Website Design in Durham
Looking for a website designer in Durham? We design and build custom websites for Durham businesses, from shops, cafes and guest houses in the streets below the cathedral to professional practices and trades serving Gilesgate, Newton Hall and the towns of County Durham. We work with you online, from the first call to launch.
Web Design Services in Durham
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 Durham. 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.
Students, tourists and permanent residents make up three separate markets in Durham, and few businesses serve all of them. Website design in Durham starts by naming the one you depend on. For students and visitors the site must work entirely on a phone, with opening times, prices and booking a tap away. For residents it needs pages for Gilesgate, Newton Hall, Belmont and the villages around the city. With only a few competitors in each market, a site that is exact about what you offer is noticed quickly.
Websites for Durham Businesses
Durham is a small cathedral city set in a loop of the River Wear, and three things carry its economy: the university, public administration and visitors. Durham University's colleges and departments occupy much of the peninsula and Elvet Hill to the south, Durham County Council governs the county from the city, and national government has passport and land registry offices here. The cathedral and castle, a World Heritage Site, bring tourists throughout the year, the University Hospital of North Durham serves the city and beyond, and there are retail parks at the Arnison Centre and Dragonville.
A Durham business serves audiences that barely overlap. Students arrive each autumn and leave each summer, tourists pass through for a day or a weekend, and both find everything on a phone. Permanent residents live in suburbs such as Gilesgate, Newton Hall, Belmont and Neville's Cross and in the former pit villages around the city, and they search by those names. In a city this small only a few competitors share each market, so a website that is specific about what it offers, where and for whom is quickly rewarded.
Website Design by Sector in Durham
How a website should work depends on what the business does. Each page below explains what a website for that kind of business in Durham needs, how its customers search and the rules that apply in England.
Homes and Property
Durham's housing divides between the old city and its later suburbs. Elvet and the streets around the centre lie within the city's conservation area, and many houses there are shared by students. Gilesgate grew with council estates after the war, Newton Hall is a large estate of detached and semi-detached houses from the later decades of the last century, and Belmont and Carrville expanded in the same period. Shincliffe village is a conservation area, and former pit villages such as Brandon and Ushaw Moor ring the city. Residents search by suburb or village.
Professional and Business Services
Durham's biggest employers are public and academic: Durham University, the county council, the University Hospital of North Durham and the government's passport and land registry offices. Professional practices work mostly from the city centre, and the county council is developing Aykley Heads, near the station, as the Durham Innovation District for start-ups and growing companies. Many firms serve the whole county, from Chester-le-Street to Bishop Auckland, so a website should make clear which towns the firm covers and what it specialises in, and give a client a reason not to look to Newcastle.
Hospitality and Retail
Visitors come to Durham for the cathedral and castle, which together form a World Heritage Site on the peninsula above the River Wear, and for the walk along the riverbanks and over Elvet and Framwellgate bridges. The Market Place and its indoor market, Saddler Street and Silver Street hold the shops and cafes, with Prince Bishops Place beside them. The Miners' Gala fills the city each summer, and graduations and open days bring families at other times. On those days hotels and restaurants fill early, and those that take bookings online are found first.
Health, Care and Wellbeing
Durham University's students live in its colleges and in shared houses in the inner parts of the city, and New College Durham is at Framwellgate Moor. The University Hospital of North Durham is the main hospital. Permanent residents are concentrated in Newton Hall, Belmont, Carrville, Neville's Cross and the villages around the city. Someone choosing a dentist, physiotherapist, nursery, salon, gym or care provider here has only a few to compare, so a clear and complete website carries real weight.
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 Durham are made on a phone and a slow page loses the enquiry.
Local Search Foundations
Page titles written for the searches people in Durham 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 Durham
People rarely search for a business by city alone. In Durham they search by district, in places such as Gilesgate, Framwellgate Moor, Newton Hall and Neville's Cross, 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 Chester-le-Street, Spennymoor and Bishop Auckland, 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 Durham
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
"Matthew has provided an excellent service to Axiom Stone Solicitors during the course of our working relationship with him- from initial inception/design of our new website through to ongoing maintenance and SEO for the firm. The results have been remarkable and it has been extremely useful to receive his quarterly reports to evidence the increased traffic to our site. Matthew provides excellent customer care and attention to detail and we would have no hesitate in recommending him and the services he provides to others."
"We now have been using Digipod for our websites and logo designs for over five years. I have to say that everything that they produce is of the highest quality. Our websites receive relevant and worthwhile enquiries, with new projects handled with consideration and professionalism."
"Matthew is very professional, helpful and talented in creating an excellent website. Thank you."
Website Design in Durham: Questions
Are you a website designer based in Durham?
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 Durham 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 Durham?
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 Durham?
We build the foundations local search depends on: a page for each service and each area you serve, such as Gilesgate, Framwellgate Moor, Newton Hall and Neville's Cross, 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 Durham 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 Durham, 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 Durham
We work with businesses across the North 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 Durham Website
Tell us about your business in Durham 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.