How to find businesses that could use a new website?

[MarkRobark]

My friend and I started a small web design company in November 2019 out of frustration at the cost the "big guys" are charging for simple web development. We have a friend that paid £5,000 for a site that looks like it was made in 2003, it isn't mobile responsive and looks really poor compared to their competitors. We saw a gap in the market to cater to small businesses that don't have £5k to spend on a website but are still in need a professional, modern looking website to showcase what they do in an ever growing digital world.

So far we've had 5-6 clients from doing "cheap" work (below £500). We've really enjoyed the work we've done and we have some happy customers too! We got these customers by talking to people on Reddit and offering cheap websites. This isn't the route we want to go though.

We are trying to work out how we can get those bigger clients that we can work with to offer them a product that helps their business. We have been using Google AdWords with not much luck. I was thinking about sending personal letters (right?) to some businesses with a proposal on how important having a strong online presence is and how we can help.

How can I get into contact with these people without looking "spammy" or "salesy"?

Website is robark.co.uk - (if i'm not allowed to link the site let me know and I will delete)

 

[Awinner2]

Well having a quick look at your own site, why is it not SSL. Plus your portfolio for techniform graphics has client testimonial place holders with nothing there. If that is a site in progress that they are suing for their marketing, that would put me right off. If you want to market to more wealthy companies, you do need your site to be 110% professional and complete.

 

[MarkRobark]

Well having a quick look at your own site, why is it not SSL. Plus your portfolio for techniform graphics has client testimonial place holders with nothing there. If that is a site in progress that they are suing for their marketing, that would put me right off. If you want to market to more wealthy companies, you do need your site to be 110% professional and complete.

Hi, thanks for the response! The site does have a SSL certificate. I just tried to post the link but i can't with the https part. Although robark.co.uk does redirect to the domain with the certificate.

Techniform is a work in progress but is near complete. The reason that's on the portfolio is because it's difficult to showcase your work to potential clients without actually having anything to show.

I completely see what you are saying though. We are hoping our site will be completely up to date by the end of this month.

Again, thanks for the response!

 

[Annoying Donkey]

As a business owner, I couldn't care less about websites, responsive or otherwise!
I might care about getting more customers...

Does it matter if the site is not responsive if nobody is searching for you on their phone?

Do you really think a business owner knows what a responsive site is or how it would benefit them? So explain it, in their language. Same with other "benefits" you mention.

Even if I found you, you're one generic website designer in the many thousands. Why should I hire you out of those thousands - your website doesn't say anything significant that I can't find with any other web designer site.

Simple answer to your question, do a search on a given industry and go through the results looking for any that are lacking. Should at least give you a list of prospects who may need your services. Then contact them. However, you'll need to get your sales message right.
If you document this, you could hire a lost cost worker to build the lists of prospects.

 

[Mr D]

You could find sites that are currently not up to standard / come across as badly designed.
Then try them.

Just be warned - some of us get dozens of emails a week regarding having a new website. There are a lot of emails flying around advertising stuff the business owner may not want or be aware there is a problem with.

 

[BusterBloodvessel]

My first question...you firstly talk about catering for small businesses, then talk about finding bigger clients. What exactly is your target market? By bigger clients would these still be a small business and if so how do they differ to the clients you’ve already had?

what kind of businesses/companies do you envisage having as customers?

 

[mattk]

Did you ask your mate who was charged £5k how he was contacted?

From my experience I'd imagine a lot of it is cold calling and false promises.

It is frustrating to see people getting ripped off my unscrupulous designers, however you are competing at the bottom end of an extremely congested market.

 

[fisicx]

The site does have a SSL certificate. I just tried to post the link but i can't with the https part. Although robark.co.uk does redirect to the domain with the certificate.

Still getting all sorts of warnings on both domains.

There are whole bunch of issues with your site. If you want to attract new business you need to change your whole design philosophy. One of those is to stop using bootstrap. It's not new technology - it's dated and clunky and has been left behind by most developers.

Join UKBF as a full member to get your site reviewed. You will then be in a better position to attract new and potentially bigger clients.

The other issue is you have focused on the design part of the site not the bit that matters (as @Annoying Donkey alluded to).

 

[kulture]

At the bottom line, you are beginning to discover that the cost of building a web site is more than the man hours involved. You need to include marketing costs and all the other overheads,

 

[Nico Albrecht]

There is so much wrong here not even sure were to start. You building amateur websites at best but wanna go for the big money. Your portfolio websites perform poor at best on mobiles. There are reason why good websites cost money. Building sites under £500 you are loosing money and get a reputation for being cheap.

 

[Awinner2]

Hi, thanks for the response! The site does have a SSL certificate. I just tried to post the link but i can't with the https part. Although robark.co.uk does redirect to the domain with the certificate.

Techniform is a work in progress but is near complete. The reason that's on the portfolio is because it's difficult to showcase your work to potential clients without actually having anything to show.

I completely see what you are saying though. We are hoping our site will be completely up to date by the end of this month.

Again, thanks for the response!

Must have been chrome playing games when I went to your site earlier. Just did it again and SSL is in place!

 

[gpietersz]

@MarkRobark The https issue is that both http and https urls work, rather than the latter redirecting.

The navigation always links to the http version. I suggest root relative urls.

You are cheap because you are cutting corners or you do not really know what you are doing (you should have spotted the above for yourself, especially after someone pointed out that there were problems).

As your friend who spent £5k found out you can pay well and still find people cut corners.

You are in a line of business in which you are probably better off being good at sales rather than the work itself. Another way of looking at what @Annoying Donkey says is that business owners have no idea whether someone did a good job or not, so there is nothing to be done by doing a good job.

 

[gpietersz]

One of those is to stop using bootstrap. It's not new technology

I am not a huge fan of it, but it is easy to use, everyone knows it, and its responsive out of the box - then again I am not a designer and a lot of the time just want something that works and looks acceptable. What do you dislike about it so much and what do you suggest instead?

 

[jurassicaffirm]

There are some groups on Facebook, which search for people for specific tasks or inquiries, maybe you could check out there? Forums should also be a great way to spread some news about your services by word of mouth. Also, since you mentioned that some people came to you from Reddit recommendations, maybe you can invest more time to mention yourself in some relevant threads there?