Web developer in Pittsburgh: today's work up front, the firm's history kept
My first change to a long-established firm's site is the home page, so it shows what you sell now. I rebuild sites this way as a web developer in Pittsburgh, with Kolkata, India as my base, and I also build for research and robotics companies selling across the country, and small sites for local service businesses.
Overview
What happens to the history
The history stays on the site. If you've traded for sixty years, it says so.
Decades of trading are evidence, so I'll keep every part of it. The founding story, the old product lines and the early clients get a page of their own. Moving the story well is design work as much as writing.
For a research or robotics company selling nationally, the site leads with what the machines do and who builds them, in words a buyer can follow. A local service business is a third case: a much smaller site, built around its services and a way to get in touch.
Side by side
Where each part of the site goes
Current services take the places a buyer sees first, and the rest is ordered by what it proves.
| Part of the story | Where I put it | Why there |
|---|---|---|
| Current services | A page each, linked from the home page | Each one shows a buyer the work on offer |
| Scale and who you serve | Each service page | It shows the size of job and the kind of client |
| The founding story | A history page, linked from About | It backs the current offer without leading it |
| Old product lines | The history page, marked as past work | Search visits to them still land somewhere useful |
A decision only the firm can make
What the firm is now is a call for the people who run it, and I can't make it for you. If the partners haven't settled it yet, our first call is a good place to talk it through.
What moves the number
Where a rebuild like this grows
Reusing the old site's text and photographs keeps the build smaller, wherever they're still accurate for the current work.
- Old pages that can be rewritten, and those that have to start again
- How much of the archive goes onto the history page
- A section for research and robotics work, apart from the main services
- Old product pages with search traffic that need somewhere to point
- New photographs of today's work, if the archive has none
- The page count once each feature has its own line
What a scope from me looks like
The first build, written down
How much room the research and robotics work gets, or a local service arm, is something we'll agree in the scope.
Included
- A written scope: every page and feature as its own line, agreed before work starts
- Design to build, reviewed on a staging URL that stays open the whole project
- Mobile first — checked on a real phone
- Domain, hosting and every account created in your name from day one
- A history page holding the founding story, past products and early clients
- Basic on-page SEO: titles, descriptions, headings, sitemap, Search Console connected
- A runbook at handover: how to edit it, what renews and when
Phase two
- A timeline with dated photographs, once the archive is sorted
- A smaller separate site for a local service arm, if it trades on its own
- Ongoing SEO once the site has traffic to read
- A maintenance plan once the site is live
- Logo and brand design, quoted separately from the build
Not doing
- Guaranteed rankings
- Choosing the firm's positioning on its behalf
Where this comes from
The US record, and who leads it
Since 2017 my team and I have finished 900+ projects; of those, 600+ projects for US clients.
I'm an offshore web developer, working from Kolkata, India, and I lead each rebuild from scope to launch. The team works on your schedule, in your time zone.
Nearby
Term-time trade in Ann Arbor, output figures in Chicago
The Ann Arbor page covers shops and services whose year follows the university term. The Chicago page covers manufacturers who state their output and how far they ship.
FAQ
Rebuilding an older firm's site
A founding date and a founding story are treated separately.
Should a firm's founding date lead the home page?
- A firm's founding date belongs on the home page as one line. It isn't the headline. The headline states what the firm sells now, and the founding year sits beside it as the reason to believe it.
Does a firm need a new name when its work has changed?
- Renaming is a business decision, and it isn't one the website makes. The site can carry the old name, a new one, or both during a changeover, with the old links pointed at the right new pages. If you do rename, the old name stays mentioned on the About page, so people searching for it still find you.
Where does a rebuild start when the material describes the old business?
- A rebuild like this starts by sorting the old material into two piles. Anything that supports a service you offer goes on that service's page, and the rest moves to the history page.
Is repairing an existing site an option?
- Repair works when the platform is up to date and its menus and templates can be rearranged. I'll check both before writing a scope, and the scope says which route was chosen and why. If the platform isn't up to date, a rebuild is the safer route, and the review explains why.
Can the site show the firm's scale?
- Scale goes on each service page in plain figures: the size of job you'll take on and the kind of client you serve, in numbers you can stand behind.
How are a firm's people shown after a repositioning?
- After a repositioning, current staff appear on a team page with the roles they hold today. Founders and past partners have their part in the firm's story told on the history page. A photograph of the founders can stay, captioned with their years at the firm.
Next step
What's left in the archive?
Whatever catalogues and brochures survive are worth digging out before we meet. They're where the new site's pictures and dates come from.
Published · Updated