Most corporate website projects fail before design even begins.
Not because the agency gets it wrong. Because the brief is built on the wrong foundations.
A new website is one of the more significant investments a business makes. The decision usually follows a trigger, a rebrand, a lost pitch, a period of flat enquiry numbers, or the dawning realisation that the current site looks like it was built in 2014. Which it probably was.
The brief that follows tends to focus on the wrong things. And that is where the problems start.
Treating the website as a design project rather than a business tool
Most briefs open with aesthetic references. Competitors that look good. A preference for clean, minimal layouts. Colours and fonts. That is not a bad starting point, but it is rarely where the thinking should begin.
A website exists to do a job. For most corporate businesses, that job is to support the sales process. It has to make a prospect feel they are in the right place, demonstrate credibility quickly, and give them a clear reason to make contact. None of that is primarily a design question.
The businesses that end up with sites that actually convert tend to start with a different conversation. Who needs to land on this site? What do they need to believe before they’ll pick up the phone? What would make them leave? The design follows those answers. When it works the other way round, you get a site that photographs well and generates very little.
Briefing the agency on what the business does rather than what clients need
The most common failure in corporate website copy is a homepage that tells visitors everything about the business and almost nothing useful to them.
Most decision-makers who land on a corporate site are trying to solve a specific problem. They are not browsing. They want to know fairly quickly whether this company can help them, whether they can be trusted and what the next step is. A homepage full of company history, values statements and team photos does not answer those questions.
The brief should define the audience precisely and be specific about what they need to see. A director considering a significant software investment needs different things from a business manager shopping for a new website. Generic copy written for everyone tends to land with no one.
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Underestimating the importance of proof
A new website will not convert strangers into enquiries without evidence. Testimonials help, but only if they are specific. A named client from a recognisable business, describing what actually changed, carries considerably more weight than a five-star rating and a vague compliment.
Case studies are more useful still. A real project written as a story, what the client faced, what changed and what the outcome was , gives a prospect something concrete to relate to. That is the difference between a site that tells people you are good and one that shows them.
Many corporate businesses invest heavily in the design of a new site and very little in producing the content that would actually persuade someone to get in touch. Those priorities are usually back to front.
Assuming the project ends at launch
A website is not a one-off investment. The businesses that get the most from their sites treat them as something that needs ongoing attention.
Search visibility does not happen automatically. Content needs to be added. Copy needs to be refined based on what is and is not working. Landing pages need to be tested and adjusted. None of that is particularly onerous if it is built into the plan from the start. But many businesses commission a site, sign it off at launch and then wonder six months later why the enquiries never arrived.
The question worth asking before a project begins is not just “what do we want the site to look like?” It is “what does success look like in twelve months, and what needs to happen for us to get there?”
Choosing an agency on price or portfolio alone
Both matter. Neither is enough on its own.
Price is a reasonable filter, but the cheapest option in website design tends to reflect a template-led approach or a junior team without the experience to push back on a brief that will not work. The portfolio tells you what the agency can produce aesthetically. It does not tell you whether those sites convert.
The more useful questions are about process. How does the agency approach a brief? What do they do before they start designing? How do they measure whether a site is working? An agency that can answer those questions clearly is more likely to build something that performs than one that leads with a gallery of attractive pages.
If you are at the stage of thinking about a new corporate website and want to understand what a project built around your business goals rather than a template looks like, we are happy to talk it through.
About Lemongrass Media
Lemongrass Media is a boutique website design agency with offices in Milton Keynes, St Albans and Bedford. We design bespoke corporate websites that look great, work hard and deliver real results for your business.
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