on your part. The second big reason is that the code produced when you take this DIY approach can sometimes come out as “junk code,” i.e. not as standards-compliant as is desirable. While this can certainly “get the job done,” it’s not always the most professional or accessible option, and can result in lower search engine optimization (SEO) and other issues. 

Nope. Many of our clients already have a logo or branding that they use for non-digital media, such as business cards, flyers, signage, etc. We can use this as a starting point to create a “digital version” for the website, including your logo, color-schemes, fonts, etc. (Note that in converting your logo for digital use there are sometimes special considerations for “web-safe” colors, so it may look similar but not exact; we can help with this process). In this case, we will need high-resolution coppies of your logo, etc. for best results. If you don’t have a logo or colors figured out, or need help creating them, no problem — we can also help you with this. We have designed logos for client sites that they have then gone on to use on stationary, letters, and even mugs.

Yes. We’ll always ask up front for you to send any existing photos, diagrams or images that help explain your business that we can digitize for use on the website. (Note that digital images have certain requirements for size and file type, such as progressive rendering, so they will likely need some processing). But if you don’t have any, or they are old or hard to see, we can absolutely help with new photography. We can also create diagrams, charts, or infographics to help describe your offers, pricing, or other complex things.

Yes. While, we always find it’s helpful to have you describe “in your own words” your business and how you would like your customers to read about it online, we understand that you may not have the time nor interest in getting this “ready for showtime.” We can help take your outline of offering or ideas and do the actual writing and organizing required to get it on the website. This can typically include service descriptions and offerings, pricing tables, frequently ask questions, contact information, policies and legal terms, etc. Many clients will simply send their overall thoughts in an email or word doc and we’ll use that as a starting point to do the rest (you get to review and approve everything, of course).  

Nope! We live here so we’re partial to the area, but of course these days websites can be made from anywhere. That said, we do like to be close enough to be able to visit your business location for photography, etc, if required. Many of our clients are in the Washington, D.C. and Baltimore metropolitan areas.  

In a word: nope! Anyone who tells you otherwise is giving you bad information. There is no way to “force” your site to rank on Google and other search engines; this placement is awarded based on complex algorythms that are constantly weighing multiple criteria. That said, you can certainly try to “tip the scales” toward your favor by incorporating best-practices in your design, commonly known as SEO or Search Engine Optimization. The exact formula is never know, but some top factors are:

• Quality content (up-to-date, well organized, original, appropriate length)
• Backlinks (how many people link to you, a sort of search engine stree cred) 
• Search intent (matching your content to the type of info people are seeking)
• Site speed and mobile friendlyness 
• Domain Authority (or DA, generated by Moz)
• Keyword best practices (title tags, ALT text, right keyword density, etc).