Two businesses can offer almost exactly the same services and work in completely different ways.
The problem starts when their websites say the same thing too.
"Personalised solutions."
"A commitment to excellence."
"A multidisciplinary team."
You could swap the logo and it would still work.
When what you sell depends on experience, judgement or a particular way of working, a list of services explains what you do, but not necessarily why someone should do it with you.
A list of services is where it starts, not the explanation
Your services need to be clear.
This isn't about hiding them behind a big brand statement.
But two studios, law firms or consultancies can offer the same thing on paper and handle projects in very different ways.
That's where the useful information begins.
For example:
- which kind of client you work best with;
- which problems you don't take on;
- which questions you ask before starting;
- which part of the process you handle and which part the client does;
- which decisions you tend to prioritise;
- where you're flexible and where you're not;
- what has to happen for you to consider a project well done.
That says far more than adding another adjective to the homepage.
Show how you make decisions
You don't need to invent a "signature method" with a four-letter acronym and a trademark.
If you genuinely have a process, explain it.
What do you need to know first?
What do you decide before you design, recommend or deliver anything?
What tends to change once you've spoken to the client?
With Somos Focus Media, for example, it wasn't enough to say they offered social media, photography and video.
That list could describe plenty of agencies.
The website had to keep the personality of a creative brand while making it clear what they did and how their services were organised.
The difference didn't come from inventing a new category.
It came from understanding better how they wanted to present themselves.
Projects need some context
A portfolio doesn't have to turn into a technical report.
But a photo, a logo or a client's name says very little on its own.
Sometimes three things are enough:
What needed solving.
Which decision mattered.
What ended up being done.
At Sánchez Ruiz Abogados, for example, a big part of the work was structuring a new law firm around its different practice areas and the needs that lead someone to look for a lawyer.
There was no need to turn every project into an epic story.
What was needed was to explain why the website was organised that way.
That helps people understand the work, not just see the finished result.
A portfolio is a selection, not a mandatory archive
This shows most in visual work, but it applies to almost any professional service.
Not everything you've done needs the same prominence.
An architect might have twenty finished projects.
A creative studio, fifty campaigns.
A consultancy, dozens of clients.
The website doesn't have to show them all.
You can choose the ones that best show:
- the kind of work you want to do more of;
- different problems you know how to solve;
- different levels of complexity;
- or the type of client you want to work with.
The selection says something too.
And if your work relies heavily on photography or video, there's a less visible side: those images need to look good without making the page slow and hard to use.
Try the swap test
There's a fairly simple test.
Cover your company's logo and name.
Read the homepage.
Could it belong, word for word, to three of your competitors?
If the answer is yes, that doesn't mean you need to write something provocative.
You don't need to invent a personality you don't have either.
Start by finding the sentences anyone could put their name to.
"Quality."
"A personal touch."
"Tailor-made solutions."
"Professionalism."
They may all be true.
The problem is they don't help much in understanding how you work.
Where you can, replace them with something a person could actually check.
What the website should put first depends on what you sell
Not every professional service needs to prove itself in the same way.
If you sell visual work, your projects and images probably need a lot of space.
If you sell knowledge, the most important thing may be how you explain problems, cases and decisions.
If you sell confidence in a difficult decision, the process, the people and evidence of experience may carry more weight.
That's why the design shouldn't be decided before you know what the website has to show.
The editorial approach we explain in editorial web design is useful precisely for ordering those priorities, not for giving every project the same look.
You don't have to look different for the sake of it
Making a website distinctive doesn't mean trying to be original in every sentence.
Sometimes two businesses do something similar.
And that's fine.
The point is that when there genuinely is an important difference in how you work, what you prioritise or what kind of project you do especially well, the website shouldn't hide it behind the same phrases the whole sector uses.
You don't need a website that shouts:
"we're different".
You need a website that helps people understand how you're different, when you really are.
If the work starts with sorting that out before any design, you can see how we approach a Brand Website.
We write about decisions that come up in real projects: how to structure a website, how to capture demand and when technology can simplify a business.