The website market is a confusing place, especially if you do not fully understand websites, their functionality and how they are built. There are hundreds of platforms, CMS systems and thousands of designers all making the choice of who to choose to build your new website even harder. But you’re in luck, here’s a guide to what to look out for when choosing your designer and how much to expect to pay.
Getting Started
The first thing to do is to decide on the type of website you want for your business. This can always be adapted and changed once you meet with a designer but it’s a good idea to have a rough outline of what you’d like your website to look like, what colour schemes you like, styling and functionality. This will serve as a solid base and help the designer give you a more accurate quote.
Once you’ve done this it’s time to get researching for a designer that can build your dream.
Researching a designer
As I mentioned, there are thousands of website designers in the UK and probably millions if you start looking around the world. They may seem like they are all offering the same thing but they definitely are not.
- Reviews: Check out a company or designer’s reviews before you call. This will serve as a great way to see if they are offering a good service to their clients and satisfying the needs they had. The best reviews to look at are either Google reviews, trustpilot or similar. These reviews are harder to manipulate as the companies will generally favour the reviewer rather than the company in a dispute, so bad reviews are hard to get rid of. Don’t make this the be-all and end all though, reviews can be bought and the best way to spot this is generic reviews from accounts that leave reviews all over the place or only have the one review you’re reading. It’s worth doing a bit of research on multiple reviews to see if they are legit.
- Their website: Does the designer’s website look good? Does it function well? Remember they will have built their own site and if they can’t get that right how will they get yours right?
- Their work: Most designers will have a portfolio of their work on their website to showcase, make time to take a look through and see if any of their previous work matches the brief you have for yours. Also, look at these websites they’ve built closely. Do they look the same or similar? Is it the same website with a new colour and logo? If so this is the website you will probably end up with too and why would you want to look like everyone else!
- What else do they offer? Is the company you’re looking a one trick pony or can they help you grow your business even further? Do they offer other services that are important to online business success like SEO, social media management and more.
Cost
Right, now to the important bit. Probably the bit you’ve skipped straight to and I wasted my time writing all of the above. Cost. This is very much a ‘how long is a piece of string’ question but a decent website requires a decent designer and a decent designer needs skills, experience and creativity, none of which is going to be cheap. You can definitely get cheap designers but something important to remember is the old saying “buy cheap, buy twice” you will soon run into problems with the site that will require an upgrade.
Usually the best way to work cost is by hours and of course the hours will depend on the complexity of the site you are looking to create. Most web designers will range somewhere between £75-£125 per hour, the best thing to do is be prepared with the knowledge of what it is you need and then you can decide if the price you are being quoted is value for money.
For a quote on your site, contact us