Many people or companies expose their websites online so as to showcase their businesses. No matter what the company deals with or whatever services it gives, every business owner may now have a website online. That is why the web design industry has experienced an enormous expansion since the past couple of years. The success behind a business online may rely on its web design. If the right web design solutions used, a company can undergo an unbelievable growth in terms of money and business.

If you have a retail business then a website is useful to display your products. The web design industry has gained so much importance that even non profit organizations need a website to show their involvements. Therefore, it may be difficult to point out a business that does not have the benefit of a website. But there are a number of things to take care of before you hand over your web design project to someone. You should be aware that using the best web design resources can be towards your own advantage. The reason behind is that it will be more profitable to you or your company. Conversely, an inappropriate web design may affect your business. Your users may find your website hard to use. As a matter of fact, you may risk losing potential customers.

Moreover, if you surf the internet, you may come across different websites. You may as well discover various web design techniques. Thus, you may immediately have an idea that web design professionals range from good to bad. In other words, some web designers are better than others. So, if you want to have a web design of quality you may have to research about the best web design companies out there. Your money is precious to you. So, the last thing that you may want to happen is being fooled by some fraud that takes your hard earned money and leaves you with nothing at all. Do not always be attracted by low prices. It is better to pay more and obtain a web design of quality than pay less and have an ill organized and unprofessional site. At this point, you may have to spend a further fortune to redo the web design completely.

Furthermore, if you have spotted a company that can carry out your web design task, you may have to analyze its credentials. Many trustworthy web design companies have a portfolio that contains all the top sites they have created. These serve as references for people who want to check their standing. You may then take your time and experience some of these sites. If then you feel they may fulfill your web design project as per your requirements, you may then finalize a deal with them. Such types of web design companies normally appear among the first 10 on the SERPs, for instance on Google.

Your web site may also need to be search engine friendly. As a result, you have to stand by and hear about their strategy to do the work effectively. The promotion of your web site is vital so as to drive your target audience to you. Good web design can therefore bring you to success.

Excellent web design competences, a good knowledge of the web design industry and new web design technologies

Most of us know someone who has some knowledge of web design. In fact web design is generally taught at school today and rightly so. The web design industry has grown so fast these past few years that many young people are getting trained to acquire at least the basic skills. Does that mean that anybody can deliver a quality web design solution that will work for your business? Obviously not. While you can come across many people who have dabbled in web design, few companies, let alone individuals, have all the right skills to deliver a state of the art web design solution that works. It is not enough nowadays to have some basic web design skills. As the industry standards rise quickly and community web sites with more and more complex feature sets become popular, Internet users expect high quality web sites too.

Creative ideas that work

Likewise, as more and more intuitive web sites appear online, web design specialists need to be more and more creative to come up with new and innovative designs and online ideas. Whilst most of the popular community web sites tend to follow similar design patterns in terms of looks and navigation, each has its own subtle differences that make it unique and attractive to users. The creative web design solution strikes the right balance between producing a popular, intuitive look and innovative concepts. Entirely new and fancy ways of doing things online are not necessarily the right answer. Remember that the human being likes and trusts what is familiar, especially if money and online payment are involved.

Have a proven track record with a large and varied web design portfolio coupled with a solid reputation within the web design industry

They say that the proof of the pudding is in the eating. No amount of words and advertising can beat a sound portfolio and satisfied web design customer base. It takes time and good work to build a large customer base and this is generally a good indication of the strength and reliability of a good web design company. Do check on the references of a web design company. Ring up one or two of the clients in the portfolio and check out on their experience. It’s hard work to keep good long term customers in the web design industry and these are certainly a measure of the good health of the web design company.

Sound online marketing knowledge and after sales web design service

It is not enough to have a web site online. Your potential customers must find it and find it consistently. A good web design company should not only design and publish your web site only but also advise you on the online marketing options that are available to drive traffic to your web site. Most of your online customers are looking for your products and services through search engines. So your web site should feature on the top of the major search engines. The process of ranking your web site high on search engines is called Search Engine Optimization. Although Search Engine Optimization is generally not included in the cost of web design, you should be able to opt in this service if you can afford it.

Equally important is a sound after sales web design service. Like everything else, web design needs continuous improvement to keep up with the market. You should feel confident to go to your web design company for changes and amendments, albeit against adequate payment.

The initial website design brief is the cornerstone to a sound and profitable website design project. Get it wrong, miss out on the key elements and you could end up at best losing a lot of time and money over the simplest of website design jobs. At worst you could end up in a dispute with your website design customer with a few hassles. While most serious website design companies will draft and present their customer with a proper quote with all the website design specs and conditions, many feel it is not necessary to have a similar document for smaller website design projects. This is a mistake because a badly planned small website design project could end up being a big headache if things get out of control. So getting the initial web site design brief right from the outset is critical.

So what is this initial website design brief? It is basically what you and your customer agreed to put in the web site design project before you take his or her good money. Very few customers, especially in the discount website design market, have a well laid out specs sheet of what they require in a website. More than likely they have an idea, they have seen a few website designs and they will try their best to explain to you what they want. So far so good and there is nothing wrong with them explaining their web design requirement verbally. The problem comes up when complications arise. If you have a piece of paper or an email that lists the features of the web design, it is easy to go back to it and have a point of reference for future arguments or additional work.

I’d advise every web design company to draft a quote listing the following:

• The aim of the web site being designed. What is the intended purpose of the website being designed?

• List all the features and functions of the website as much as you can.

• Describe the visitor’s experience when he or she is on the website.

• Describe the webmaster’s experience. What functions and info can the webmaster access on the website? Put down what is required for you to start the web design project, e.g a deposit, the material, photos, texts etc.

• Make it clear how long the web design project will last.

• Put down the cost involved to complete the web design project and the payment terms.

• Do not forget to mention other costs like domain name and hosting.

• Make your term and conditions clear on the quote. No small prints.

I would recommend you draft your own specs based on the customers web design requirement, even if the latter has provided a well documented specs sheet or rfq. By rewriting the brief with the web design requirement you are making sure that you understand every one of the web design features. The devil is in the details. If you have any doubts at this stage, ask the customer. Do not assume anything because once you submit the quote, the customer will assume that you have understood and hold you to it. If there are web design features you feel you cannot deliver, do not hesitate to make this clear to the customer. Although very often you can come to some arrangements, it is preferable to sometimes lose an order than to promise web design features that you cannot deliver.

Most importantly, do not give your customer high expectations if you are not sure about your ability to deliver. It is much better to be conservative about your capabilities while quoting and over achieving than the other way round. Salesmen are generally very good at over selling and promising the sky. Anybody who has worked in bespoke web design production knows that the time spent on a web design project can quickly snowball unless you have a good brief or quote and the project is tightly managed according to the brief.

The website design industry is one of the most competitive around. Try to advertise for web design services and you are up against a host of competitive suppliers, one cheaper than the other. Makes you wonder how they do it sometimes. If you are determined to have a crack at the website design business, you have more than likely been tempted to cut prices by offering big discounts and cut corners to get some orders. Experience will show though that offering big discounts and cutting prices is not the way forward to setting up a viable and sustainable web site design business. More important, it is not even necessary to cut prices to grow your website design business.

Why not just cut prices and grab the business? You cannot have everything in this world. If you offer big discounts something must go in order to sustain the business and this does not sound like a sound business strategy, neither for your business nor for your customers. If you are cutting prices, more than likely you are compromising the quality of the websites or the service your website design customers should receive for their money. Even if you have a sound business model and you are able to cut cost through, for instance, outsourcing abroad it is unlikely that you will be able to offer cheap web site design services. Yet some people seem to do it.

There are dangers in offering big discounts on website design work from the outset. First, the quality and service levels will probably suffer as we have mentioned above. Second, you are not generating enough revenue to invest into development, research, training in new website design techniques. It is difficult to grow a website design business without investing, much of which could come from a decent revenue from decent products and services. Third, you could be losing website design customers who themselves avoid buying cheap stuff and would prefer to go for the more expensive product with a perception of higher quality and value.

Experience has showed that customers are very often willing to pay more for quality products and services, at least those who mean business and want to get somewhere with their website. The fact is, the web site design market is big enough and growing fast enough and it is possible to find market segments that are willing to pay more for quality web site design. Those who advertise discount web site design will inevitably attract customers who are only willing to spend very little on their web site. These customers have little resources and will very often demand a lot at minimum cost – not the easiest customers to handle, let alone make a profit.

On the other hand, try advertising more high value web site designs with a professional web site and quality service. You will attract the same number of enquiries and orders but of higher value and you will collect more revenue for the same amount of work. Selling discount in the web site design industry is not, in my opinion, a good business strategy. Target the good customers who are not necessarily looking for the cheapest web site but who are willing to pay a bit more for a professional solution and a good customer service.

The Internet is more popular than ever and any business that is not online is losing out to its competitors. With many businesses and individuals now being aware of the tremendous power of the Internet, it has become very important for them to find a suitable web designer to carry out their project.

Unfortunately, the success of the Internet has also given the opportunity for unqualified and unprofessional web designers to market their services making it very difficult for clients to determine to best web designer for them. If your web site is made by a bad web designer, it can have a detrimental effect on your business and cost you dearly!

What Makes a Bad Web Designer?

Bad web designers are everywhere and they are able to dupe clients into giving them their business because most clients don’t know the difference between a good designer and a bad one. Even directories of ‘approved’ web designers found on the Internet return nothing but incompetent web design ‘wannabies’ whom given half the chance will provide you with a website that will make your competitors very happy indeed. Here are the main things that indicate a bad web designer:

* Lots of animated gifs on their pages

* Overuse of Flash and JavaScript

* Unflattering/ clashing colours

* Badly written content

* A table based layout

* Shoddy graphics

* No mention of web standards or accessibility

* A website that does not validate at http://validator.w3.org

What Makes a Good Designer?

Now you know the danger signs when you’re looking at the website of a designer you are considering. Here is a list of factors that indicate the designer may be worthy of you time:

* A well chosen, attractive colour scheme

* A clean, crisp, easy to navigate layout

* A CSS based layout

* Mentioning web standards and accessibility

* Well written, clear and concise content

* A web site that validates at http://validator.w3.org

As well as the factors listed here, the designer should maintain good communication with the client at all times. They should treat the project as if it is their own and endeavour to surpass all of the client’s expectations.

Where Can I Find a Good Web Designer?

One of the best ways to find a designer is to look on the major Internet search engines such as Google or MSN. However, be careful because the results supplied by these search engines will list hundreds of thousands of results and finding a really good designer amongst them could be difficult. Click through some of the results that sound suitable and subject them to the criteria already mentioned above.

There are numerous directories on the Internet that contain links to web design companies. Some of these directories claim to only link to ‘approved’ web designers, but don’t be fooled into hiring a web designer from one of these directories. In reality almost any site can be included into these directories and inclusion does not mean the designers are reputable or reliable. There are probably many good designers in these directories but finding them amongst the list of bad ones could take some time! Of course, there are exceptions to this rule, but be aware that inclusion into to most directories means little.

One thing to take into account when hiring a web designer is location. Due to the nature of the Internet you could hire a web designer anywhere in the world but keep in mind that if there are any problems you may wish to meet face to face. However, if you find a designer you are sure is suitable for you and they are located in another country don’t be afraid to give them a try.

A final word of warning about choosing a web designer; beware of hiring a web designer just because a friend or acquaintance has recommended them. By all means check their website and see what you think but just because your friend is happy does not mean they have a good website. Your friend could be blissfully unaware of the damage being caused by their badly designed website.

Web page design companies are generally have the required skill sets and experience for creating Web sites. They design new, customized Web sites as well as change or redesign existing sites for their customers. Web design companies use technologies like Flash, JavaScript, and DHTML to create professional Web sites. Often, Web design companies are also experts in marketing and promoting the Web sites. In short, they follow Web standards to create easy accessibility, usability, and search engine visibility.

Before approaching a Web design company, one needs to do a bit of homework. The first step is to determine the objectives of your Web site and to define the target audience. The next step is to gather the basic content for the Web site, which might include text and photographs. You should also decide whether you need your site to work with a database to capture customer details or you require services such as online credit card processing.

Choosing the right Web design company is an important decision. Organizations seeking to hire a Web design company need to ensure that the company they choose has the capabilities to create a site that delivers on their goals and ensure optimal visitor experiences. You can request to see their recent work and interview their reference clients.

Web design companies usually charge their customers an hourly rate. The number of hours is estimated based on various parameters such as the size of the Web site, the graphic design requirements and the complexity of interactive sections. Cost is undoubtedly important, but it should not be the sole criterion for hiring a Web design company.

The Web design contract should spell out important details such as intellectual property ownership and penalties for non-delivery as well as the costs and delivery dates. It should also include the kind of support the company will offer when things go wrong or need changing and their charges for maintenance services.

With today’s technology, more and more companies are utilizing the World Wide Web to promote their businesses. Prior to putting a website on the Internet for individuals to view, the company must first set up the website. This is where web design companies enter the picture. A web design company is hired to construct a website for an individual or company that is suitable to their tastes. There are a few factors to consider prior to settling on a specific web design company to construct your new website.

Examples of Prior Web Designs

One important factor to consider when choosing a web design company to develop a website is the type of web designs which the company has produced in the past. Many web design companies will make portfolios available for potential clients to view so that they may see the style of the web design company and determine if their finished product is what the client is looking to achieve in the way of a website. This is extremely helpful when trying to determine if the work product of the web design company is up to one’s standards. Therefore, always ask to see samples of a web design company’s prior work before signing them up to construct a website.

Estimated Completion Time

Another important factor to consider when selecting a web design company to design one’s website is what their estimated completion time may be. This is beneficial to know up front so the client can expect the finished work at a certain time. Since many individuals are using the Internet for conducting business, it is important that the client get their website up and running as soon as possible. This will also give the web design company notice that the client needs their completed product at a certain point in time and they will be less likely to push it to the side and work on other client’s projects.

Cost of Web Design Project

It is also crucial to know up front how much the completed web design project will cost the client. Since many businesses are on a tight budget these days, it is vital that one knows how much they will need to pay for their web design. Along with the total cost of the web design project, the client should also receive a breakdown of the individual costs of the project.

What Is Included with the Total Web Design Price?

One who retains a web design company to construct their website should also ask about what items are included in the total web design cost. Some companies will include follow-up consultation in the web design price or web design help in the future. It is important to inquire about these things in the beginning so as to know what type of items they can expect with the amount that they paid for the web design.

References

For those clients who wish to be on the safe side and know exactly who they are dealing with, requesting references is always an available option to the client. Many times the web design company will offer references that will vouch for their professional behavior and wonderful finished product. References are a good way to weed out the bad web designers from the good ones.

Volume of Past Experience

It may also be beneficial to inquire about the company’s amount of experience. Companies that have been in business for a good many years may just have a bit more experience than newcomers to the web design scene. Although this is just one of the many factors which should be looked at with regard to hiring a web design company, it does help to sway the decision maker one way or the other with regard to hiring or not hiring a specific company to prepare a website for them.

Customer Service

It is also important to consider the customer service skills of the web design company. One who is paying good money to have their website designed wants to make sure they are dealing with a company that will listen to what they want and make themselves readily available to their clients. If one is considering a particular web design company that has bad customer service skills, it might be more advisable to choose a company that is more client-oriented.

Summary

There are many different web design companies one can choose from when they want to have a website designed. By considering the factors mentioned above, one can help to ensure that the company that they select to take on this important task does so in a professional, reasonably priced manner. In addition, the client should determine that the web design company has an adequate amount of experience and will produce a product that is exactly what the client is looking for.

Whether you’re building a site from scratch or updating your existing site, you’ve got a few options. Your goals for the site determine the options you should go with, so make sure you’ve got those nailed down first. Ask yourself: What does your company want to achieve with a website?

1. Will you use the site to dispense information?

2. Do you merely want a Internet presence so customers can find you online?

3. What sections do you want in your site? (e.g. About your company, company history, product pages, executive bios)

4. Will you need to develop any special tools for users to interact with your site?

5. Do you already have a logo that your site designer must incorporate in their design?

6. About how many pages are you looking to have designed?

7. Are they capable of adding any back-end functions (like blogs, shopping carts, galleries, etc.) to your design?

8. Are they willing to work around components you’ve already had designed by someone else?

9. If you don’t have a company logo designed already, are they capable of designing one?

10. What type of search engine optimization do they offer ?

11. Ask how long they have been in the business and who their current clients are. This would also be a good time to get some references.

12. Have they won any Web design awards? Which ones? (It’s a nice sign if they have, but don’t be surprized if they haven’t. There are only so many Web design awards to go around.)

13. If they cannot finish the project by the agreed-upon date, will they charge extra fees to finish it? Your contract should say so.

14. Will they be taking on other projects while working on yours? If your project is complicated, you don’t want someone who may be overextending.

15. A website professional’s own home page will give you enough insight to save you the time and cost of searching around too much. Their site should tell you where they are located and exactly what type of services they provide.

Look at their past work. Have they worked on websites that resemble the site you have in mind for your company? Do they have adequate samples shown?

Communicate fully. How do they charge for their services? By the hour? Flat fees? By the project? Get a resonable estimate for how long it will take to complete the project, and at what cost. Include the agreed-upon dates in your contract and provisions for what will happen if these dates are not met.

Make sure you can review the progress of their work at reasonable intervals as the site is being designed and built. Can you see the progress on a test site?

Are your goals in line? Do each of you seek the same ideal? Confirm that they understand your business objectives and your customer base – don’t be afraid to ask important questions. If they dismiss any question as insignificant to the design of your site, find another designer. A good web professional will either come into the interview with a good sense of what your business is about, or will at least be eager to adapt to your instructions. Understand the process of when you don’t agree on something.

Choosing the best webpage designer that is right for you should not be a confusing chore; you should not have to work too hard to find that perfect fit for your project.

Designing your site can be as simple – or as complex – as your imagination and budget allows. Go ahead. Look around, check out your competition, use a couple of search engines (like google, msn or yahoo) to find the perfect website designer for you. www.jollymoon.com

When you’re self-employed, choosing a website designer is a crucial decision, as a good website can bring you more business and a bad one can drive away prospective customers. Below are some important things to consider when selecting a website designer for your new site or site redesign.

What Types Of Websites Designers Are Out There?

I don’t think there is an “official” definition, so I’ll give you MY definition:

• A Website Designer helps you to determine the page layout, graphics, text location and colors of your site, as well as the navigation and how pages will cross-link to one another. He may also do the actual computer programming and graphic art work for the site, or may hire out that work to a programming specialist. A Website Designer is the project manager for your site design or redesign.

• A Website Programmer takes the design from the Designer and creates the code to make the site run. She is also responsible for all the technical stuff that happens behind-the-scenes to make sure the site works properly for your visitors.

• A Graphic Designer creates the graphics for the site, including your logo and buttons. A Graphic Designer may also create the overall look and feel of the site.

• An Internet Marketing Specialist helps you to determine how your website fits into your overall marketing strategy, and how to get more traffic and sales from your website.

Sometimes, if you’re lucky, you can get all four of these skills from the same person. You may find a designer who can also help you with the text for your website but don’t count on it. Be prepared to write the text yourself, or hire a professional copywriter.

Who Is A Good Designer And How Much Do They Charge?

I don’t recommend specific designers, as much of it depends on whether you want to work locally with someone, or whether you are willing to work remotely with them over the phone. Here are some things to think and ask about when hiring a website designer:

• Talk to some of their current and recent clients, to see how smooth the process was.

• Look at sites they’ve designed to see if you like their style. Is there a certain feel to ALL their sites, or are they flexible in their designs?

• Ask them if they did the actual graphic and layout design of the site, or if they just did the programming.

• Ask them if they have a structured planning process that leads you through the design phase, and if they will document all the discussions that you’ll have together. If they have a Website Planning Guide that you’ll work through together, it’s helpful.

• Ask them what they know about internet marketing and search engine optimization. Be sure that they’re creating a site for you that meets your larger marketing and business goals.

• Ask the designer for their fees (expect to pay between $60 – $200 an hour, depending on their skill and their location), and what is the estimate of cost for the site you want. They may not be able to give you a good estimate until you discuss content and features of the site.

• Ask them how they bill you. Will they invoice you monthly, or when certain milestones are reached? Do you have to make deposits?

• Pay attention to how much they ask you about YOUR BUSINESS. They should want to get to know you and your business intimately. How else can they design a site that reflects you and your business, unless they spend time to get to know you?

• Pay attention to whether they’ll try to stick within your budget, or whether they keep suggesting new add-ons that increase to the cost of your site. Remember, designers aren’t responsible for your budget, you are.

• Ask them whether they will maintain your site after the initial design, and how much they’ll charge for that. Some designers want to create new sites but don’t want to maintain them. Someone like a virtual assistant (VA) may be able to maintain your site for a lower hourly fee, as long as the VA is skilled in website programming. The more bells and whistles and complicated programming in your site, the less likely that an average VA will be able to maintain it for you.

• If you’re going to maintain the site yourself, ask them if they’ll design your site in a software package that’s easy for YOU to use, like FrontPage. Many professional website designers look down their noses at FrontPage or Adobe Contribute, but guess what? If you want to maintain your site yourself, then you have to use a software package that’s easy for YOU to use, regardless of the website programmer’s preferences. (And don’t let a programmer tell you that they can’t design a good site in FrontPage. There’s a difference between can’t and won’t. I’ve been designing sites since 1997, and have designed over 40 sites in FrontPage that are clean, modern, visually-appealing, and visitor-friendly.)

• Do you LIKE the designer? Do you believe they’ll act ethically? Do you enjoy speaking with them? Do they stay focused to the task at hand, or do they ramble and waste your time? Do you feel you “click” with their personality and values? Do they offer you invaluable insight and advice about your site design?

• Tell each prospective website designer what your deadline is and ask if they can meet it. If you don’t have a specific deadline, brainstorm with the designer to create a good working deadline that you can both meet.

By doing extensive interviewing of potential website designers, you’re more likely to pick one that can do the work you want, is willing to really listen to you, can create a site that reflects you and your business, and keeps within your budget.

Advertising online can be a very effective promotional tool for business. However, given the stiff competition faced by companies that advertise online, there is a need for them to come up with an effective web site that can attract more traffic and therefore, generate more sales. To be able to do this, companies need the appropriate tools and skills to use them to come up with a web site that would stand out among those offering similar products. Unfortunately, most small companies do not have an IT department to help them build a website. In this case, the only viable option is to hire a web site design company to do the job. This does not mean, however, that the whole process is going to be expensive. There are options that companies can choose to get affordable web site design services.

Searching the Internet

One of the best sources of good deals on web design services is the Internet, simply because there is large number of web design companies that advertise online. Companies may want to consider hiring an organization that is just starting out because these are willing to do work at very competitive rates as they go about establishing themselves in the market. A very good source of these companies is via online marketplaces or on search engines.

Hiring a web design company does not necessarily mean more expenses. This is because there are a number of start-up companies that offer quality services at very affordable prices. In addition to this, a large number of companies that offer the same services have also lowered their rates significantly because of competition.