Refresh
You have already put real work into the current site. We preserve what is working, create a palette of possible looks, and help you choose and combine options into the final sign-off site.
Website refresh / Search / AI-ready / Spend cleanup
New look, better reach.
Upgrade your website so it looks better, is easier for people, search engines, and AI assistants to find, and helps hunt wasteful costs.
SEO
Search Engine Optimization is precise, but practical. Search engines read visible content and behind-the-scenes page details, so we work through a checklist: titles, descriptions, headings, links, service wording, locations, and structure.
AI-ready
Many searches now start in a chat box, from ChatGPT to Google AI results. We make the basic facts easier to understand: who the business serves, what it offers, where it works, and which answers belong on the site.
Cost cleanup
Small web costs add up quietly. We look for unused subscriptions, overlapping tools, paid tiers, renewals, and ownership gaps, then sort what is worth keeping, changing, or canceling.
How we work
Low-pressure choices, clear next steps.
The process is built around preserving what is useful, comparing real options, and turning the chosen direction into a final site you can sign off with confidence.
Review what exists
We start with a short intake interview, then review the current site, what is already working, what should be preserved, and where visitors may be getting stuck. If analytics are available, they can inform the review; otherwise the first pass stays observational and practical.
Explore possible looks
You get a small palette of design directions so you can compare real options instead of guessing from abstract descriptions.
Choose and combine
You can pick one direction or mix pieces from different options, including the existing website, until the site feels right.
Prepare the final site
Once the direction is chosen, we tighten the pages, search details, AI-ready structure, mobile flow, and practical launch items.
Selected work
Public sites, built to stay useful.
A few public examples where the work is visible: WordPress upkeep, search-focused refreshes, and full-design photography commerce.
Refresh / WordPress maintenance
Assurances de Rueil
A French insurance brokerage site refreshed for clearer service navigation, local trust signals, and a steadier WordPress foundation.
WordPress maintenance, public page fixes, metadata and content cleanup, mobile polish, and ongoing technical upkeep.
Visit site
Refresh / SEO optimization
Golden Years Tax Strategy
A public tax-strategy site refreshed around clearer service positioning, stronger search structure, and a direct consultation flow.
SEO metadata cleanup, answer-friendly page structure, Cloudflare Pages launch, policy pages, and ongoing technical maintenance.
Visit site
Full design
Photos By Elie
A photography-commerce site designed around travel collections, photo detail pages, social campaigns, and digital-download paths.
Brand system, catalog browsing, campaign pages, policy and support flows, and a public production domain.
Visit siteAbout Elie
Decades of software judgment, applied practically.
I have spent decades in software engineering, which means I look at websites as more than a surface design problem. A good site also has structure, maintainability, search signals, tool choices, and costs underneath it.
For independent businesses, I am excited by how quickly the web is changing right now: AI search, better design tools, automation, and new ways to make small sites more capable without making them bloated.
Where savings hide
Small bills add up quietly.
Subscriptions: website apps, booking tools, email add-ons, analytics products, image tools, or AI tools nobody is actively using.
Overlap: two services doing the same job, legacy plugins kept out of habit, or a paid tier chosen years ago that is now too large.
Renewals: domains, hosting, themes, plugins, and business directories that renew automatically but no longer support the business.
Ownership: unclear logins, scattered billing, and vendor accounts that make it hard to know what is essential and what can go. Savings are treated as opportunities to verify, not as guaranteed project payback.
Budget
Simple retainer, visible progress.
Start: most projects begin with a practical 10-hour initial bundle, so there is room to review, design, and make useful progress without a long proposal cycle.
Accounting: work is tracked in clear $100/hour increments, with notes on what was done and what changed.
Visibility: you are kept up to date as the budget is used, with a clear manual check-in when the retainer reaches 50%.
Quick answers
Useful facts, easy to quote.
These are the plain-language answers people, search engines, and AI assistants should be able to extract from the site.
Who is Web By Elie for?
Web By Elie is for independent businesses that already have a website or web tools and want a practical refresh, clearer search signals, AI-readable structure, and a review of avoidable web spending.
What happens in the first pass?
The first pass reviews the current site, preserves useful work, identifies visitor friction, compares design directions, and checks page titles, descriptions, headings, service wording, links, mobile flow, AI-readable facts, and avoidable costs.
Can SEO or AI answer placement be guaranteed?
No ranking, traffic, lead, or AI answer placement is guaranteed. The work improves clarity, crawlability, structure, and answer quality so the site is easier for people, search engines, and AI assistants to understand.
Is the existing website replaced from scratch?
Not by default. The process starts by preserving what works, then offers practical design and structure improvements before preparing a final site direction.
How is the initial budget handled?
Most projects begin with a 10-hour initial bundle. Work is tracked at $100 per hour with progress notes and a manual check-in when the retainer reaches 50%.
Next