A New Website Design!

New Websites

Web Design with Ape Red Media comes in all shapes and sizes from the small but effective single page site or landing page, through small 3 to 5 page dynamic sites, larger business sites, right up to 900 plus pages of ecommerce web design.

Whatever your website requirements we’re bound to have just the right solution for you, however there are a few different types of website out there and it can be a bit confusing for the new business owner with no experience of web design. We explain briefly the pro’s and cons of the most common types of website below.


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Key website types & pros and cons

Responsive designs ensure that your website is user friendly across a huge range of devices. It is the design method favoured by Google, published on their website.

Pros
  1. Google favoured
  2. Easily read/used on small handheld devices
  3. Time & money saved by not needing multiple sites for multiple devices
  4. Great first impression regardless of the device being used
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Non responsive sites don’t change how they display when viewed on a smartphone or tablet and enlarging the site is normally required by the 'swipe screen' technique with the fingers. A bit fiddly at the best of times but when in a hurry... irritating! You might be best with one of these if you have a limited budget as they appear to be cheaper, the reason for this is less consideration and code work is required. However with the ever increasing use of smartphones for internet use a non responsive site put you at a disadvantage.

Single page websites have become more popular again with the creation of ‘Parallax Scrolling’ which can make the page look very professional. A single page scrolling site works with sections rather than pages. You might opt for this type of site if the budget is tight or if you want a landing page for a product or service that then directs traffic to an existing site.

Pros
  1. Can look very professional
  2. Easy control of the flow of information
  3. Hubspot research carried out into one page check out vs. multi page checkout revealed a 21.8% improvement on conversions.
  4. Suits user behaviour more effectively some would say
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A content management system (CMS) allows the site owner to add in or alter content themselves, use template themes to create a site use plug ins to create mailing lists and such. The most popular CMS is likely to be Wordpress. Wordpress was created as a blogging platform and if you’re setting up a blog it may be a good choice.

Pros
  1. Almost any tech savvy individual can operate a Wordpress site
  2. Lots of plugins
  3. Easy installation process
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Blogs, truncated from the words ‘web logs’ are discussion sites usually displaying post/articles about the blog subject and in reverse chronological order ie. the latest post showing first. There are numerous platforms available including Google’s Blogger, Wordpress, Tumblr, Blog.com, Typepad. Some are free with premium services, some are paid services only. A blog can be operated from a unique domain or from the service providers domain such as apered.tumblr.com. There are also blog platforms that can be inserted into your own html pages without the need to use a template site from the likes of Wordpress. An example of such is Disqus used on the apered.com blog.

Pros
  1. Posting an article is almost effortless
  2. Blogging and CMS software usually handle things like tagging and categories to help with SEO
  3. Visitors will be able to comment and interact with each other under each article you write, creating a community
  4. Ease of updating site theme
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We use the word ‘dynamic’ to describe this type of site as the content is dynamically created by the server. Navigation bars don’t lead on to new pages, the link swaps out the content and replaces it with server side content.
A convenient way of producing single ‘url’ sites as budget sites and/or landing pages but there are SEO drawbacks as with any single page site that needs to rank for more than one or two key words.

Pros & Cons
  1. Pro - Low budget
  2. Con - SEO limitations if promoting multiple services and/or products
Responsive Website responsive webdesign seen in iPad Mini

Responsive Website

A small responsive project from 2013
Non-Responsive Website non responsive webdesign

Non-Responsive Website

A non-responsive project from 2012
Responsive 1 Page Website responsive webdesign seen in iPad Mini

Responsive 1 Page Websites

Single / Landing Page Design
CMS Website Designs CMS

Content Management System Websites

Content Management System Project (Non responsive) from 2011
Blog embedded tumblr blog seen in iPad Mini

Blog

Ape Red Media's Tumblr Blog
Dynamic Content Website dynamic webdesign seen in desktop view

Dynamic Website

A dynamic project from 2011

What is the next step ?

You may have decided to have a website for a new business project or a redesign for an existing businesses website. You may be after a micro site or landing page for a new marketing program. Or, you may of course be in the process of trying to decide if you should have a website for your project at all.

The next step might be to complete a brief or a detailed design brief and submit it for a quote, or maybe you'd prefer a chat! We don't have sales men eager to persuade, we'll simply listen to your thoughts and give you ours free of charge or obligation.

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