Creating Website Portfolio

Creating Website Portfolio

What is a showcase site? And why have one for his activity?

Some terms related to websites are unclear to people who want to create their own. Different types of websites exist, named differently. Today we will detail the concept of a showcase site: what does this name correspond to, who is this type of site for and why make one?

WHAT IS A SHOWCASE SITE?

A showcase site is a website that presents the products and services of your business, without selling online. A showcase site therefore aims to provide an online presence to a company, a craftsman, a community and others, in order to acquire contacts, prospects and customers via the Internet. It is therefore intended for anyone with a commercial objective but without direct online sales.

When the showcase site presents products but without the possibility of online purchase, we can then talk about a catalogue site. The showcase site is opposed to the e-commerce site, which sells online. But it is close to the institutional site, which presents professional information without the aim of direct conversion, although brand image and the acquisition of notoriety are indirect objectives. This concerns associations and communities in particular.

WHY CREATE A SHOWCASE SITE?

Creating a showcase site for your company allows you to find new customers on the Internet. Depending on the company’s business sector and its objectives, it will allow you to obtain quotations, contact requests, telephone calls, document downloads… And therefore to obtain new customers that the company might not have been able to reach outside the web.

Internet now has 37.4 million French Internet users, so there is a good chance that your target audience will surf the web. Moreover, if you have a local or national catchment area, with good content work, you can target people in your geographical area of operation or throughout France.

Of course, like any website, a showcase site needs to be optimized for natural referencing, in order to be present on the Google requests of Internet users who are looking for the company’s services. By being on the first page of Google on searches related to the company’s services, the showcase site will acquire traffic (visits) and therefore contacts.

HOW MUCH DOES A SHOWCASE SITE COST?

The price of a showcase site depends on many parameters: number of pages, functionalities requested, additional services, CMS used… The price of our showcase sites starts at 1500 € for about 5 pages, but the average price of the sites of our SME and craft customers is 3000 € including a more personalized graphic service and natural referencing services. This can be up to €20,000 to €30,000 for customers with specific and advanced needs in custom development and SEO.

For example, we have created sites for works councils, real estate agencies with property records management and local authorities with multiple sites, for the most complex ones. But also sites of roofers, various construction companies and service companies. These sites allow these companies to obtain new customers and further develop their business. Or to send their target the right information (for communities, for example). Consult our references of showcase sites!

The importance of continuity between your website and your company’s image

When you start a business, you get to a point where one has to choose his image, that is, determine a name, a logo, make a business card and choose a certain style, a certain approach, a certain concept, a specific image. This is an important aspect of a company’s identity.

Although these elements can be changed along the way, it is important to have continuity between different forms of presence. If you have a logo, a name, and some of the colors that characterize your company, they should be found in your business cards, in your posters and, of course, on your website.

A website can be a key element in a company, it reflects who you are in the world of the web… It is therefore important to consider it as a global piece that must harmonize with others in the development of your corporate identity.

Creating a website is one thing, having customers on it is another…

This is a point to be understood from the outset. It is common for people who are unfamiliar with the principles of the web to confuse website creation and promotion via the Internet. Some may believe that all you have to do is create a website to have visitors and customers and that the phone will ring.

Although it is true that there are ways to optimize the structure of a website to target certain keywords and rank in Google, this is rarely enough these days to get good rankings in search engines for certain keywords, except in extremely uncompetitive areas. Google does not easily give credit and authority to a new website that has just been created, especially in the first 6 months of its existence.

If your goal is to generate more customers through the web, you will have to invest time or money (whether for natural referencing or PPC paid referencing) in addition to creating your website. You will have to promote via the Internet, either by paying or natural referencing, promotion via social networks or by applying other promotional strategies.

One thing is certain, visitors will not appear overnight on your website if you just put it online without investing in promotion either time or money.

If you already have an established clientele and your goal is to have a site to offer a certain service, this is different. You can use your customer list, or your offline advertising material to direct your existing customers to your website.

It is therefore important to understand in your planning that you will need to allocate some time or budget to creation, and another time and budget to web promotion. You can consult this article for advice on planning a web marketing strategy.

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