I make bespoke websites for London firms, practices and organisations from a studio in Littleport, near Ely. Since 2001 I have made more than 1,600 of them, and I still design and build every one myself, from the first call to the care afterwards.
Most of my clients are in and around Cambridge and Ely, and those further afield I work with by video call and email, from the brief to the design to the launch.
For a London business the arrangement has one plain advantage: nothing you say has to be passed on before it is acted upon. There is no account manager and no ticket queue; the person you speak to on the first call designs the website, builds it, launches it and looks after it afterwards.
The experience behind it is not only local. I have run Cambridge Web Solutions and the web department at Simpsons Creative, and worked on the intranets of RWE, npower and Thames Water and on joint research websites for the NHS and the University of Cambridge.
An online shop near Peterborough, a convenience chain whose stores are mostly in the north of England and the Midlands, and a recruitment agency in Ely: three clients outside London, and three different jobs.
An online shop for a raw dog food kitchen near Peterborough, with trade accounts and their own prices built in. Most of the work went into the tools that win an order or save someone a job: a feeding calculator that ends in a basket, repeat orders the customers manage themselves, and barcode packing straight from the freezer.
Read the case study
The store finder for a chain of 39 convenience stores, most of them in the north of England and the Midlands: an interactive map with filters and a postcode search, and a page for every store, so that a customer finds the nearest shop, and what it offers, at a touch.
See how the store finder works
A website refresh for an independent recruitment agency in Ely. The live vacancies by sector sit on the homepage, each with its count, above the latest roles and their salaries, because a candidate's first question is what is open now and an employer's is whether the agency can fill the post.
“We were looking for a website refresh and he came up with some great ideas and made the whole process very straightforward.”Emma SmithXpert ResourcingVisit the site (opens in a new tab)
If you are choosing on behalf of the partners, a board or a committee, you may later be asked why you chose a designer outside London, and these are the answers you will want to have ready.
Confirmable in writing before any work begins
Work done over Zoom and email depends on prompt answers, so every email is read and answered by me no later than the end of the next working day. While the website is being built there is a check-in at the end of each week. At launch there is a 30-minute training session and a written guide to the things you will change most often, and afterwards, on a care plan, changes are made by me rather than passed to a queue.
“Adam did an amazing job for our new website, which included a bespoke interactive map. He went above and beyond to build it quickly and communicated well with us throughout.”
They range from where I work to who actually does the work, and if your question is not here, you are welcome to send it to me and I will answer it plainly.
Yes, I work with businesses across the country by video call from a studio in Littleport, near Ely, and the standard of the work, and the person doing it, are the same wherever you are.
No, there is no need: projects run largely over Zoom and email, and I have never met many of my clients in person; the work is no worse for it. The first conversation is a 30-minute call on Zoom, booked online at a time that suits you.
Every website is quoted to the job, because no two firms need quite the same thing. After a free 30-minute call you receive a written proposal within two working days, with one fixed price and a launch date, whether you bring your own words or would like the research and the words handled for you. That price holds however long the work takes.
It takes about four weeks from the discovery conversation to launch for a website, and about six for an online shop. The launch date goes in writing beside the price before we begin, and I plan the work backwards from it, so that you can tell the people you answer to exactly when to expect it.
I do, and there is no one in between, no junior and no outsourcing: the person you brief is the person who designs, builds and looks after your website. A trusted associate is on call for cover while I am away, so that nothing rests on any one person, including me.
Every website is built lean and fast, with the search work done properly from the first day: a clean structure, sensible page titles, quick load times, local schema and your Google Business Profile. Rankings are earned over months rather than weeks, and ongoing SEO can build on that foundation should you want it.
Everything a website includes, and the proposal as it arrives, are set out on the web design page. Three other pages may help a London business decide.
You are welcome to book thirty minutes on a call, or to leave a note in the form about where the current website falls short, and I will reply by the end of the next working day. The call is most useful when there is a real project in mind, so that the thirty minutes are well spent. If I can help, the written proposal follows within two working days; if I am not the right fit, I will say so.
Or write to enquiries@adamlord.co.uk. For a fuller picture, the project brief takes about ten minutes.
It has come straight to me rather than to a queue, and I will reply by the end of the next working day.