We believe at MCG that your website is an integral part of the growth strategy of your company as a whole. Everyone knows that without a website, you have no digital presence, your customers cant find you and you lose business. The growth of companies that allow you to create a website yourself, without having to higher coders or have any web development knowledge is a great thing—allowing a business to grow without having to worry about considerable web development cost. That said, just because you can, doesn't always mean you always should. A poorly designed website is worse than no site, in some cases. There's plenty of research that shows customers don't trust a website that looks unprofessional and often consider their services untrustworthy. A big issue is a lot of companies/People create websites without first contemplating the brand and UI design; which only further puts off potential customers.
We work with our clients to consider the current and future position of their business/growth strategy when creating their websites or branding design—making sure that the website/branding visually communicates their businesses Core Creative motivations.
Our collaboration to create the branding/website design for newly launched CBD Brand 'Hemp Smile' is a perfect example of this. CBD has had a shockingly fast growth as an industry. Unfortunately, as a result of such rapid growth, there has also been a growth in confusion about the benefits of CBD (which isn't helped by equally confusing government legislations and positioning). This, combined with the fact that most people connect CBD with cannabis smoking rather than health research, only further complicates things. When setting out to creating a brand guideline and website for Hemp Smile, we first had to consider their motivation for functioning at all (their Core Creative). We translated this into a brand and website design that was aline with their company motivations for CBD education, health, community support and better industry legislation. We created a brand that visually, was more connected to high street brands like Holland & Barrett than resembling most CBD sites which remind me of a coffee shop company you'd find in Amsterdam. We advised on their marketing strategies, for which we outlined how they could stand alone from the crowd by focusing purely on their passion for educating, collaborating and supporting peoples understanding of the CBD industry. We suggested that they focused marketing towards those who are new to the world of CBD with informative, innovative and creative outputs, this would also allow them also to include information about the wider natural health industry as a whole, which was very important to the client.
By considering how your website can work towards the broader brand growth motivations, you are making your site a significant part of your company growth as a whole. It may seem like it's better to get a basic site up so your customers can find you. But by taking the time to consider how your website fits within your broader business plans (making sure you are visually communicating your brands' ethos), you are setting better foundations for growth.
Please feel free to head to our website to read the full 'Hemp Smile' case study journey at mycreativegurus.com/hempsmile-case-study.
Stay creative.
Author: Mark A Yearwood
Founder & Creative Consultant of Guru Creative Consultants
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