Are you considering starting an online business? If your answer is yes, then a digital marketing agency business might be the best choice for you. With the right idea and strategic digital agency website, you can work from anywhere and serve clients all over the world.
Digital Marketing Agency
In this post, I will show you how to build a digital agency website and business. I will walk you through the entire process step by step. We’ll cover how to build a website, create your business plan, and how to market your digital agency so you can get clients and start making money. Let’s jump in!
Chapter 1: Make A Website
First, you need to create a website for your business. After all, without a website, how will potential clients find you? Your website is where you will share information about your services as well as make it easy for potential clients to contact you and work with you.
Step 1. Get Hosting and Domain
The first step to building a website is to get a domain and hosting. In most cases, you’ll be able to get a domain name from the hosting company. I recommend using your business name as your domain name to maintain brand consistency and look professional online, for example, the company name is AbidingTech and your domain name Abidingtech.com is right for you.
You can buy Hosting and domain from Hostinger, NameHero, or Siteground. These companies have fast loading times, excellent uptime, and very good customer support.
Step 2. Install WordPress
After signing up for your hosting plan, you’ll want to install WordPress. WordPress is the most popular CMS that powers 40% of all websites online. It is easy to use and allows us to create any type of website. The best part is that it can be installed with one click.
To install WordPress, you’ll log into your hosting dashboard and find the WordPress installer. Next, provide a title and the description for your site, choose a username, and set a password that you’ll use to log into your WordPress dashboard. Then click on Install and wait for the installation process to finish. Click to see a video on how to install WordPress!
Step 3. Download Theme
The next step is to actually design your website. I use the GeneratePress theme which is a free theme with advanced features and a modern and professional design. It looks great and works with any style of digital agency you want to build like an SEO company or web designer’s agency. And also it supports Elementor so you can build your website easily. Check out How to install a theme.
Step 4. Create Your Pages & Menu
Now we need to create pages and menus for our website. To create a new page, go to Pages > Add New in your WordPress dashboard. Enter a name for your page, such as Home or About, and hit Publish. Repeat this process for all other pages you want to add to your site.
To create a menu, go to Appearance and click Menu. Now click on Create a menu and enter the name Menu. Next, use the panel on the left to drag pages onto the menu. Assign the menu as Primary and hit Save.
Step 5. Design Pages
Now it’s time to design your website pages. You can use a page builder like Elementor or an alternative plugin to easily design your pages with drag and drop.
Step 6. Customize Your Website
After designing the pages and setting up headers and footers, you need to customize your website. This includes changing colors, using your favorite fonts, uploading your logo, and more. The generate press theme comes with tons of customization options to make your website look exactly the way you want it.
Step 8. Include A Contact Form
Finally, you need to add a contact form to your website so that potential clients can contact you. Some popular contact form plugins you can use WPForms, Contact Form 7, and Gravity Forms.
Chapter 2: Create A Business Plan
Now that you have a website, let’s build a business plan around it. There are two ways to write your business plan. You can create a detailed business plan which is better if you plan to find investors or get a loan. This type of business plan usually has dozens of pages.
Alternatively, you can create a lean startup plan that summarizes the main points and elements of your plan. This type of business plan is usually only one page long.
If you choose a detailed business plan, you’ll want to include the following sections:
- Executive summary – this is where you’ll add information about your company such as your mission, services you offered, and basic information about your employees and location. ( What Do You Offer?)
- Company Description – Here, you can get more details about your agency or company and the problems it solves, the businesses/clients it will serve, and your competitive edge. (Who Are You?)
- Market Analysis – In this section, you will want to provide information about your competitors and their strengths and weaknesses. (Why are you different?)
- Organization and Management – In this section, share details about the structure of your company and who will run it (who does what?).
- Marketing and Sales – In this section, you will explain how you’ll attract and retain clients (create a marketing plan).
- Financial projections – In this section, provide information about how you plan to make money and how much you expect to earn in your first 5 years.
- Customer Relationships – Here, you need to define your client’s experience and how they’ll interact with your business (keep your customers HAPPY).
- Customer Segments – In this section, you will define the different client personas your business will serve.
- Marketing Channels – In this section, write all the different marketing channels you will use to reach your clients (How will you market?).
- Cost Structure – Use this section to define your pricing strategy and whether you will focus on minimizing costs or providing the best value. You also need to list your business expenses. (Think About Future Expenses)
- Revenue streams – Finally, describe how your digital marketing agency will make money. For example, affiliate marketing, one-time services, retainer services, etc.
It’s worth noting that there is no wrong or right way to write your business plan, however, if you intend to apply for a business loan or get funding, it’s worth choosing a traditional business plan and writing your own. Provide as many details as possible about the digital agency. But, if you want something simple to use as a guideline, a one-page lean startup plan is what you need.
Step 3: Create A Brand Identity (Important)
Your brand identity will serve as the visual representation of your company. It will make your company website more memorable and instantly noticeable in social media feeds and everywhere else online. Looking at the image above, you can see how each business represents a specific location and has chosen a color to help represent its business. If you ask me, I like red or a gradient for digital agencies because we are all about being creative.
When developing your brand identity, you’ll want to work on your vibe and style, choose the right colors, and choose the fonts to use on your website.
What Kind Of Customers Are You Trying To Attract?
If you want your agency to be taken seriously, your style and manner must be professional. However, that doesn’t mean it has to be boring. You must focus on how you want people to feel when interacting with your website and other brand touchpoints. This helps create a mood board for your brand. Use pictures and images that represent the feeling you want to create in your customers. For example, your vibe and style might be one of the following:
- Cool and professional
- Laid back and casual
- Elegant and sophisticated
- Moody and vintage
- Hipster and minimal
Your vibe and style will dictate the rest of the branding choices, from your color scheme to fonts, and your brand voice.
Choose Colors
Once you’ve decided on your vibe and style, you must choose colors for your brand. This is another reason why putting together a mood board is helpful, you can use it to create a color scheme for your digital agency website.
An important note when choosing colors is to pay attention to color psychology. Colors have certain meanings and can also affect your conversion rate. Here are some common color meanings:
- Red — energy, excitement, power, passion, danger
- Orange — energy, happiness, joy, fun, determination
- Yellow — confidence, joy, optimism
- Green — growth, harmony, money, healing
- Blue — serenity, trust, logic, intelligence
- Brown — stability, strength, reliability, safety
- Pink — feminine, love, tranquility
- Purple — creativity, royalty, luxury, spirituality
- White — cleanliness, innocence, light, perfection
- Grey — formal, sophisticated, conservative
- Black — power, elegance, death, mystery
Keep your target audience in mind when choosing colors. Another point to remember when choosing colors is to not go overboard. Choose one or two main colors and one or two neutral colors. You can use a website to create a color scheme for your brand.
Choose Fonts
Finally, you’ll want to select a set of fonts for your website and other branding materials. Fonts can be classified as follows:
- Serif fonts have small feet at the end. They are generally seen as elegant and classic. Check a few serif fonts, including Georgia, Playfair Display, Times New Roman, Lora, and Adobe Garamond.
- Sans-serif fonts that do not have feet at the end. They typically flaunt a more modern look and feel and are associated with younger brands and companies. A few examples are Arial, Roboto, Helvetica, Lato, and Raleway.
- Script fonts exude elegance but, depending on the style, can also be seen as playful or romantic. In general, you’ll want to avoid script fonts because they’re hard to read.
- Display fonts command attention and give a bold look and feel. Examples include Algerian, Abril Fatface, Cooper Black, and Caslon Antique. They are designed for large titles and posters. You need to use them sparingly because they can be overwhelming.
There is a whole science behind combining fonts, but a few tips to keep in mind include:
- Stick to one or two fonts.
- Pair a serif font with a sans-serif font for more variety and contrast.
- Assign each font a specific role eg. sans-serif for body text, serif for headings, sans-serif for navigation and buttons.
- Experiment with font weights to create a good hierarchy.
