I came across this article written online that is aimed at warning small business owners from hiring “flaky” web designers. Being a web designer myself, I found it very enlightening. Have you ever accidentally overheard someone else talking about you in a negative way? Especially when they think you aren’t listening! On the one hand, it hurts you emotionally to hear what someone else is saying behind your back, but on the other hand, now you know what they actually think about you! In a strange sense, you now have the advantage because you know how to better interact with them.
So, I thought that many beginner web designers could learn something about what business owners actually think about you. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a mighty fine article and I agree with its points wholeheartedly. In fact, I think this article clarifies issues that business owners have with web designers so much that I bought the rights to the article so that I could publish it here with my commentary inserted between the lines.
The parts that are in blockquotes are the original article while my commentary is normal formatting. So, without further ado:
How to Hire a Web Designer Who Won’t Flake Out on You
If you’ve ever tried hiring a web developer, you know how flaky they can be. They promise you the world, you pay them, and they disappear with your website design.
Here’s a mistake that I see many, many web designers and web marketing agencies make when talking to their prospecting clients: they overpromise and underdeliver. I can’t begin to express how important it is that you set realistic expectations in your client’s mind before you do any work for them. If they come to you and ask if you can “get them to be number one on Google,” tell them that while you can certainly help them, you can’t guarantee anything.
Weeks go by and no news. You’re starting to wonder what happened. Here are a few ways you can prevent this from ever happening to you again.
This next point is crucial: you should maintain constant communication with your client; even when everything is going well. If they don’t hear from you, they’re going to imagine the worst. Don’t let their imagination run wild. Let them know the actual state of their project about two or three times per week. If things aren’t going well, or if you’ve hit a snag, let them know, but also let them know that you can handle it (assuming you can).
Money Talks
Web development is like any other service you pay for. Generally, you get what you pay for. If you go looking for discounts and low-priced developers, expect to get the runaround. If you think about it, it makes sense that low-paid developers aren’t motivated to spend a lot of time on your project.
Think about the logic of this for a second: If you’re cheap, not only are you going to imply to the client that your work is below standard, but you’re also going to attract clients who won’t be willing to pay professional rates. As Tim Ferriss says in The Four-Hour Work Week, “Price high, then justify.”
When you are charging a fee that is attractive to you, you’re more likely to provide a better service. How would you treat a client who gave you $100 differently than you would a client who gave you $1,000? Even more so, how would you treat a client who gave you $10,000? Remember: price high, then justify. Decide the amount of money first, then decide how much value you’ll provide to make it worthwhile to the client.
Maybe they needed the money, and so they took on your project. Then, after realizing how much work it would be, they moved onto the next one without finishing yours.
Solution: spend as much money as you can and hire an expensive web designer. It won’t guarantee you get the results you want, but it will usually weed out a lot of the flaky people.
Did you notice the part where the advice is to “hire an expensive web designer”? If you’re going to be a professional web designer, then you should be charging professional rates. This is another example of why you should be charging for value instead of trying to be as cheap as possible.
Get Recommendations
Get a recommendation from a friend or from web design forums. If you know someone who had a good experience with a designer, you almost don’t need to check references because they’ve already done a good job for someone you know.
When you get a recommendation, ask about the experience they had as well as the result. Don’t just ask whether they were happy with the person. Many people say they’re happy because they don’t want to bad-mouth the person directly. However, if you ask someone about their experience, you give them an opportunity to tell you the facts surrounding their business deal. In that sense, it’s not personal and subjective.
They may tell you things you would never otherwise hear too, like whether the developer missed deadlines or delivered a design that wasn’t quite right but was “good enough.”
Check References
When you can’t get a recommendation, check references the designer gives you. Ask for at least 5 references. If they don’t have at least 5, then move on to the next candidate. You want someone with experience working on your website.
Use the same approach with the references that you used with recommendations. Ask about the person’s experience.
Get a Solid Timeline
It’s usually difficult to nail designers down on deadlines. However, you can get them to give you a timeline with milestones. This way, you know what to expect throughout the process. If a designer can’t give you a timeline, then don’t work with them.
Milestones let you set mini-goals for the designer and make it easier to set soft deadlines. If you want to improve the odds of those deadlines being met, have a clear end-goal and sub-goals for your project.
For example, come to the designer with a wireframe or at least a sketch of how you’d like the website to look. This way, all the designer has to do is build it for you. The more you change your initial design after the designer starts working on it, the longer it will take. Also, the price usually goes up because changes are being made to the design after the fact.
While I have had the client come to me with a mostly-realized idea in their head about what they think the website should look like, sometimes it’s not always the best. Usually, this happens because the client visited another website that had a feature that they thought was “cool”. A few years back, it was trendy to have a tiny pop-up video of a person talking in the bottom corner of the web page that would automatically start playing as soon as the page loaded. Nothing is worse than auto-playing videos with loud sounds when you least expect it! While I have had clients request these, I’ve educated them that those types of videos that automatically start playing are a good way to annoy your visitor and may chase them off more than they’ll convert.
Start Small
Give the designer something simple to work on so you can see what they’re capable of. For example, have the designer build a simple website. Don’t go crazy with it. Don’t ask for a full-on membership website with shopping cart integration. Ask for a basic 3 to 5-page website with a contact form, intuitive navigation, and maybe the ability to accept payments through a third-party merchant services provider.
One thing that I’ll note in order to help save web designers in this hypothetical scenario: if there’s a potential for something like a membership section or shopping cart integration to come later, make sure to ask the client upfront during the initial meeting.
This also speaks to the web designer’s ability to effectively communicate with the business owner. Ask questions not only about what the project will be but also about what it might be in the future. The reason for this is that you don’t want to set the client on a system that is great at hosting a “basic 3 to 5-page website with a contact form” that might not be able to provide a good basis for an e-commerce site. While there are always methods to get around these issues, being able to see them before they arise is going to help you greatly in the long run.
Where To Go From Here
Finding a web designer isn’t easy. Because the barrier to entry is so low, almost anyone can call themselves one. However, if you comb through a person’s references, ask around, and are willing to pay top dollar for work, you should end up with someone you can trust who won’t flake on you.
