10 MUST-ASK QUESTIONS BEFORE HIRING A WEB DESIGN AGENCY
Table of Contents
1.1: Your website is the face of your business
1.2: Getting the best web designer is vital
1.3.1: What is your website design and development procedure?
1.3.2: Is your web design agency experienced in my field?
1.3.3: What is the estimated budget for the project?
1.3.4: What is contained in your web package?
1.3.5: How do I receive updates during the development process?
1.3.6: Will the whole project be done in-house or tasks will be outsourced?
1.3.7: How about the responsiveness of my website?
1.3.8: Will my website be developed from scratch or customized from a template?
1.3.9: What is your policy on website and content ownership?
1.3.10: How will you ensure that the website helps me achieve my profitability goals?
1.4: Any web design agency near me?
Ever seen a giant retail store without an imposing, ornately designed entrance? Of course the answer is a resounding NO. This is because regardless of the quality and magnificence of the items inside, customers won’t notice the store if there is no visible entry point to guide them in.
Your website is the face of your business
The same goes for businesses in today’s digital era. The growing popularity of online shopping makes it imperative for businesses to have a strong online presence to harness the potential of e-commerce.
And how can they do this? Using websites of course. Like in the analogy above, websites serve as virtual entrances to businesses online. They enable customers to access a business’s products, services, customer support, and other important information meant for their consumption.
Getting the best web designer is vital
Therefore, your business website must be the best above all others. It should have immense aesthetic appeal, an organized layout, fast speed, and be convenient and easy to use. As such, you need a competent web designer to create a unique, effective, and attractive website for your business.
How do you get such a web design agency? Well, by asking several specific and objective questions that will reveal to you the most suitable web design agency to handle the responsibility of creating or redesigning and revamping your business’s website.
Below is a comprehensive outline and breakdown of MUST ASK questions before hiring a web design agency;
What is your website design and development procedure?
Okay, it might seem like you don’t have to know the intricacies of how your web design agency will go about creating your website. The end justifies the means, right? Well, that may not always be the right way to approach it.
Getting a comprehensive design and development procedure your designer will use is essential. It gives you a rough idea of how well they have understood your vision and how prepared they are to implement it.
When a web designer clearly spells out their design and development process, you can also gauge how long the whole project will take and the associated costs. This will help you to better understand the whole thing and prepare for any input that may be required from you at any stage.
Is your web design agency experienced in my field?
The 21st century has witnessed extensive digitization of operations in all sectors from commerce, industry, and government to education, sports, and health. Therefore, the specific website needs of your business may vary greatly from those of others depending on your field of specialization.
As such, it is important to establish the field in which your web design agency has specialized. This will help to gauge if they possess the necessary competencies to effectively implement the vision you have for your business’s website.
If they have extensive experience in your field of specialization, they will understand what works best with your target market and execute it. However, there is a tweak here. The web design agency should have some knowledge of web design in other fields as well.
This gives them a well-rounded, circumspect understanding of the process. Consequently, they will easily borrow other useful elements from other fields and blend them in to produce a unique, highly functional website that will fulfill your needs.
What is the estimated budget for the project?
The fact of the matter is getting a unique website that will offer you high utility is more important than the money you spend creating it. However, there is no business with limitless budgets as there are other operational costs that have to be met as well.
Therefore, you should request your web design agency to give you the approximate cost for implementing your web design ideas. You can then share with them what your budget for the website is and they will tell you what kind of web package your budget can get you.
Based on this information, you can make an informed decision of whether to expand your budget, maintain it, or negotiate for better terms. Regardless of what you decide, ensure that you do not compromise on the type of website and features that will sufficiently fulfill your business needs.
This is because, in the long run, your business will benefit more from a highly functional website than any amount of money you may save by agreeing to get a website without some features which may be critical to your business’s success.
What is contained in your web package?
Different web design agencies have different policies when it comes to the services they offer in their packages. Therefore, it is crucial to know all the services that are included in a package and those that are not so you can figure how to acquire and pay for them.
This is mainly because everything doesn’t just start and end with the completion of your website. There are potential threats such as bugs and hackers that may compromise the smooth functionality of your website. Therefore, you need to know if your web design agency will provide maintenance services once such cases occur.
You also need to know if your web designer will host your website and if they will integrate search engine optimization from the beginning of website development. Let your designer tell you if they provide extra extensions and plug-ins to optimize your site’s functionality.
This way, you can have a clear understanding of how your money is being put to use and the utility the final product will give you. You will also be able to anticipate whether you’ll incur any extra costs in case you want to make any revisions or a need for maintenance arises.
How do I receive updates during the development process?
Progress updates are not just a quick fix to quell a client’s impatience. In an actual sense, they are very crucial in ensuring that the client’s vision for how they want their business’s website to look is achieved.
This is because one can never be too sure that they are on the same page with their web designer. Both the client and the web designer may misunderstand information exchanged between them even when they think they have perfectly understood everything.
By updating you on the progress whether, through sketches, wireframes, or a dashboard to the site, a web designer enables you to see and confirm if the website is turning out to be exactly what you want.
You can make suggestions for adjustments or give any further instructions that will enhance the quality of the final product. Getting regular updates also helps to ensure that major changes don’t have to be done towards the completion of the project. This saves a lot of time and effort.
Will the whole project be done in-house or tasks will be outsourced?
Many design and development professionals understand that clients always seek the most convenient way of getting their projects done. Therefore, it is attractive to them if a provider claims to offer in entirety all the services required to implement a project.
However, the truth is not all firms have the staffing and financial resources to do every single task in the web design and development process. Therefore, they may outsource some tasks to other providers.
It is vital to know whether your web design agency will outsource any work so you can anticipate the cost, time, and coordinative implications of such a move. You can also vet the collaborator to see if they are capable of ensuring you get your desired end-product.
How about the responsiveness of my website?
Going back to the analogy of the retail store, it doesn’t matter how great an establishment is. If it is not easily accessible, it will not reach its ultimate potential in terms of sales. The same applies to your business’s website.
If it is only accessible by certain devices say on desktop alone and not on tablets and mobile, then your website is not responsive. The result is that many potential clients will be barred from interacting with your website and hence your traffic will remain low.
Also, search engines like Google have policies that reward and give precedence to mobile responsive sites as they are optimized for user convenience. Therefore, ensure that your web design agency intends to make your website mobile responsive.
Will my website be developed from scratch or customized from a template?
Depending on the specific needs of your business and the quality standards you have set for yourself, your website can be coded from scratch or modified from an existing template. Using existing templates is cheaper and requires a short time to complete.
However, getting a fully custom-made website is more advantageous. It allows your web designer to incorporate all the features you may need and tailor-make everything according to your specifications. It also makes it more convenient to make changes in the future.
Therefore, it is crucial to establish whether your web design agency will build everything from the ground up or not. This will help you anticipate any limitations or strengths associated with whichever choice you make.
What is your policy on website and content ownership?
Ownership and copyright claims cause major problems between developers and clients in all sectors. Therefore, it is important to have a clear understanding of what your web design agency’s ownership policy is.
It is ideal to own your website and all the content in it. This way, you can make various changes and adjustments in the future depending on how your business’s needs evolve. If your web designer doesn’t support this, it is best to search for an alternative that does.
How will you ensure that the website helps me achieve my profitability goals?
It is common knowledge that every business is created with the motive to generate profit. However, this profit is only made after the business offers its clients value. Therefore, ensure that your web design agency clearly explains how the website they will build for you will boost your business’s profitability.
Allow them to share the creative strategies they intend to use in the design and development of the website to make it attract more visitors. Let them explain how these visitors can then be converted into clients.
If your web design agency can satisfactorily do that, then you can rest assured they are the best fit for your business. This is because they are committed to offering quality and value to their clients instead of just chasing profit.
Any web design agency near me?
If you are a business owner who would wish to have your website created or redesigned, worry not. We have a competent team of experienced, professional web designers who can help you realize your business goals by extending your reach using an efficient SEO-optimized website. All this is at an affordable rate.
Click here to contact us today and let us help you take your business to the next level.
