Website Design in Canterbury
Looking for a website designer in Canterbury? We design and build custom websites for Canterbury businesses of every kind, from shops, restaurants and hotels inside the city walls to professional firms and trades that also serve Whitstable, Herne Bay and the villages around, working with you online from the first call to launch.
Web Design Services in Canterbury
DigitalPod is a UK-based design and web development studio that provides its web design services across the UK, including website design for businesses in Canterbury. Your website designer starts with a blank page and works from your brand and your customers, and the same team then builds the site in-house, with no templates and no outsourcing. The studio specialises in startup website design and website redesigns, with a design degree and more than 15 years of industry experience behind it, and websites start from £2,400 wherever you are based.
Visitors, students and residents all look for businesses in Canterbury, and they rarely want the same thing. Choosing the audience is the first step in website design in Canterbury. A restaurant inside the walls needs menus, photographs and booking that work for someone planning a day out. A trade or practice needs pages for the places residents search by, such as Wincheap, Sturry and Bridge, and for Whitstable and Herne Bay if you work there. As your website designer we build the site around the group your business depends on.
Websites for Canterbury Businesses
Canterbury's economy rests on three things: tourism, higher education and retail. The cathedral, which forms a World Heritage Site with St Augustine's Abbey and St Martin's Church, draws visitors to the streets inside the walls, where many houses are timber-framed and centuries old. The University of Kent, on the hill at St Stephen's, and Canterbury Christ Church University give the city an unusually large student population for its size. Whitefriars is the main shopping centre, and the council district also takes in the coastal towns of Whitstable and Herne Bay.
Customers therefore come in three kinds. Visitors decide where to eat, shop and stay before they arrive. Students come to the city new each year and search for everything, from a dentist to a hairdresser. Residents of the city and its villages search by the name of their own area, such as Wincheap, Sturry or Bridge, and compare businesses in Canterbury with those in Whitstable, Herne Bay and Faversham. Whichever group a business wants, its website has to speak to them directly, and it has to be found by people who have never walked down the High Street.
Website Design by Sector in Canterbury
How a website should work depends on what the business does. Each page below explains what a website for that kind of business in Canterbury needs, how its customers search and the rules that apply in England.
Homes and Property
Inside the walls Canterbury has many timber-framed houses of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and terraces of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries line Wincheap. Hales Place, a former estate to the north now largely housing, is home to large numbers of students from the nearby University of Kent. Beyond the suburbs lie villages, among them Harbledown, which joins the city on its western side, Sturry, Bridge, Blean and Chartham. Owners of old houses, landlords and village households are different customers, and each searches by the name of their own area.
Professional and Business Services
Canterbury's economy leans on its institutions. The two universities account for a significant share of local jobs, the Kent and Canterbury Hospital and the city council, whose main offices are in Rose Lane, are here too, and retail is one of the three main sectors of the economy. Wincheap has an industrial estate and a retail park. Solicitors, accountants, advisers and recruiters based in the city act for clients across the district, including Whitstable and Herne Bay, so a website should show both the specialisms on offer and the area the firm covers.
Hospitality and Retail
Visitors come for Canterbury Cathedral, the ruins of St Augustine's Abbey, the Westgate Towers and the Roman Museum, for punt tours on the river and for the Marlowe Theatre and the Canterbury Festival. They shop along the High Street and at Whitefriars. High-speed trains run from London St Pancras to Canterbury West and drivers use the park and ride, so many people arrive for the day with a plan already made. A clear menu, opening hours, prices and a booking link decide which restaurant, shop or hotel they choose.
Health, Care and Wellbeing
The Kent and Canterbury Hospital is run by East Kent Hospitals, and with the University of Kent, Canterbury Christ Church University and a campus of the University for the Creative Arts, students make up an unusually large part of the population. They arrive needing a dentist, a hairdresser, a gym or a physiotherapist. Around them are suburbs and villages, from St Stephen's and Wincheap to Sturry and Bridge, whose residents can choose providers in Whitstable, Herne Bay or Faversham as well. Reviews and information on prices and availability carry weight with both groups.
What Every Website We Build Includes
Custom Design, No Templates
Designed from a blank page around your brand and your customers, and approved by you before any code is written.
Fast on Every Phone
Hand-coded for speed, because most local searches in Canterbury are made on a phone and a slow page loses the enquiry.
Local Search Foundations
Page titles written for the searches people in Canterbury make, service and area pages, and details that match your Google Business Profile.
Bookings, Quotes and Members
Online booking, quote forms, member areas and payments where your business needs them, built in rather than bolted on.
Update It Yourself
An optional admin dashboard, so you can add services, news, listings or photographs without calling a developer.
Hosting and Support
Managed cloud hosting from £20 a month, or take the code and host it yourself. The website is yours either way.
Getting Found in Canterbury
People rarely search for a business by city alone. In Canterbury they search by district, in places such as Wincheap, St Dunstan's, Sturry and Harbledown, and by the towns around it, so a website that wants local customers needs a page for each service and each place it serves, written for that place rather than copied with the name changed.
We plan that structure with you before the design starts: which districts and nearby towns, such as Whitstable, Herne Bay and Faversham, are worth a page, which services people look for, and how the site should match your Google Business Profile. Our guide to getting a new website found on Google explains what to do after launch. We do not promise rankings, which also depend on reviews and competition, and ongoing search engine optimisation is available as a separate service.
What a Website Costs in Canterbury
Our prices are published and do not change with your postcode. A custom-designed website of up to around ten pages starts from £2,400, a website with an admin dashboard from £3,900, and managed cloud hosting from £20 a month if you would like us to run the site for you.
- Startup Website from £2,400
- Website + Admin Dashboard from £3,900
- Managed Cloud Hosting from £20 per month
Agencies commonly quote £6,000 to £20,000 or more for a comparable small business website, while experienced freelancers and small studios typically charge £2,000 to £6,000. With us, payment is a 50% deposit with the balance on completion, and the finished website, its design and its code are yours. See the full website design prices or, for a new business, startup website design prices.
What Clients Say
"After a poor experience with a previous SEO provider I consider myself very lucky to have engaged the services of digital pod. There has been a significant improvement to the number of visits to my Firm's website and the conversion rate from new enquiries is improving. My Firm is appearing on the first page of google searches, not bad for a start up business!"
"I would highly recommend digitalpod. Matthew has designed a brand for my company that I'm really happy with. I have a lot of customers who comment on how good my website is both visually and for ease of use."
"We are so pleased we used Digital pod to design our website and our branding, logo, stationery etc. From the very beginning Matthew was amazing. He listened to our ideas and perfectly translated them into designing the look and feel of our site, and our branding. He worked with us patiently despite our indecisiveness and happily changed and adapted elements at our request as we went along. He took the time to answer all our questions promptly, and made the whole project run smoothly. We are beyond delighted with the outcome and can't thank him enough."
Website Design in Canterbury: Questions
Are you a website designer based in Canterbury?
No. DigitalPod is a UK-based design and web development studio that provides its web design services across the UK, and we work with businesses in Canterbury entirely online, over video calls, email and shared documents. You review designs and the test site in your browser and give feedback in writing, so nothing is lost between conversations. Where your website designer is based has no bearing on the quality of the website, and our prices are the same wherever you are.
How much does a website cost in Canterbury?
The same as anywhere else in the UK. Our websites start from £2,400 for a custom-designed site of up to around ten pages, and from £3,900 with an admin dashboard so you can update it yourself. Managed cloud hosting is from £20 a month. Agencies commonly quote £6,000 to £20,000 or more for a comparable small business site, while experienced freelancers and small studios typically charge £2,000 to £6,000.
Can you help my business get found in Canterbury?
We build the foundations local search depends on: a page for each service and each area you serve, such as Wincheap, St Dunstan's, Sturry and Harbledown, page titles written for the searches people make, fast loading on a phone and details that match your Google Business Profile. Nobody can honestly promise a position on Google, because rankings also depend on your reviews and the competition. Ongoing search engine optimisation is available as a separate service.
What kinds of business in Canterbury do you work with?
Any business that needs a website to win customers. We have built sites for solicitors, recruitment companies, trades and service businesses, e-commerce stores and membership organisations, and we have researched what a website needs in twenty sectors, from plumbers and accountants to restaurants, dentists and care homes. Each has its own page for Canterbury, listed above. If your kind of business is not among them, tell us what you do.
How long does a website take?
Most websites take three to six weeks from brief to launch, provided your content is ready. We give you a realistic completion date once the visuals are approved, and if you are working to a deadline we can suggest a focused first version to launch quickly and build on.
More answers in our FAQ. Starting a new business? See startup web design. Replacing a site that has dated? See website redesign. Or go to the DigitalPod home page for our portfolio and services.
Website Design Near Canterbury
We work with businesses across the South East and the rest of the UK. These are the nearest cities with a page of their own.
Guides to Planning and Costing a Website
Start Your Canterbury Website
Tell us about your business in Canterbury and what the website needs to do, or book a call with our senior software engineer to talk it through. Everything runs online, and we reply personally with a clear, fixed price.