refreshing ideas in all these flavours
refreshing ideas in all these flavours
After more than three decades working across design and advertising, including international campaigns and projects for major global organisations, Semistone Media now brings that experience to web design for local businesses in and around Chichester.
We design and build websites for local businesses that need clarity, professionalism, and technical stability.
This includes:
Our websites are designed to be credible, usable, and durable — built to serve as long-term business assets.
Good web design doesn't exist in isolation. Our experience in branding, graphic design and SEO informs the way we approach websites — from visual identity and information hierarchy to content structure and visibility.
These disciplines are available independently, but they also give us a broader perspective when designing websites for local businesses.
Effective SEO primarily comes down to sound structure and consistency. We apply best practice at a foundational level, ensuring local business websites are technically sound, clearly organised, and aligned with how people search for services locally.
Our approach avoids short-term tactics and speculative guarantees, focusing instead on sustainable visibility — particularly for local search and Google Maps.
Branding provides the framework for a website’s operations. Where required, we develop or refine visual identity systems to ensure clarity, consistency, and appropriateness across digital and physical touchpoints.
Our branding work is grounded in established design principles rather than fashion-led aesthetics, allowing local businesses to present themselves clearly and confidently without frequent reinvention.
Graphic design is often where long-term working relationships take shape. Once a brand has been established and applied to a website, businesses typically require ongoing, well-judged design support across their wider communications.
We provide ongoing graphic design support for local businesses, ensuring the visual identity is applied correctly and consistently across digital and print materials — from social media assets and marketing literature to signage and printed collateral.
Different disciplines, complementary experience. Together, our backgrounds span design, advertising, digital strategy and technology, bringing a broader perspective to the way we approach websites.
This experience allows us to make fewer assumptions, ask better questions, and avoid unnecessary complexity.
David Marshall: 30+ years experience
David brings more than three decades of experience in design and advertising, working across global markets and a wide range of industries — from early-stage ventures to established SMEs and multinational organisations.
Since founding Semistone Media, he has led complex branding and digital initiatives, including major rebranding programmes for several pharmaceutical organisations operating globally with HQs in Switzerland and India. His work focuses on translating business objectives into clear, considered design systems with long-term relevance.
Benedict Francis: 25+ years experience
Benedict has over 25 years of experience across digital strategy and technology, working in senior and hands-on roles including Digital Director, Chief Technical Officer and Head of Technology. His career has involved delivering digital projects for organisations in the UK and internationally, from websites and ecommerce platforms to bespoke software and wider digital strategy.
At Semistone, he brings the technical and strategic perspective to our web projects, overseeing development, performance and search while ensuring the thinking behind the design carries through into the finished website.
“Dave is fantastic! I really appreciated his expertise and experience throughout the whole process. We worked together to shape exactly what I wanted for the website, and he really took the time to listen and understand my vision. He made the technical side feel easy and helped bring everything to life just how I’d imagined. Highly recommend!”
Emma O’Malley
Owner of Emma O'Malley Hair & Beauty, Midhurst
“David provides a first-class service for the construction and maintenance of websites. He is keen to understand the nature of the business so that the website has the right feel and properly reflects the organisation’s values and ethos. During the construction phase, he offers plenty of common-sense advice on how to improve the offering. He is naturally creative, so the website is attractive and pleasing to the eye, encouraging users to delve deep into the website. His attention to detail is superb, and his “can-do” approach makes him a joy to work with.”
Trevor Hines
Chairman of FABIS Charity, Chichester
“When I first met Dave, he looked at my business website, which I had produced myself on Wix, and raised many concerns.
I was reluctant to spend money on something I thought I could do myself, but my Wix site wasn’t bringing in any business enquiries.
So, one day, I called into Dave’s office to see what he had in mind. That meeting dramatically changed my understanding of websites and online marketing. I was stunned by how much goes on behind the scenes.
As Dave had pointed out, the design and content are just the starting point. I had no idea about SEO or how it can put you on the radar of potential clients.
In the meeting, I realised Dave is as passionate about making our website work for us as we are about our business!!
So, we let Dave loose, and he totally rebranded us, new logo, website, the works…. and the result, within a few months, work boomed! We had a steady stream of enquiries each month, with a good success rate in winning the work.
We’re now setting up a new company, and Dave at Semistone Media is our go-to web guy…Thanks Dave!”
Kyle Edwards
MD of KLE Decorators, Chichester
If you’re a local business in Chichester looking for a professionally designed website — or questioning whether your current site still truly represents your business — we’re happy to have that discussion with you.