ABOUT DESIGN SEO WEBSITES | WEB DESIGN & SEO EXPERIENCE

THE STORY BEHIND DESIGN SEO WEBSITES
WEBSITE DESIGN, SEO & REAL-WORLD EXPERIENCE.

THIS STARTED WITH MY OWN BUSINESS

Design SEO Websites didn’t start with me deciding that I wanted to become a web designer or SEO consultant.

It started nearly 20 years ago when I started my own business.

Back then, that business was a jet washing company, and like most new businesses, I needed a website.

I found a web designer and worked with them to get the website looking exactly how I wanted it. The design was important to me, but once the website was finished I quickly discovered something else.

Having a website was one thing. Getting people to find it was something completely different.

And that’s where my journey into SEO really began.

I LEARNED BECAUSE I NEEDED TO

Whenever I wanted changes made to my website, I sometimes had to wait a long time for my web designer to make the amendments.

Eventually, I thought:

Why don’t I learn how to do it myself?

So I did.

I started learning how websites were actually built. I learned to work with code and used Dreamweaver to make changes myself.

The more I learned, the more interested I became.

Then I started looking at the other side of the website — getting people to actually find it.

FROM WEBSITE DESIGN TO SEO

In the early days, I registered my website with as many relevant directories as I could.

That’s when I started learning about backlinks and how websites could gain authority from other websites linking to them.

From there, I went much deeper into SEO.

I learned about:

• Keywords and search phrases
• Website structure
• Page structure
• Internal linking
• Backlinks and online directories
• Search engine behaviour
• Website performance
• Analytics and measuring results
• Local search
• Search intent
• Content strategies
• How different industries require different approaches

And perhaps most importantly, I learned to test things and look at the results.

I didn’t just want to read about SEO.

I wanted to know what actually worked.

THEN I STARTED SEEING THE RESULTS

Over time, I learned how to build individual pages around valuable search terms and phrases and get them onto the first page of Google.

My own jet washing website eventually had a large number of pages attracting people searching for specific services and locations.

The result was more enquiries than I could realistically deal with.

That was the point where I realised that what I had learned could be valuable to other businesses too.

People started asking me to build websites for them.

Then friends of friends started asking.

And gradually, web design and SEO became something I was doing for other businesses as well as my own.

SEARCH HAS CHANGED — SO I HAVE CHANGED WITH IT

The internet hasn’t stood still.

Google’s algorithms have changed.

The way people search has changed.

Mobile phones changed the way websites needed to work.

Responsive design became essential.

Search became much more focused on intent, quality and relevance.

And now we’re entering another major change with AI-powered search.

People are increasingly asking systems such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude questions instead of simply typing a few words into Google.

So I’ve continued learning.

I’ve followed the changes, tested new approaches and adapted the way I build websites.

That’s where SEO, GEO and AEO come together.

SEO, GEO & AEO

SEO is about helping your website become visible in search engines.

Local SEO helps businesses become visible when people are searching for services in particular locations.

GEO — Generative Engine Optimisation — is about making your business information easier for AI-powered search systems to understand, connect and potentially use when answering questions.

AEO — Answer Engine Optimisation — focuses on creating clear, useful answers to the questions people are actually asking.

The principles aren’t completely separate.

They all come back to the same thing:

Make your business easy to understand, useful to your customers and easy for search systems to find and interpret.

Nobody can honestly guarantee that Google will put you in position one or that ChatGPT will recommend your business.

What I can do is build the website, content, structure and supporting signals with modern search and AI discovery in mind.

I’VE ALWAYS BEEN HANDS-ON

Over the years I’ve also worked with graphics and video production, creating promotional videos and visual content for businesses.

I still make videos, and they can be extremely useful for the right business.

But my real passion is building websites that get noticed.

I enjoy taking a business, understanding what it does, understanding what its customers are searching for and then building the online structure around that.

That’s why I don’t see a website as simply something that looks good.

A good website should have a job to do.

It should help people find you, understand what you do and give them a reason to get in touch.

MY OWN BUSINESSES ARE PART OF THE TESTING GROUND

I’m not just building websites for clients and hoping the theories work.

I run businesses of my own, which means I experience the same challenges that my clients experience.

One of those businesses is The Jet Wash Fella, my own pressure washing business.

I’ve used it to build and test local SEO strategies, service pages, location pages, specialist subject content and more.

Because it’s my own business, I can see the real-world consequences of what I do.

If something works, I see the enquiries.

If something doesn’t work, I have to work out why.

That experience is incredibly valuable when working with other businesses.

I DON’T DO GOBBLEDYGOOK TALK

You don’t need to understand every technical term to have a good website.

You don’t need to know what schema markup, search intent, entity relationships or AI discovery means.

That’s my job.

If you want to talk about your business, your website or an idea you’ve had, give me a call.

I’m a normal person running businesses myself, and I’ll explain things in plain English.

If something is complicated, I’ll explain it in a way that makes sense.

If I think something isn’t worth doing, I’ll tell you.

And if I think there’s a better way of doing something, I’ll explain why.

I DON’T WANT TO BUILD THE SAME BUSINESS EVERYWHERE

There’s another reason I don’t want to work with too many businesses offering exactly the same service in exactly the same area.

I don’t want to spend my time building websites that compete directly against each other.

If I build a strong SEO strategy for one particular service in one particular area, I’d rather help that business establish itself properly than build several almost identical websites competing for the same searches.

So if you operate a local business and you’re serious about getting found online, it’s worth talking sooner rather than later.

There are only so many strong positions available for each search.

WHO I WORK WITH

I work with businesses that want to take their online presence seriously.

That could be:

• A local business wanting more enquiries
• An established company looking to improve an existing website
• A new business starting from scratch
• A company wanting to improve its Google visibility
• A business wanting to build stronger Local SEO
• A company looking at GEO and AEO for AI-powered search
• A business with an existing website that simply isn’t performing as it should

I work with businesses in the UK and can also build websites and search strategies for businesses further afield.

BASED IN CRAWLEY — WORKING BEYOND SUSSEX

I’m based in Crawley, West Sussex, a little south of London, but the internet doesn’t stop at the edge of Crawley.

My clients can be local, national or international.

The principles of building a website that can be understood, found and trusted don’t change simply because the business is in another part of the country — or another part of the world.

DESIGN. BUILD. GROW.

That’s really what Design SEO Websites is about.

DESIGN a website that represents your business properly.

BUILD it around SEO, Local SEO, GEO and AEO from the beginning.

GROW its visibility and continue improving it as search changes.

I’ve spent many years learning how websites and search work.

Now I’d like to use that experience to help your business perform at its best.

WANT TO TALK ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS?

You don’t need to have everything figured out before you contact me.

If you’ve got an idea, an existing website that isn’t doing what you want, or simply want to know what’s possible, get in touch.

We’ll have a chat about it.

No complicated sales pitch.

No gobbledygook.

Just a straightforward conversation about your business and what you want to achieve.

GET IN TOUCH

Design SEO Websites

Design. Build. Grow.