Your best-behaved clients are probably the most rewarding to work with and, in most cases, get the best outcomes. If that’s true in your business, it’s definitely true when it comes to website design and development.

ChatGPT tells me there are around 5,000 advice and planning firms in the UK. They’ll probably redevelop their websites every eight years. So that means that 625 will buy a new website in 2026.

Those firms have three choices:

• Give up the day job and DIY
• A generalist marketing agency
• A financial services specialist marketing agency (hint, hint, nudge, nudge).

The firms that choose an agency will base their decision on all sorts of factors: price, skill, experience, chemistry, and so on. All of those matter. But there’s something else that hugely influences whether the project succeeds or disappoints.

What is it? The type of client the adviser/planner turns out to be.

Allow me to explain.

At Yardstick, we’ve been building websites for nearly 10 years and, over that time, we’ve realised there are three types of advisers/planners when it comes to new website projects.

Type A: The Box-Ticker

They believe a website is a commodity, so they’ll almost always choose the cheapest option.

If they aren’t taking on new clients, that’s fair enough.

However, if they want to grow their business, choosing the cheapest option is a bad move. I guarantee it’ll mean a poor-quality website that won’t impress prospects and consequently will cost the firm far more in lost clients than they would have paid for a great site.

Type B: The Nearly-There Buyer

This group is the most frustrating. They know their website isn’t a commodity but still don’t quite get things right.

The first group of Nearly-There Buyers invest the money that’s required to build a great site, but not the time. For example, they:

• Send us poor-quality team photos, taken on an iPhone
• Don’t dedicate the necessary time to the fact-finding process
• Refuse to provide the information we need, especially for the all-important team pages
• Won’t invest the time and money (a fraction of the website cost) in social proof that’ll convince website visitors of the value in working with them.

The second group of Nearly-There Buyers overinvest in the project by overcomplicating things, not giving their agency the space to work or by using the design process to temporarily change career. They also tend to incorrectly prioritise what’s important. For example, many will talk about their services far too early, prioritising them ahead of what’s important to visitors.

The advisers/planners in this group always have the best of intentions. However, their actions mean the skilled team of writers, designers, and developers they’ve hired can’t fully deploy their skills.

As a result, they always get a website that could have been better had they given us what we need, or they had (forgive the honesty) got out of our way.

Type C: The Trusting Partner

The final group understands their website isn’t a commodity and is happy to invest time and money into the project. They fully engage when asked to do so, then step back to give our team the time and space to do their best work. Finally, they listen, putting their website visitors’ needs before their own preferences and understand the basics when it comes to things like social proof, imagery, and calls to action.

You guessed it, the more effective websites are built for advisers and planners who fall into the Trusting Partner category.

So, if you’re one of the 600 or so firms that will invest in a new website in 2026, by all means challenge, debate, and push back. Just remember there’s a reason why you chose your agency partner, so let them do their thing.

We build websites that are different

Very few adviser/planner websites stand out from the crowd; most talk about products, are packed with cliché-ridden stock images and treat the consumer as an afterthought.

Not the websites we build.

We know the importance of showcasing real people (your team and your clients) on your website, we understand how to use social proof and know how to future-proof your site for the AI age.

If that sounds appealing, email abi@theyardstickagency.co.uk or call 0115 8965 300 to arrange an initial chat.