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Website design in Edinburgh, built around enquiries
We offer Bespoke WordPress website design services for businesses in Edinburgh and across Scotland. Designed around the way your customers actually decide, and structured so Google can read every page.
What a new website usually needs to fix
Most people come to me because something specific is not working. These four come up most often.
Your site looks dated next to competitors
First impressions decide whether somebody reads on or goes back to the search results. A current, well composed design buys you the few seconds you need to explain what you do.
It is awkward on a phone
A large share of local searching happens on a phone. If your menu, forms and phone number are fiddly on a small screen, you lose enquiries you never even hear about.
People visit but nobody gets in touch
That is usually a structure problem rather than a design problem. Clear services, one obvious next step, and a phone number and form exactly where people are ready to act.
Google cannot make sense of the site
Page titles, headings, internal links, image sizes and loading speed all feed into rankings. Building them in from the start costs far less than retrofitting them later.
Website Design
What's included ?
Every project is quoted individually, but this is the shape of a typical website design project.
Design
- Bespoke design concepts, not a stock theme
- Layouts for phone, tablet, laptop and desktop
- Typography, colour and spacing set as a reusable system
- Design approved by you before any build work starts
Build
- WordPress and Elementor so you can edit the site yourself
- Clean page structure and sensible headings
- Fast loading and Core Web Vitals checks
- SSL and secure configuration
Content and SEO
- Sitemap and a page by page content plan
- Keyword research for the pages that matter commercially
- Page titles, meta descriptions and heading structure
- Image compression and useful alt text
- Internal linking that helps people and search engines
Launch and after
- Testing on real devices before launch
- 301 redirects so an existing site keeps its rankings
- A walkthrough so you can update content confidently
- Optional ongoing maintenance and SEO
The website design process
Five stages, with a clear point at each one where you say yes before anything moves on.
Discovery
We talk about the business, what you sell, who buys it, who you compete with and what a good month of enquiries looks like. I look at the search terms people in your market actually use.
Structure and content plan
You get a sitemap and a page by page outline: what each page needs to say, what it needs to prove and what it needs the reader to do next. This is where most of the value is decided.
Design
Bespoke layouts built around your content, not the other way round. You see and approve the design before a line of code is written.
Build
The site is built in WordPress with Elementor, responsive from the start, with the SEO groundwork already in place rather than added afterwards.
Test and launch
Real devices, loading speed, accessibility, every link and form, redirects from old pages, then launch and a walkthrough so you are not dependent on me for small edits.
Redesigning an existing website
A redesign is not a fresh start. Your current site may already rank for terms that bring in work, and losing those in the move is an expensive mistake.
So a redesign begins with an audit of what is already working: which pages get traffic, which terms they rank for, and which pages quietly do nothing. Anything that earns its place is carried across, with 301 redirects mapped page by page so search engines follow you to the new addresses.
The rest is the same process as a new build, with the advantage that we already know what your customers respond to. If you want the ongoing side handled as well, look at website maintenance and SEO services.
One person, start to finish
You are not handed from a salesperson to a project manager to a developer. The person you speak to on the first call is the person who designs and builds the site.
Design and search together
I have been doing both since 2003. The structure that makes a site easy to use is usually the structure that makes it easy to rank, so they are planned at the same time.
You own everything
The domain, the hosting, the WordPress install and the content are yours. Nothing is locked to a proprietary platform you cannot leave.
Local if you want it
I meet clients in Edinburgh and across central Scotland face to face. If you would rather do everything by video call, that works perfectly well too.
Where I work
I am based in Edinburgh and meet clients face to face across the city and central Scotland: Leith, New Town, Old Town, Southside, Stockbridge, Morningside, Bruntsfield and Corstorphine, as well as the Lothians, Fife, the Scottish Borders, Falkirk, Stirling, Livingston and Dunfermline.
I also work with businesses in Glasgow, Dundee, Aberdeen, Perth, Inverness and the rest of the UK by video call and screen sharing, which suits plenty of clients perfectly well.
Website design questions
A few of the questions that come up on nearly every first call. There are more on the FAQs page.
A straightforward brochure website is usually four to six weeks. A larger site with more pages, a blog and local SEO work is typically eight to twelve weeks. A complex online shop with integrations can run to three to six months. You get milestone dates during the planning stage so you know where things stand.
Every project is quoted individually, because a five page site for a local trade and a forty page site with an online shop are very different jobs. After the first conversation you get a written, fixed quote covering exactly what is included. Nothing starts until you are happy with it.
Yes. The domain, the hosting account, the WordPress installation and all of the content are yours. If you ever want to move to another designer, everything goes with you.
WordPress runs a very large share of the web, which means it is well supported, flexible and easy to find help for. Elementor lets me build bespoke layouts while still leaving you a visual editor for day to day changes. You are not locked into a proprietary platform that only one agency can touch.
That is normal. I plan the content structure with you and can work from notes, an existing site or a conversation. Photography is worth investing in where it matters, and I will tell you honestly where it does and where it does not.
A new site launches with the technical groundwork in place, which helps, but rankings build over time. There are no guarantees of a number one spot, and anyone who promises one is guessing. If search visibility matters to your business, look at ongoing SEO services.
Ready to talk about a new website?
Tell me what you sell, who you sell it to and what is not working at the moment. The first conversation is free and there is no obligation at the end of it.
Or call 07905 819522, Monday to Sunday, 9am to 7pm.