How Long Does It Take To Build a Website for a Home Remodel Firm?

How Long Does It Take To Build a Website?

Building a Website on Squarespace can take six to eight weeks with a plan and the right designer.

Building a home remodelers website today is a much different process than just a few years ago. Content management platforms like Wordpress have brought template based website design to the mainstream. Unfortunately, with Wordpress you'll still need to research plugins, write code to customize your site and manage images by first creating Photoshop files, converting them into HTML and then using them.

If you search Google for “How long does it take to build a website?” you'll get results ranging from non-committal (why bother writing if you don't have an answer?) to anywhere from six to nine months. Articles citing the longer end of the range stated that the extended timeframe was due to the time needed to gather content including photography and text, closely followed be developmental and design issues associated with content management platforms like Wordpress.

So how long does it take to build a website?

We've found that inferior tools, process and lack of communication are the main reasons for delays when building a website. Means-of-Production builds websites using Squarespace because it allows us to build a website in four to six weeks. How? We do not need to write custom code, research plug-ins, create a Photoshop file, convert it to HTML and apply it to Wordpress.
Squarespace is an intuitive template-based platform that can handle photography with a lengthy conversion process. Image galleries are included in templates allowing us to build photography based websites for our clients in a much shorter timeframe. Templates help to make website design a smoother and easier process. Even still, there are other factors that can slow down the process.
Open communication with clients can help to reduce delays as can setting realistic deadlines and sticking to them. Businesses need to decide on and gather assets like photography, bios and supplied text in order to accelerate the building process. Early discussions and decisions on direction, design, and functionality can also work to keep the process running more efficiently. Speaking to an expert before you begin is a good first step.

What are the must haves for a home remodeler website?

Inbound marketing is all about building trust and relationships. A sloppy, difficult to navigate home remodelers website does not build trust. Your website needs to be user-friendly, inviting and informative to build trust and generate leads. 

Here are some best practices and “must haves” that will help to make your home remodeling firm's website get found online and stand out from the competition.

1.     Have a detailed plan – The better your plan, the smoother the process. Decide what is important to potential visitors. Tell them about your business process. Identify your audience, craft your message and create a plan.
2.     Home remodeling is a visual practice – Gather all of your visual assets, job site photos, before and after shots, and video walkthroughs and organize your work to make browsing easier. Keep it simple and use Dropbox folders to group your assets by style or job to keep visitors browsing. Squarespace gallery templates can help to organize your content.
3.     Keep your content relevant – Stay focused, on message and educate, inform or entertain your visitors. Use industry relevant keywords in content to improve search. Your content establishes your brand and can give readers a real sense of who you are, what you do and why they should work with you on their next project. If you decide to have Means-of-Production build your website, we will write your content for you.
4.     “About us” pages – Make your "about us" pages and bios personal and professional. This can help to build trust with your visitors. Let them know who you are and include a photo so they can place a face with your name. No one really cares where you vacation or who your favorite band is.
5.     Services – Make sure you specify all of the services you offer, for example, if you specialize in kitchen and bath remodeling, will perform small jobs, etc. Also, make sure you let potential clients know if you offer services to both residential and commercial customers.
6.     Optimize for search (SEO) – Use industry specific keywords in all of your content, alt tags and photo descriptions. Also, make sure to include location information to aid local search. Share your content on all social media sites like LinkedIn, Facebook and Instagram to help build authority with the search engines.
7.     Use analytics to track performance – The strength of the best websites is using them as part of an inbound marketing process. This begins with analyzing performance. Using tools like Clicky, Google Analytics, Quill Engage and/or Squarespace Analytics can help you understand what's working, and more importantly what isn't. We use all of them for our clients for a variety of different reasons. Track who is visiting your site, where they came from, how long they stayed and what pages they viewed. This data allows you to continuously monitor and improve your content, which will drive more traffic to your site. It also helps you know what resonates with customers and where to put what call to action, landing page and form sequence.

Creating a plan, organizing assets, using tools like Squarespace and open communication can help to get your website up and live much faster. Using these and other best practices can help you to get found online, help you to stand out from your competitors, build thought leadership in your field, and trusting relationships with potential customers. Contact for advice or to learn more about why we only build websites using Squarespace.