WordPress Website Development

Web Design

• Project style guide is built
  Your project’s style guide serves as the design “rule book” for your website’s look and feel. This guide is built around your branding and priorities. We work closely with you to identify the colors, elements and overall style that will be applied to your website.
• Website architecture is organized
  The content already outlined in your high-fidelity wireframe is then organized into an architecture of all the webpages mapped out for your website.
• Homepage design
  The “concepting” of the homepage design is done during this phase. The homepage is, fundamentally, the most important page of your website. It’s serves as the first impression of your business and our team takes great care to design a homepage that will serve as a solid foundation for your entire project.
• Subpage design
  Once the homepage design is right, the remainder of the internal pages for your WordPress site are designed. All our web designs are fully scalable for desktop and mobile devices.
• Additional WordPress website elements designed
  If your website requires additional elements, we will design and implement them according to your website’s needs. Additional elements might include highlighting important information on the page, incorporating calls to action, etc.

Web Development

• Map out website architecture
  This phase of your WordPress website project launches in parallel with the web design phase. The first step here is to map out the underlying architecture of your entire website.
• Take approved designs and design elements and set them into your site
  Next, we take all the approved page designs and design elements and slice and code them into your website. The code is then connected with your WordPress CMS. At completion, your team will learn to adjust or change your website and content through the easy-to-use WordPress admin panel.
• Build in website functionality
  After all the attractive, front-facing website design elements are built in, next we code in the functionality of your website. This “behind-the-scenes” coding includes everything from third-party tool integrations to complex member-access areas.
• All content is built in
  At this phase both your website copy and images are added to the site. This is the wonderful, unifying moment when all the design decisions meet your brand’s message.
• Mobile-responsive site set up
  Comrade Digital Marketing ensures your website is fully functional and equally attractive across all devices: desktop, laptop and mobile.

Foundational SEO

• Identify and set up SEO priorities
  Our team, in collaboration with yours, identify SEO priorities and long-term insights into how your website performs against your ranking objectives.
• Onsite SEO is woven into your website
  The SEO priorities are then used on all your website elements for optimal findability of all your content. This helps Google understand the value of your content so it recommends your site to its users.
• Check website for embedded SEO keywords
  The SEO keywords used on your website have to be “readable” by Google to get you the SEO benefits. We perform a full sweep of your website to check for embedded SEO keywords so that Google can understand every optimization on the page.
• Set up Google Analytics, Google Webmasters and other monitoring systems
  Our team also sets up all the website monitoring tools your team will need. We even establish the event triggers and work with you to ensure you get the most out of the data collected.

Acceptance, Launch & Stakeholder onboarding

• Website functionality and performance testing
  Once everything has been built and optimized, testing is the final phase to ensure the full functionality of your WordPress web design. We test every last detail to maximize your site’s performance.
• Website “sign-off”
  Once we’ve completed testing, the final website is sent to you for review and approval. As soon as you give us the green light, we launch your website live.
• Deployment and tracking of initial performance
  As soon as your website is live, Google finds and indexes it. After this process is complete, we start monitoring the initial performance numbers to ensure your site has optimal findability and functions properly once users land on a page. We review this initial performance with you.
• Training for you and your team
  Whether it’s you, other stakeholders, or teammates identified in your organization, we train the people who will be responsible for monitoring, managing and updating your WordPress website in the future.
• Support for your website as needed
  Once a project is completed, we don’t disappear into the horizon. First, our WordPress website development comes with a set warranty period during which we monitor your website and continue to make necessary adjustments. We also have maintenance packages available if you would like our team to perform website updates and optimizations over time. We are here, every step of the way to answer any questions you may have.

Custom-Built vs. Template WordPress Websites

After making the decision to build a new WordPress website, the natural question is: “Can I save money using a template?” WordPress and all compatible builder plugins have templates for pages and whole sites that can save time and money. The real question, however, is whether a template suits your goals.

Comrade or any custom WordPress development company will start by assessing your marketing objectives. If you’re aiming for more leads and sales or greater visibility, your website is built to drive those results in a predictable and measurable way. Using a template can make for a lower-dollar spend on the actual website, but it will not be designed to deliver certain results, thus your return on investment could suffer. A custom-built website is designed to generate specific, pre-determined results. If traffic, lead generation, conversion and sales opportunities are the goal, custom sites are always the better investment.  Please visit our blog for informative articles explaining the ins and outs of custom vs. template-built websites.

Advantages of a Custom-Built WordPress Website:

• A design as unique as your brand that marries your organization’s personality with its marketing objectives
• Faster page-loading, which decreases bounce rate, more effectively engages users and ranks higher on search engines
• Clean web design and development void of unnecessary elements that clutter your admin panel and slow website performance
• Custom SEO architecture that boosts your findability and delivers users the information they’re seeking
• Your site is scalable; built to grow with your business
• ROI. The spend on your project is later offset by better website performance (meeting deliverables)

What Are the Disadvantages of Custom WordPress Development?

• Most custom WordPress websites require a greater investment than with a template-based site
• Developing a custom site requires more time than does a template-based project