Business Articles

When business owners contact me at EDevMachine about designing their web site, they often are almost solely interested in price. This is natural. Being a business owner myself I know how crucial the bottom-line is, especially in very competitive fields. But I promise you…the lowest priced web design does not equal the best priced web design. By leaving your company’s web site in the hands of the “lowest bidder” you risk a poorly designed web site which will cost you even more money in the future, and also not convert your “potential” customers into “buying” customers.

The lowest bidder is often someone new to web design. They can probably create a “first draft” for a web site, but happens if you want to change the layout or add a new feature? Do they have enough knowledge of web design to implement these… the right way? Will they “stick with it” even when the going gets tough (as it often does when you’re new to a field), or will they “skip town” when they can’t fix something? What if the work involved in creating your web site is more than what they expected? Will they finish the job?

I’ve had to go in after the fact and “clean-up” the messes created by these “lowest bidder” web designers. Believe me…you’d much rather pay to have your web site done right the first time, than pay someone to fix it. Sorry, but web pages created by a rookie are just a “big pain” to fix. Page “structure” is all skewed; html or javascript code is just thrown in there…seemingly haphazardly; it can be ugly. When you have to call in a professional web designer to fix these problems…they will charge accordingly.

Bigger doesn’t mean better.

So you did a web search for “web design” and some web design companies appeared in the results of the first page. You’d be wrong to think these first few web design firms are the best at web design…or even good. They are on the first page because of their advertising budget, not their great web designs. Generally, these companies will churn out a lack-luster, “cookie cutter” web site and then move on to the next customer.

You also want to “read the fine print” in their contract. Often, a big web design firm will have a low $199 special. Sounds good right? Wait until you find out that the price doesn’t include registering a domain name or a hosting account or a myriad of other “extras”. These “extras” can be really expensive too. I’ve seen them charge as much as $50 a month for a shared hosting account ($600/yr.)! In case you don’t know…this is an insanely huge amount of money to host a brand new web site, but is typical of what I’ve seen the big web design firms charge.

They are counting on the ignorance of small business owners to not know any better. I really dislike the big design firms. Not because they are my competitors, but because I find their tactics despicable! If they just created boring web designs for unknowing customers that would be one thing. But, then they gouge your pocket-book for “extras” that should cost a fraction of what they charge! Many of their customers don’t any better.

Check for standards compliance

Aside from avoiding the neophyte web designer or the big web firm, the first test for any web design company should be to check their home page for web standards compliance. This may sound complicated, but all you really have to do is go to http://validator.w3.org/ and enter the web address of the web design company in the “validate by url” field. Try this with http://www.edevmachine.com and you’ll see it is “valid xhtml.” Simple enough, but you’d be surprised how many of the large web site design firm’s homepages fail this test.

Why is this important? Well, newer versions of browsers come out every few years. A web designer could create a web page using invalid html/xhtml which may currently display correctly, but on the next browser update it may not. You’ll almost be back at “square one” and need to have your web site fixed to display correctly. Remember how costly it can be to have a webpage “fixed?”

Check for cross-browser compatibility

There are many different browsers out there...and many different versions. Just because a web page displays correctly in one browser and version, doesn’t mean it will display correctly in all browsers and all versions. If your web site looks bad in a popular browser and version…you’re almost certainly losing your potential customers who just see an ugly looking web site.

So have a look at a potential web designer’s homepage, and portfolio in a few different web browsers. If you only have one installed, maybe ask a friend who uses a different browser or version to check it out.

The bottom-line

It’s not that difficult to find a competent web designer, but…honestly…there can be some pitfalls. Going with the lowest bidder for your company’s web site is just asking for problems, and will likely cost you much more in the long term. Using a big web design firm isn’t the answer either. You will probably get (at best) a lack-luster design. At worst, you’ll also be paying a lot more than you should.

All I’m saying is please do some research before deciding on whom to entrust your company’s web site design. Check for “valid” coding of the design company’s web site. If their site isn’t coded correctly, will your’s be? Also check that the pages in their portfolio look right in few different browsers.

What prompted me to write this article was how often a potential customer contacts me about designing their web site, and I have explain to them exactly what I discussed here. This article is far from a sales pitch for my services. Contact me at EDevMachine if you want, or go with another qualified web designer. Just please do know what to look for in an good web design company. And pass this article on to your friends if you’ve found it valuable.