Website Design in Manchester
Looking for a website designer in Manchester? We design and build custom websites for Manchester businesses of every kind, from professional firms in Spinningfields and independent shops in the Northern Quarter to trades, clinics and salons in the suburbs, working with you online from the first call to launch.
Web Design Services in Manchester
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 Manchester. 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.
Every search in Manchester returns a long list, with national brands and firms from Stockport, Salford and Trafford among the results. Website design in Manchester is an exercise in focus. We narrow the site to the customers you want, a household in Chorlton, say, or a company in the city centre, give each service its own page and each district its own, from Ancoats and Withington to Wythenshawe, and put your strongest reason for being chosen where it is read first.
Websites for Manchester Businesses
Manchester is the main commercial centre of the North West, and its economy is spread across districts with very different characters. Spinningfields holds law firms, accountants and financial services companies, with more offices around St Peter's Square and at NOMA, where the Co-op has its head office. The Northern Quarter is the home of independent shops, cafes, bars and creative studios, and the universities and teaching hospitals line Oxford Road to the south. Beyond the centre, the suburbs keep their own high streets, from Chorlton and Didsbury in the south to Cheetham Hill in the north.
That spread shapes how customers look for a business. Someone in Levenshulme searching for an electrician, a family in Didsbury choosing a dentist and a company comparing accountants in the city centre are making quite different searches, and each of them sees a long list of rivals, including national brands and firms from Salford, Stockport and Trafford. A website that wins work here names the districts and towns it serves, gives each service a page of its own and offers a clear reason to choose it over the firm listed next to it.
Website Design by Sector in Manchester
How a website should work depends on what the business does. Each page below explains what a website for that kind of business in Manchester needs, how its customers search and the rules that apply in England.
Homes and Property
Manchester's housing changes sharply from one district to the next. Victorian terraces fill Levenshulme, Rusholme and Moss Side, larger Victorian and Edwardian houses stand in Whalley Range and in Didsbury and Chorlton, parts of which are conservation areas, and Wythenshawe was begun between the wars as a garden city of council homes. Fallowfield and Withington have large numbers of student lets, and in the city centre and Castlefield converted warehouses sit beside new apartment towers such as Deansgate Square. People describe where they live by suburb, and that is how they search.
Professional and Business Services
Spinningfields, between Deansgate and the River Irwell, is the city's modern business district, where national law firms, accountancy practices and financial services companies work beside the Civil Justice Centre. There are more offices around St Peter's Square and on King Street, once the banking street of the North West, the Co-op's head office anchors NOMA, and smaller firms work from the Northern Quarter and suburban centres such as Didsbury. Clients comparing firms here see national names beside independent ones, so a smaller practice has to state its specialisms, its people and its fees plainly.
Hospitality and Retail
Visitors come for football at the Etihad Stadium, concerts at Co-op Live and the AO Arena, conferences at Manchester Central and performances at Aviva Studios, the Bridgewater Hall and the Palace Theatre. They shop at the Arndale, on Market Street and King Street and among the independents of the Northern Quarter, and eat in Chinatown, in Spinningfields and along the Curry Mile in Rusholme. Much of this is planned around a fixture or a ticket bought long in advance, so restaurants, hotels and shops need to be found and bookable online well before the day.
Health, Care and Wellbeing
The Manchester Royal Infirmary and the Royal Manchester Children's Hospital stand on Oxford Road beside the University of Manchester and Manchester Metropolitan University, with Wythenshawe Hospital in the south, North Manchester General in Crumpsall and The Christie in Withington. Students live in Fallowfield, Rusholme and Withington, while Didsbury, Chorlton and Burnage are settled residential suburbs. Residents in every part of the city can choose between several dentists, physiotherapists, nurseries, salons, gyms and care providers close to home, and most compare them online before they book.
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 Manchester are made on a phone and a slow page loses the enquiry.
Local Search Foundations
Page titles written for the searches people in Manchester 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 Manchester
People rarely search for a business by city alone. In Manchester they search by district, in places such as Didsbury, Chorlton, Ancoats and Levenshulme, 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 Stockport, Sale and Altrincham, 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 Manchester
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
"I would recommend Digital pod as I am very pleased with the website they designed for me."
"Been working with Matthew at DigitalPod to apply and build upon our existing website. Our business needs to display the artwork and present it really well for our client, DigitalPod have completed every task we have asked of them and more. We have in the past suffered from bad website developers yet Matthew and his company are a total delight to work with and I can Highly recommend him and his company. We have also intrusted them to keep working on our website also to complete SEO projects and look forward to a long business relationship. Thank you very much indeed to DigitalPod."
"We required a designer to take our initial vision and develop a website for our company that would be extremely easy to use and would be most appealing to our intended market.Digital pod were an excellent choice and were extremely helpful through the entire process.The end result is something that we are all very proud of and has greatly helped our business expand into a wider market place."
Website Design in Manchester: Questions
Are you a website designer based in Manchester?
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 Manchester 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 Manchester?
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 Manchester?
We build the foundations local search depends on: a page for each service and each area you serve, such as Didsbury, Chorlton, Ancoats and Levenshulme, 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 Manchester 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 Manchester, 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 Manchester
We work with businesses across the North West 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 Manchester Website
Tell us about your business in Manchester 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.