The ocPortal web development agency

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Our premise

Rather than building several 'pages' and calling it a website, we provide you with real tools you need to succeed in today's competitive online world of highly sophisticated beautiful social websites.

In addition, our first-class websites include practical tools (like SEO) that actually make a website effective.

Why not a regular web design company?

Through our unique relationship with ocPortal, you'll receive:

• Service from a world-class web development company with an active web presence and public fan base
• Cost-effectiveness, by leveraging ocPortal's features and avoid reinventing the wheel
• A low-maintenance web solution with capacity for low-cost growth
• An integrated web solution with advanced functionality and features
• Software that has passed the tests of time
• Reduced reliance on third-party software/technology: avoid buck-passing

Read more about our company's approach.

(we can do non-ocPortal solutions too, if appropriate)

We're not all about technology

It's vital that you get a beautiful web design that carries your brand and gives your users confidence:

• We won't just use template, you'll have a real designer working for you, someone with experience
• We include logo design, if you want it
• Free use of professional stock photography

(if you're a design agency, we'll build your design)

We want your users to keep coming back to you, not a competitor. A great and charming user experience helps.

We make our projects partnerships

As our business partner you will get:

• To liaise directly with a project manager in charge of your web design project
• A free email account and domain name (if you take out our low-cost hosting option)
• Inbuilt search engine optimisation and automatic search engine submission
• Inbuilt web analytics
• A website that is compatible with all the major web browsers (Internet Explorer, Firefox, Google Chrome, Safari, and Opera)
• Comprehensive support to make your site as successful as it can be (under our support account service)

We also have the skills and resources to provide all kinds of other design/development services as-required, such as user-testing sessions and mobile-app development.

The world-class web development team is just a phone call away

The website design process

Comparison to other web designers - don't get ripped off!

A lot (possibly the majority) of companies cut-corners and generally do a shoddy web design job. We've put together a document explaining what to look out for and another on pricing. We're upfront about our costs, most web design companies advertise their lowest quotes but have their highest-budget projects in their portfolio.

Insist your web designer provides a mature approach

Through experience we have learnt the need for taking great care in our work. From our Sheffield office our project managers will create test sets, deployment plans, risk assessments, and (where appropriate) UML diagrams. Ask us how we will manage your shop-front responsibly, and if you are receiving quotes from other companies ensure that your quotes are made against the level of service you need.

Don't be fooled by a slick pitch

There isn't much meaning to 'accreditation' logos, and some companies are known to get good testimonials by giving out freebies. Here are some demonstrable facts about ocProducts:

• Thanked publicly by Facebook for helping them improve their technology
• One of just a few Content Management Systems distributed by Microsoft
• Thousands of registered users of our technology
• Regular third-party coverage of our innovations
• Third parties package our technology for use on cutting-edge Amazon Cloud services
• We are rated highest by users for ‘Built-in Applications’ on the biggest CMS comparison website
• A high percentage of web hosts supply our technology as a service to their users

Local web designers may make a lot of bold fancy claims about expertise and technology, and have a few nice sites in their portfolio, but can they say anything like this? ocProducts is an International technology leader, but with all the business and creative excellence you'd want from a good web design company burning at our core.

(if another company says they have a CMS, can you actually demo it? Usually it is either something they've knocked together, or they simply claim something like Joomla or Wordpress as their own)

Agency or support ticket?

This page of our website relates to our agency service. We also have a support tickets system called “Experts By The Hour” that is available to you. This is our innovative service for providing great web support at whatever service level you require for an individual query – saving you money for small queries, and meeting urgency when needed (and no long-term service contract!). We have a document that helps you decide whether to choose our agency service or support tickets.

We usually recommend that large developments be done via our agency service (for example, a complete website design), then supported using a topped-up “Experts By The Hour” account. The agency service has many advantages: for example you can visit us directly at our Sheffield office (or for larger projects we will visit you).

Project funding

There are roughly three kinds of web design project funding scenarios:

1. New businesses, designed to make money with the website being the/a key foundation
2. A necessary investment for a new/existing business (a capital cost to “keep with the times”)
3. A non-profit project, such as for a charity or government organisation who need a strong web presence

Sometimes we see web design project ideas that we don't immediately see as viable as the foundation for a business. We try and do some level of market review when we write a project proposal, to identify competition, learn a little about the markets involved, and see what has sometimes not worked for other businesses in the past. We may make some suggestions on how to add additional differentiation to your original idea, or what marketing strategies you could use to reach your market.

Ultimately though it is important that you yourself consider your business plan carefully as there is quite a lot of expense and uncertainty starting a web design project on the modern web. If you'd like us to conduct a more thorough and formal review on your behalf please ask us to do so and we'll include that as an initial phase of the project.

Generally a business should see a website development investment like any other: write a proper business plan, then arrange an appropriate source of funding (for example it might be a personal investment, a company expenditure, or from an external business investor).

Working in partnership

As well as being able to provide a high quality full agency service, we enjoy working on web design projects with other professionals in partnership. For example, we can work with designers as a development provider – making the design and vision real, and implementing extreme technology as required. If you would like to work with us then we would love to hear from you.

The few web development things we cannot do

We don't do Flash websites. We work to W3C standards (the proper standards for consistent reliable accessible web-sites), and Flash isn't one of these. Flash won't work on iPads or iPhones, hurts search result positions, and is considered by some a 'rogue' tool in web-design. Modern websites can still be very flashy without needing Adobe Flash. Where it is needed (usually, for online games) we'll partner up with a specialist.