When we launched our Summer Sale this year, we knew we wanted to do something meaningful for the small businesses considering a new website. What we didn’t expect was to reach the end of the summer and realize that Barefoot Build clients had collectively saved more than $15,000 on professional website projects.
We’re incredibly proud of that number, but probably not for the reason you’d expect. Barefoot Build started with a simple goal: to help small businesses build a better presence online and reach the people looking for what they do. As we’ve grown as a web design company, added new services, learned more, built more websites and watched the digital landscape change, that goal has stayed remarkably consistent.
We want small businesses to succeed online. That’s what started Barefoot Build, and it’s still what drives us to work hard every day.
More Than $15,000 That Stayed With Small Businesses
Running a small business is expensive. We know that firsthand. There’s always another bill, another subscription, another piece of software and another investment you’re told your business needs to make.
A professionally designed website is a significant investment, too. We don’t pretend otherwise. Our Summer Sale gave us an opportunity to make that investment a little more accessible for businesses that were ready to improve their online presence. By the end of the promotion, the savings across those projects totaled more than $15,000 for our clients.
That’s more than $15,000 that stayed with small businesses. It’s money that can go toward payroll, equipment, advertising, inventory, technology or any of the countless other expenses that come with running and growing a company. For us, that’s much more meaningful than simply saying we had a successful sale.
Why We Started Barefoot Build
Barefoot Build didn’t begin because we wanted to build as many websites as possible. We started because we saw how difficult the website process could be for small business owners. Business owners are experts in what they do. They shouldn’t also have to become experts in WordPress, website hosting, mobile optimization, SEO, Google Search Console, conversions and every new way people are discovering businesses online.
That’s where we come in. Our job is to learn what makes a business different, understand what it’s trying to accomplish and turn that into a professional website designed to support those goals.
Sometimes that means starting from scratch. Sometimes it means replacing a website that no longer represents the business behind it. Other times, it means helping an established company prepare for its next stage of growth. No two businesses are exactly alike, which is why we don’t think their websites should be either.
What Helping Small Businesses Actually Looks Like
When we say our goal is to help small businesses grow online, we aren’t talking about an abstract mission statement. We get to see what that looks like every day. Here’s some good examples of who we’ve helped the last few months:
- This summer, we worked with a strength and conditioning professional building a highly specialized training business. He needed more than a website that looked good. He needed an online space that could take years of experience, a unique training philosophy and specialized services and make them understandable to the people searching for exactly what he provides. That meant thinking carefully about the structure of his website, how potential clients would move through it, what information mattered most and how search engine optimization could help the right audience discover his business. His website needed to establish credibility while still making it easy for a potential client to understand what made his approach different.
- We also began working with an experienced software developer creating her own independent professional brand. Her challenge was completely different. She has extensive technical knowledge, but potential clients don’t necessarily speak the same technical language. Her website needed to establish expertise and credibility while making complex services like software development, legacy modernization, data services and AI automation approachable and easy to understand. Instead of simply filling pages with technical terminology, we’ve worked to build an online presence that helps visitors understand both what she does and why it matters to their businesses.
- We’re also working with a family-owned payment solutions company preparing for its next stage of growth. This business already has experience, established services and a strong foundation. Its new website needs to better communicate that expertise while creating clearer pathways for potential customers to take action.
For that project, we’re focusing on stronger messaging, better calls to action, improved opportunities for lead generation and a website structure designed to reach businesses both here in North Carolina and across the country.
Three businesses. Three industries. Three completely different goals. That’s exactly what we love about small business web design.
Your Website Should Be Built Around Your Goals
We’re not interested in taking the same website, changing the logo and colors and calling it custom web design. Before we build, we want to understand the business behind the website.
We want to know who you’re trying to reach, what makes your company different, what someone needs to understand before they’re comfortable contacting you and, most importantly, what you actually want your website to accomplish.
The answer isn’t always more traffic. A new business may need credibility. A service provider may need more qualified inquiries. An established company may need a website that finally reflects the quality of the work it’s already doing. An ecommerce business may need to make purchasing easier. A local business may need to become more visible when someone searches for its services in Cary, Raleigh or elsewhere in the Triangle.
Good web design starts with understanding the goal. The design, content, SEO and technology should all support it.
The $15,000 Means More When You Look at the Businesses Behind It
That’s why reaching more than $15,000 in client savings through our Summer Sale feels so significant to us. It’s easy to look at that as a promotional number. We look at the businesses behind it.
It’s money that didn’t have to come out of the budget of a coach building something new. It’s money an independent professional could keep in her business while investing in a stronger online presence. It’s money an established family-owned company could put toward the hundred other things that come with growing a business.
And those are only a few examples. Every small business we’ve worked with this year has come to us with its own story, budget, challenges and goals. Being able to make professional web design more accessible while still giving each project the strategy, research and individual attention it deserves is something we’re genuinely proud of.
Small Business Has Shaped the Way We Work
One of our favorite parts of building Barefoot Build has been getting to know the people behind the businesses we work with. When you work with small businesses, you’re rarely working with some faceless corporation. You’re talking to the person who started it.
You’re talking to the person answering emails after dinner, wondering whether the next investment is the right one and making decisions that can directly affect their business and their family. We understand that because we’re a small business, too.
That perspective influences how we communicate with our clients, how we approach website projects and how seriously we take the trust someone places in us when they choose Barefoot Build. A website isn’t just another project sitting in our queue. It’s part of someone’s business, and that matters to us.
The Way People Search Is Changing
The internet looks very different today than it did when we started Barefoot Build, and it’s going to continue changing. Traditional search engine optimization is still important, but people are discovering businesses in more places and in more ways than ever before.
Google continues to evolve. AI-powered search is becoming part of everyday search behavior. Websites need to perform well on mobile devices, provide genuinely useful information, demonstrate real expertise and make it easy for both people and search engines to understand what a business offers.
Our approach to web design and SEO for small businesses continues to evolve alongside those changes. We keep learning because our clients aren’t investing in websites for the internet of five years ago. They’re building businesses for what comes next.
Our Mission Hasn’t Changed
Technology changes. Search changes. Businesses grow. Barefoot Build has grown, too. But underneath all of that is the same reason we started doing this in the first place: we want good small businesses to have a fair shot at being found, understood and trusted online.
Saving our clients more than $15,000 this year is something we’re incredibly proud of, but we’re even more excited about what those businesses do next. The websites we’re building today will become places where someone discovers a new business, schedules an appointment, requests a quote, purchases a product, learns about a service or decides who they trust enough to work with.
That’s why we care so much about getting them right. We’re going to keep learning, improving and paying attention to where web design, SEO and online search are headed. And we’re going to keep doing everything we can to help small businesses build an online presence that supports where they want to go next.
Because Barefoot Build builds websites, but helping small businesses reach their goals online is why we built Barefoot Build. And that’s still what drives us every day!
When we launched our Summer Sale this year, we knew we wanted to do something meaningful for the small businesses considering a new website. What we didn’t expect was to reach the end of the summer and realize that Barefoot Build clients had collectively saved more than $15,000 on professional website projects.
We’re incredibly proud of that number, but probably not for the reason you’d expect. Barefoot Build started with a simple goal: to help small businesses build a better presence online and reach the people looking for what they do. As we’ve grown as a web design company, added new services, learned more, built more websites and watched the digital landscape change, that goal has stayed remarkably consistent.
We want small businesses to succeed online. That’s what started Barefoot Build, and it’s still what drives us to work hard every day.
More Than $15,000 That Stayed With Small Businesses
Running a small business is expensive. We know that firsthand. There’s always another bill, another subscription, another piece of software and another investment you’re told your business needs to make.
A professionally designed website is a significant investment, too. We don’t pretend otherwise. Our Summer Sale gave us an opportunity to make that investment a little more accessible for businesses that were ready to improve their online presence. By the end of the promotion, the savings across those projects totaled more than $15,000 for our clients.
That’s more than $15,000 that stayed with small businesses. It’s money that can go toward payroll, equipment, advertising, inventory, technology or any of the countless other expenses that come with running and growing a company. For us, that’s much more meaningful than simply saying we had a successful sale.
Why We Started Barefoot Build
Barefoot Build didn’t begin because we wanted to build as many websites as possible. We started because we saw how difficult the website process could be for small business owners. Business owners are experts in what they do. They shouldn’t also have to become experts in WordPress, website hosting, mobile optimization, SEO, Google Search Console, conversions and every new way people are discovering businesses online.
That’s where we come in. Our job is to learn what makes a business different, understand what it’s trying to accomplish and turn that into a professional website designed to support those goals.
Sometimes that means starting from scratch. Sometimes it means replacing a website that no longer represents the business behind it. Other times, it means helping an established company prepare for its next stage of growth. No two businesses are exactly alike, which is why we don’t think their websites should be either.
What Helping Small Businesses Actually Looks Like
When we say our goal is to help small businesses grow online, we aren’t talking about an abstract mission statement. We get to see what that looks like every day. Here’s some good examples of who we’ve helped the last few months:
- This summer, we worked with a strength and conditioning professional building a highly specialized training business. He needed more than a website that looked good. He needed an online space that could take years of experience, a unique training philosophy and specialized services and make them understandable to the people searching for exactly what he provides. That meant thinking carefully about the structure of his website, how potential clients would move through it, what information mattered most and how search engine optimization could help the right audience discover his business. His website needed to establish credibility while still making it easy for a potential client to understand what made his approach different.
- We also began working with an experienced software developer creating her own independent professional brand. Her challenge was completely different. She has extensive technical knowledge, but potential clients don’t necessarily speak the same technical language. Her website needed to establish expertise and credibility while making complex services like software development, legacy modernization, data services and AI automation approachable and easy to understand. Instead of simply filling pages with technical terminology, we’ve worked to build an online presence that helps visitors understand both what she does and why it matters to their businesses.
- We’re also working with a family-owned payment solutions company preparing for its next stage of growth. This business already has experience, established services and a strong foundation. Its new website needs to better communicate that expertise while creating clearer pathways for potential customers to take action.
For that project, we’re focusing on stronger messaging, better calls to action, improved opportunities for lead generation and a website structure designed to reach businesses both here in North Carolina and across the country.
Three businesses. Three industries. Three completely different goals. That’s exactly what we love about small business web design.
Your Website Should Be Built Around Your Goals
We’re not interested in taking the same website, changing the logo and colors and calling it custom web design. Before we build, we want to understand the business behind the website.
We want to know who you’re trying to reach, what makes your company different, what someone needs to understand before they’re comfortable contacting you and, most importantly, what you actually want your website to accomplish.
The answer isn’t always more traffic. A new business may need credibility. A service provider may need more qualified inquiries. An established company may need a website that finally reflects the quality of the work it’s already doing. An ecommerce business may need to make purchasing easier. A local business may need to become more visible when someone searches for its services in Cary, Raleigh or elsewhere in the Triangle.
Good web design starts with understanding the goal. The design, content, SEO and technology should all support it.
The $15,000 Means More When You Look at the Businesses Behind It
That’s why reaching more than $15,000 in client savings through our Summer Sale feels so significant to us. It’s easy to look at that as a promotional number. We look at the businesses behind it.
It’s money that didn’t have to come out of the budget of a coach building something new. It’s money an independent professional could keep in her business while investing in a stronger online presence. It’s money an established family-owned company could put toward the hundred other things that come with growing a business.
And those are only a few examples. Every small business we’ve worked with this year has come to us with its own story, budget, challenges and goals. Being able to make professional web design more accessible while still giving each project the strategy, research and individual attention it deserves is something we’re genuinely proud of.
Small Business Has Shaped the Way We Work
One of our favorite parts of building Barefoot Build has been getting to know the people behind the businesses we work with. When you work with small businesses, you’re rarely working with some faceless corporation. You’re talking to the person who started it.
You’re talking to the person answering emails after dinner, wondering whether the next investment is the right one and making decisions that can directly affect their business and their family. We understand that because we’re a small business, too.
That perspective influences how we communicate with our clients, how we approach website projects and how seriously we take the trust someone places in us when they choose Barefoot Build. A website isn’t just another project sitting in our queue. It’s part of someone’s business, and that matters to us.
The Way People Search Is Changing
The internet looks very different today than it did when we started Barefoot Build, and it’s going to continue changing. Traditional search engine optimization is still important, but people are discovering businesses in more places and in more ways than ever before.
Google continues to evolve. AI-powered search is becoming part of everyday search behavior. Websites need to perform well on mobile devices, provide genuinely useful information, demonstrate real expertise and make it easy for both people and search engines to understand what a business offers.
Our approach to web design and SEO for small businesses continues to evolve alongside those changes. We keep learning because our clients aren’t investing in websites for the internet of five years ago. They’re building businesses for what comes next.
Our Mission Hasn’t Changed
Technology changes. Search changes. Businesses grow. Barefoot Build has grown, too. But underneath all of that is the same reason we started doing this in the first place: we want good small businesses to have a fair shot at being found, understood and trusted online.
Saving our clients more than $15,000 this year is something we’re incredibly proud of, but we’re even more excited about what those businesses do next. The websites we’re building today will become places where someone discovers a new business, schedules an appointment, requests a quote, purchases a product, learns about a service or decides who they trust enough to work with.
That’s why we care so much about getting them right. We’re going to keep learning, improving and paying attention to where web design, SEO and online search are headed. And we’re going to keep doing everything we can to help small businesses build an online presence that supports where they want to go next.
Because Barefoot Build builds websites, but helping small businesses reach their goals online is why we built Barefoot Build. And that’s still what drives us every day!
