January 1, 2016
This afternoon, I'm going to be giving you my top tips for finding a great web design agency. This as we know, as business owners, is one of the hardest things to do because there are so many complexities and technical issues surrounding getting websites online.
From registering your domains, installing SSL certificates, to what CMS platform do you use, and all sorts of different things in between.
Not only do you have your own preconceived ideas about what it takes to get a website built, but also your web developers, whoever you go and put a quotes request out to, they're going to have their own ideas about what they think you should be doing as well. Hopefully I'm going to give you a few tips on how you can get the most out of the freelancer or web design agency which you choose.
Buy a copy of my #1 best selling book, Online Business Startup from Amazon.
Definitely shop around!
A common problem for business owners to go for the first web designer they get recommended to or they hear about or they find on Google. They don't shop around and compare different web design agencies, or work out whether they're getting the best bang for their buck. What I would suggest you do is look at local web design agencies if you want close contact with your web designer. You can find highly reputable agencies further afield not forgetting that the web is all geared around being able to do work remotely over the internet. You can set up a relationship with a web design agency using tools such as Skype. At least you can meet them face-to-face albeit through an online tool.
Ensure that you're comparing prices, not based on how much it's going to cost you, but look at the brief which you are being given, the quote which you're being given, and work out whether you're getting a like-for-like comparison for the prices. It might be that you've got two web design agencies giving you the same price, but they might be offering a completely different feature set on a completely different CMS platform.
In order to make that happen easily, I'd recommend that you go in and create a specification document. This allows you, when you get your proposal back from your web design agency, to create a check list of features and compare both documents. What are they offering you? Make sure you go through each web design agent's quotes and your specification document, and make sure they two are matched up and that they haven't missed anything out. Sometimes, it's one of those situations where it can look too good to be true. If somebody says they're going to do everything for a knockdown price, I would definitely double check it and make sure that what they're offering is exactly what you're going to get.
A specification document should outline any problems which you think that you might face, as well as any kind of features which you are hoping to include within your website.
I'd thoroughly recommend giving your chosen web design agency the once over. Check that they have all of the right credentials in place. What you don't want to do is go with somebody who is going to go out of business within a couple of months of your website going live. That's going to leave you in a bit of doo do. When they go, if they've registered your domains on your behalf, if they stop paying for their server because they've gone out of business, your website will DEFINITELY go down. It's unlikely that it will be recoverable. You've got to make sure that you're checking yourself and checking their credentials. The simplest way to do that is to check if they're well established and how long they've been around for. Eight, 10, 12, year? Well, it's unlikely that they're going to be going anywhere soon.
You can also check the extent and quality of their portfolio, which should be on their website I might add. If they've got 70, 100, 200 clients on their books, it's likely that they've got a nice recurring revenue coming in. Therefore, they're not going to be going anywhere for quite some time.
I'd then look at the detail that they pitched in their proposal. When they come back to you with a proposal, don't forget you created a specification document already. If you look at the detail in their proposal and it's a single page or two line document, it's going to cost you X, well, that probably wouldn't fill me with the greatest amount of confidence that I was going to get everything that I've asked for within my specification.
You can check whether they've outlined both the upfront costs for them developing the website, and also the ongoing costs. Having a website designed is a very organic process and the website isn't built and spontaneously goes live. It's likely that you'll need some support, some hosting, and various other bits and pieces adding on to the site. As well as help adding content or additional features further down the road. You can ask the question as to what their ongoing costs are. This might take the form of a monthly support fee, or an annual support fee. It could be that they outlined that there are no support fees, but they have an ad hoc, you know, hourly rate which they charge out whenever you have any updates done to the site. As I said earlier on, compare your proposals so they're like-for-like. If you've got two quotes back from companies. And, one's £3,000 and one's £6,000. Well, are they proposing the same set of features? What CMS platform are they using? What are you going to get back for the money which you're paying them?
Be wary about choosing purely based on price. You get what you pay for at the end of the day. If you're choosing something based purely on price, then remember the time-quality cost triangle. If you go for the cheapest option, it may not be the best quality, or it might take a little bit longer than you'd anticipated. It's very rare that you can get a knockdown anything that's really high quality and done very quickly.
I'd recommend asking for some testimonials from their existing customer base. A good designer or developer will have no problem with supplying you with some testimonials or even putting you in touch with their existing customers so you can have a quick chat.
How did it go? Were there any problems with that developer? Was everything as you expected? Did you get everything in your proposal, in your quote from them?
This allows you to gauge what the working relationship is going to be like moving forward. What you don't want is to ask for a testimonial or ask for contact details or references from their existing customer base and for them to be a bit cagey about handing that information over. Be wary of what the relationship is going to be like moving forward with your web developer.
So, to summarise my key points about how to find a really great web development agency:
The Entrepreneurs Guide to Launching a Fast, Lean and Profitable Online Venture.
This is where the magic happens.
