Ask a business owner what kind of website they need and most will say the same word: a website. Singular, generic, one thing. But a site that convinces someone to enquire about a $40,000 renovation works nothing like one that takes payment for four hundred SKUs across two currencies, and neither looks anything like the page you need live in six days for a conference discount code.
That confusion costs money. We've seen briefs written for a marketing site handed to a Shopify build, campaign offers tacked onto a homepage nobody wants to touch, and customer portals bolted onto a store that was never built to hold a login. Each type works well on its own terms. Mixed up, they cost more to untangle than they would have to scope correctly the first time.
The untangling usually happens later than it should. A retailer briefs a landing page for a single campaign, then keeps adding to it for the next twelve months until it's carrying full navigation, a blog feed and three unrelated product ranges, doing none of those jobs well. A services business builds a brochure site, then bolts on a login area for existing clients without the account logic to support it properly, so passwords get emailed and files get shared over the phone instead. Neither business set out to build the wrong thing. They just kept extending a site built for one job until it was quietly doing four.
Most established businesses in New Zealand and Australia end up needing a combination of four distinct types: a marketing or brochure site, an ecommerce store, a landing page for a specific campaign or offer and, for some, a web application that does more than sell or explain. Below is what each one does commercially, and how to work out which combination fits your business.
The marketing or brochure site
A marketing site's job is to turn a stranger into an enquiry. It explains who you are, what you do differently and why someone should trust you with a considered purchase, whether that's a bathroom renovation, a commercial fit-out or a piece of enterprise software. There's no cart and no checkout. Success gets measured in one number: how many of the right people picked up the phone or filled in a form.
This is the right starting point for service businesses, B2B companies and any brand selling something people research before they buy. Heritage Saunas launched a Webflow marketing site before a single sauna had been built, with no finished product photography to show. Within three months it was converting enquiries at 4.6% against a 2.7% industry benchmark, generating two to three qualified leads a week with no paid advertising behind it.
If your business runs on relationships and consultations rather than instant purchases, a Webflow marketing site is the right foundation to build from.
The ecommerce store
An ecommerce store has a different job: sell the product directly, without a phone call in between. That means a cart, checkout, inventory that stays accurate and shipping and discount rules that hold up under a Boxing Day sale. Design and build happen at the same time here. The theme takes shape inside Shopify's own architecture as the store gets built, not as a separate stage signed off beforehand.
Clean Collective rebuilt on Shopify with a stockist map and 3PL integration running across New Zealand and Australia. Conversion rate rose 103% and sales grew 28%, the sort of result a store gets when it's built around how people actually shop rather than as a digital shelf for the existing catalogue.
Retailers with a large or complex catalogue need more than a standard build. Advintage moved more than 5,000 SKUs off Magento onto Shopify, carrying wholesale pricing, complex discount logic and an ERP integration across with zero downtime during the switch. We scope and manage integrations like that rather than build the connection ourselves. The platform or the specialist app behind it handles the technical work, and our job is making sure it functions inside the site the way your business operates.
If you're selling product, start with Shopify website design or a broader ecommerce website build. Once you're past standard checkout limits or running multiple sales channels from one back end, Shopify Plus is where that conversation moves.
The landing page
A landing page does one job only: convert the visitor who arrived from a specific ad, email or campaign into a single action, whether that's a purchase, a booking or a signed-up email address. It has no main navigation to wander off through and no unrelated content competing for attention. It exists for the length of a campaign, then gets retired or rebuilt for the next one.
Businesses running paid campaigns, product launches or seasonal offers need this most, because sending that traffic to the homepage means asking a visitor who already knows what they clicked on to go and find it again.
Skyrocket builds landing pages as part of a broader site or campaign, not as a standalone service line. If a single offer is driving genuine paid traffic, it deserves its own page rather than a paragraph added to the homepage.
The web application
Some businesses need more than a site that explains or sells. A trade account might need to log in and see wholesale pricing a public visitor never sees. A returning customer might need to book a service and manage that booking without emailing anyone. Both need logic that remembers the visitor from one session to the next.
This is where accounting systems, booking platforms and stock feeds come into the build. We scope and manage those connections into the site. The technical build of the connection itself sits with the platform or app on the other end, whether that's Xero, a booking system or a stock management tool. Getting the scope right early avoids paying twice for functionality that should have been mapped out before the build started.
A web application layer gets built inside an existing Webflow or Shopify site, with the marketing or commerce job continuing to run alongside it.
The line between "a bit of extra functionality" and "a web application" usually comes down to whether the site needs to remember who's visiting. A contact form doesn't need that. A page that shows one customer their order history and a different customer their wholesale price list does, and that changes the build from the ground up rather than being a feature bolted on near the end.
Which one (or combination) does your business actually need?
Most established businesses need more than one of these types working together. A few combinations come up often:
- A marketing site for brand and credibility, with a fresh landing page built for each trade show or campaign
- A Shopify store for retail, with a customer portal for trade accounts to reorder at wholesale pricing
- A Webflow front end for content and brand, with Shopify running commerce underneath it
Slight Twist runs the third pattern: a Webflow front end paired with Shopify for commerce, a combination strong enough to win three CSSDA awards in 2025, including a Special Kudos. Design standards and commercial function aren't competing goals when each platform is put to the job it's actually good at.
Start the decision with the commercial job the site needs to do, then let that decide the platform and structure. Is the goal to generate enquiries, sell product directly, convert one specific campaign or serve customers who already bought? Answer that before naming a platform, because the platform question only has a sensible answer once the job is settled: a brochure site and an ecommerce store solve different problems even when they sit on the same domain.
Once you know the type, cost and scope follow. See what a website actually costs in New Zealand for how each type prices differently, and use how to choose a website agency once you're briefing an agency on the right one.
Common questions
Can one website actually be more than one type?
Yes, and for most established businesses it should be. A single site commonly runs a marketing section for brand and credibility alongside a store or a login area, built as one connected experience rather than separate projects stitched together later.
Do I need a landing page if I already have a website?
If you're running a paid campaign, a launch or a seasonal offer, yes. Sending that traffic to your homepage forces visitors to hunt for the offer they already clicked on, which loses conversions a dedicated page would have kept.
Is Shopify or Webflow better for an online store?
Shopify is the commerce engine: checkout, inventory, payments and discount logic. Webflow handles content-led marketing sites well but isn't built for transactional commerce, so a store belongs on Shopify, with a Webflow front end layered in front of it where brand and content carry real weight.
What's the difference between a landing page and a homepage?
A homepage has to serve every visitor and every intent at once, with full navigation and multiple paths through the site. A landing page serves one visitor type with one intent, stripped of navigation, built to convert a single offer.
When does a business need a customer portal instead of a normal website?
Once customers need to log in and see something specific to their account, such as wholesale pricing, order history or a booking they've already made, a normal page stops being enough and the site needs functionality that persists between visits.
Does the type of website change how much it costs?
Significantly. A marketing site, an ecommerce store and a web application carry very different scopes, timelines and price ranges, covered in detail in our website cost guide.
If you're not sure which combination fits your business, get in touch and we'll work through it with you before anything gets designed.
