That’s right, I dare you to save money. Hire a website design service to update your present website or a brand new domain that needs to be created from scratch.
When you hire website design services you save the cost of hiring an employee! Seriously, why hire a web designer? Think about it …
- No unemployment insurance to pay,
- No compensation fees,
- No pension plan contributions to make,
- No desk needed,
- No office supplies to make available,
- No office space needed,
- No computer costs (no purchasing, leasing, updating, or repairing!),
- No software to pay for,
- No weekly or by-weekly pay cheques to be responsible for.
… woooh-hooo!
More Useful Tips on Hiring a Website Design Service
Don’t just go looking for cheap website design services either. Doing that you may discover the hard way that you only get what you pay for.
Though yes, inexpensive website design services may be essential to your business needs, the skills of the web designer you hire are also important.
You may even find affordable website design services that are being offered by an independent website designer; one who has lots of experience with small, local business sites which might be exactly what you need.
Here’s why I am suggesting this.
Most design services or agencies are now being offered by rather large companies who charge premium prices in order to keep their employees (website designers, PLUS) working. You might even recognize their brand.
Heck! They’ve paid a lot of money for their brand recognition.
Some of their designers on staff may only know how to work with the front end of a website. Meaning they might be able to install a content management system (CMS) like WordPress, and they may even know how to install a theme … but … when it comes to solving issues with the scripts, well, let’s just say that is NOT what most website designers are being taught nowadays.
If it’s not drag ‘n drop, most graduate students as website designers have no idea how to clean up or fix scripts so that a website might function better.
An independent, affordable website designer with skills in working with HTML, cascade style sheets (CSS), and other such scripts would be a much better fit, don’t you think?
Most times, the local website designer is the owner of their business, who lives in close proximity to the areas they serve. Benefits of hiring such a person is obvious; their livelihood depends on the success of their web designer services … and chances are, this person will go out of their way in providing high quality services to all of their customers. If they were to fail to do so, they would be out of business in no time.
Comparing sole ownership to large website designer service companies, a sole owner’s main concern is constantly improving their ROI (return on investment) while minimizing customer complaints.
When hiring an independent or sole proprietor website designer you may even improve your chances of finding a designer who truly cares about providing you with great services at affordable prices, as well as responding quickly to your website needs.
Hiring a web designer who knows how to solve website scripting issues can also be vital in keeping a website “live” and available to your potentials customers. Never mind that search engine optimization should ALSO be an important skill of the designer you decide to hire.
When it comes to setting up a website, the day and age of “set it and forget it” is no longer the case. If you cannot offer great quality content then you may want your website design services to have the unique, quality content created for you.
Though, expect to pay extra for this service … but again, this would leave you free to operate your business.
Website designers for small business can be one of your best hires, so don’t just take on the first one you find … unless, of course, the designer comes to you highly recommended by another business owner.
Any designer worth their “salt” will offer their customers a money back guarantee. This alone could save you thousands of dollars … and lot of frustration.
Yearly management services for your business site is a “must have” from the website design service you decide to hire.
Do be aware that local businesses are best off hosting their websites with a local hosting company. That is the number one (and easiest!) search engine optimization (SEO) task all small business owners need to know about.
Website hosting is no longer expensive, so do make sure you own your own website hosting. This will also eliminate any potential problems in the future.
If you don’t believe me, then please, read the story Eric Davis shared, in the screen print to your right.
Better still, if you own your own internet web hosting server, then this won’t be an issue for you.
An independent web designer, who knows how to do local SEO, would also be of a big benefit for your business.
Benefits of Hiring a Local Web Designer
- Save the cost of an employee
- Money back guarantee
- Regular website maintenance
- Should have (at the very least) basic SEO skills
- Solve scripting errors leaving you free to run your business
- Timely responses to your website needs
- Easier to verify references
Though your business may be thinking global, you will want to hire local.
Making sure your chosen web designer is local to your business should make it easier for you to reference them then, say, someone out of province … or out of country. Online references may no longer be as creditable as they once were thought to be. Sometimes a simple telephone call to a past or present customer used as a reference, can reveal a LOT!
When hiring an independent, local website designer service, you will be not only creating work for that person’s business, but you will also be supporting your community.
Hiring local helps your local economy!
Optimizing a Website Now More Important than Ever Before
There are several ways to optimize a website so that it loads faster. Today, more than ever, your website must be fully optimized to stay ranking high.
If you have had a website that was created in, let’s say, WordPress, than your database tables may now need optimizing. If you have your website created using HTML only, it may need to be redesigned using responsive coding.
Then there are your images… they too now must be fully optimized so they load on your websites pages faster.
Are your website image ALT tags being used properly? These tags are used by screen readers that allow the visually impaired internet users to know what the images are about. So, ALT tags must now be used properly to describe the image and NOTHING else.
Reducing your website files sent from your web server will definitely reduce your page loading time for repeat visitors.
So let’s review … why you should hire a knowledgeable web designer:
- Saves your business LOTS of money (no employee expenses!)
- Get quality website design services at affordable prices
- More likely to get better customer service due to sole ownership of business
- Helps your local economy
- A better understanding of website design beyond simply drag ‘n drop
- Apt to be knowledgeable with SEO
You might also be interested in learning 11 mistakes to avoid when hiring a website designer.
If you’re ready to hire a reliable website designer whose only intention is to make sure you get the website you want to represent your business, and offers a money back guarantee if you’re not fully satisfied … all at an affordable price, I do hope you will consider our services.
All comments will be greatly appreciated (below), and if you have found this post helpful, I do hope you will share it with your friends.
I love your useful tips, but noticed you didn’t include anything about website management. Once the website is designed, a client needs to think about website management. Is there a retainer cost? Would the client know how to fix any website issues that arise? Definitely important factors to consider, especially when hiring a website designer.
Hey Nicola, oops, you must have missed it. “Regular website maintenance” is listed as the 3rd benefit of hiring a local web designer, of which truly is a MUST HAVE for any website.
You are SO right, website owners DO need to make sure that their sites are being managed regularly. My customer’s websites are fully-managed so they can focus on running their business.
If a website owner is not receiving a detailed listing of the maintenance performed on their website over a specified period of time, then chances are their websites have been created, and then forgotten.
I like that you say that with a professional developer, you will have the opportunity for regular maintenance for your site. My brother is planning on taking his business online and wants to have a good site for people to view his product. It might be a good idea for him to consult a web development service to get started.
Yes Benjamin that is a good idea, and selecting a developer close to your brother’s business location (if he is near you in South Africa) is also highly advisable. This works best for both the local business owner and the web developer.
I’m glad that you mentioned that you could have a lot of ways to optimize your website. I am thinking about creating one and I would want to to be as fast a possible. I should consider getting someone to design it for me so that it would be completely optimized and super fast.
Yes Tyler, and adding a method of caching your website and compressing your site images are among the basic ways of optimizing your website. By hiring this service done for you that would leave your time free to run your business. Thanks for dropping by.
This is the reason why I think web design firms have to position themselves as solution providers and not just web guys/gals. A client doesn’t need a website, they need sales. The website is just part of that solution but it’s not the solution and unlike web design, service like email marketing automation, SEO, and PPC requires an experienced professional.
You are so right, web design covers only the frame work of the website itself.
Quality content, SEO, and PPC are addons that any business would need to give serious consider to implementing too once they have their website created and maintained regularly.
As for quality content, a great place to start is offered right here: https://www.eparrs.com/blog/blog/lower-your-advertising-costs-and-get-more-customers/