Wilson55

Wilson55 has been selling fine art, antiques and collectables from Cheshire since 1955.

Previously Peter Wilson Fine Art Auctioneers, it's a long-established member of the Society of Fine Art Auctioneers, with specialists covering everything from Northern art to fine jewellery and watches.

We designed and built Wilson55's new website and rewrote its content. We also set up a new paid marketing programme, starting months before the new site launched. By the time the website went live, the marketing was already bringing in valuation requests and bids.

Auction software websites are built to get lots online and bids placed, and they do that well. But they're not designed to sell an auction house's real advantage: its expertise.

Buyers and sellers will naturally compare commission rates, but they’ll choose the house they trust. And that trust starts with first impressions. A bespoke design makes the website look as good as the objects in the saleroom. It also gives specialists room to share what they know in a way people want to read: striking imagery, interesting stories behind the objects and genuine expert insight, not just a catalogue entry.

That's what wins sellers, and what gives bidders the confidence to commit. A template built for the sale just isn't designed to do either.

So Wilson55 kept the software that runs the sale, and we built a website around it that puts its specialists and expertise in the spotlight.

Wilson55 continues to rely on Go Auction for cataloguing, bidding and back-office sale management. We integrated it with the new website, providing:

• A custom auction calendar linked to Go Auction catalogues
• A consistent customer experience from browsing a catalogue on the website to bidding through Go Auction.

Visitors stay in the beautifully designed Wilson55 experience right up to the point of bidding. Then the cataloguing software seamlessly takes over, maintaining customer trust.

This is where we took the website far beyond a platform version. We built it in Umbraco, giving Wilson55 a website designed around its own brand, rather than adapted from a shared template.

• We reviewed and rewrote the site's content page-by-page, in a new brand voice that makes their expertise engaging and accessible. Each department page now leads with what its specialist knows: what the market’s looking for, what makes an object desirable and how they can help.
• Department FAQs answer the questions sellers and collectors really ask. They also help Wilson55 appear when people ask questions in AI tools like ChatGPT, which is increasingly where the search for an auction house begins.
• News and post-sale reports give specialists room to tell the story behind objects, not just list it in a catalogue.
• Every page is built to do the same crucial jobs: show expertise, build trust and lead to a valuation enquiry or a bid. It's the thinking behind our article, The story behind the object: turning specialist knowledge into commercial advantage. Authority builds trust, and trust drives consignments.

• Brand. We enhanced Wilson55’s brand for digital, ensuring it feels sophisticated but accessible, reflecting an established specialist auction house with its eyes on the future.

• Clear journeys. We restructured the site around what visitors want to do: request a valuation, bid in a sale or visit the saleroom.

• Found in search and AI. SEO and GEO optimisation help Wilson55 appear in both traditional search results and AI-generated answers.

• Day-to-day control. Umbraco makes it easy for the Wilson55 team to keep auctions, departments and news up-to-date themselves.

• Accessibility, cookie and privacy requirements met from launch.

Wilson55's sales calendar doesn't pause for a website project, so neither did the marketing. Google Ads search and paid social campaigns went live in May 2026, months before the new site launched.

Every campaign was built around Wilson55's specialist categories, including Northern art, jewellery and watches, modern art and design, and probate valuations. The campaign structure matched the department structure of the new website, so it carried straight over at launch.

Search campaigns that attract vendors

Paid advertising began generating valuation requests as soon as the campaigns went live.

After three months, paid campaigns were responsible for around 47% of all valuation requests. Paid search and paid social together also brought in around 20% of all website visitors from a standing start in May.

Social campaigns building an audience of bidders

In the first three months, Wilson55's Meta ads delivered over a million views, reaching more than 370,000 people and driving over 23,000 clicks to the website.

They also generated more than 23,500 post engagements, along with a steady flow of newsletter sign-ups, valuation requests and bids.

Both sides of the auction, ready for launch

Together, search and social are building a growing base of newsletter subscribers, registered bidders and active bidders, alongside new valuation requests.

The new website launched into that momentum. Campaigns already running send people to pages custom-built to win their trust, with three months of results providing a clear benchmark to measure the new site against. We'll share how it performs in a future update.