Hiring a Web Designer: How to find the perfect match for you

Hiring a Web Designer can be overwhelming and time-consuming. You know how important it is to have a website that showcases you and your business in the best possible light.

You also know that you don’t want to spend too much of your precious time trawling through websites of web designers that are not the right fit for you and who won’t deliver what you are actually looking for.

Although you will have to spend some time researching, emailing and hopping on consultation calls, in this post I will break down what the most important things to look for in a web designer are, so the process is as streamlined and effective as possible.

Before hiring a web designer: Figure out what you need.

What is and isn’t working with your current website?

To make hiring a web designer as clear and easy as possible, it’s really important to know what you were looking for. You don’t have to have all the answers, that’s why of course you’re looking to hire a professional, but it is good to analyse what is and isn’t working about your current website or lack thereof.

You don’t want to go into these conversations with a completely blank mind and end up being led into a direction that you don’t actually want to go in or that won’t work for your business.

Your website should work for your business and your business goals first and foremost.

So have a look at these areas and see if any of them are relevant for your website and need to be improved:

• Does your site look dated?
• Is the branding of your site attracting the wrong types of clients?
• Have you outgrown the visual look and feel of the site as your business has grown?
• Does your website look like everybody else’s in your industry?
• Does your site glitch and not function how it should and drive you and your clients mad? (You definitely want to work with someone who can sort this out!)
• Do you have ideas of functions you’d like to integrate into the site that would make your work so much easier?
• Do you want to be able to make small updates to the site but you currently don’t know how?
• Do you know what budget you have to invest?

These are just a few topics to consider when you are analysing your current website or what you want from a brand-new website if you don’t have one already.

Maybe other things will pop into your head as you’re considering these questions. Put a document together,  you can copy and paste in these questions and answer them if you like, and add in anything else that comes to mind.

A note on your budget:

It’s important to consider your budget before you talk to any designers. It’s good to know what will be possible for you to invest so that you know how in-depth of a service you can get.

If you’re ready to move on from a DIY site or a site that really doesn’t reflect the quality of your business, it is good to be aware that an investment is going to be required to get you to where you want to go. A website is a big undertaking so it’s always good to be as prepared as possible.

Of course there might be other things that come up in the course of your conversations with different web designers. They may bring up some ideas that you hadn’t thought of and suggest some improvements that you really like the sound of.

This list is just to get things going in your head and make sure that the time you spend interacting with potential designers will be time well spent.

What to look for in a web designer…

Here’s what I recommend to look for when hiring a web designer.

Now that you are as prepared as you can be to go into these conversations with a clear vision of what you need, it’s time to figure out how to find the perfect web designer for these needs. I suggest looking for or asking about the following:

➔ Client Results

Web design is really powerful when it’s done right. It has the potential to help your business get to the next level and book more of those clients who value your work.

When you’re hiring a web designer, it’s not just about their technical ability or how many sites they’ve designed, it’s about the results their work has helped their clients achieve.

For example my client Ciara, Founder of Positive Prospects, is now booking more of the type of clients she really wants to work with after working with me. My work has helped her transition from 1 on1 coaching to being hired by more SME, Tech Companies and Universities to deliver trainings and workshops.

Check out the chat I had with Ciara about these fantastic results here.

Also my client Fiona doubled her revenue in her second year of business with help from the brand and website I designed for her. Check out the chat we had where she breaks down how this results came together for her here.

My client Stacy has had global companies reaching out to her since we launched her site. Check out our chat here.

➔ Reviews and client testimonials

You want the designers you choose to talk to be well reviewed. Some designers might have their testimonials on the website but it’s also good to see what the reviews are like on public platforms like Google reviews (you can see mine here). This will give you a great idea of the particular designer’s past client’s experiences.

If they have enough reviews you can begin to look for patterns. Is there customer service mentioned in a positive light? Did they deliver the project in a timely manner? Did the designer’s work meet or exceed the client’s expectations?

And honestly a really important one, were they are friendly and polite person to deal with? You will get a good sense of what it’s like to work with this designer and that will help inform you if you’d like to take the next step and make first contact with them.

➔ Design style

Designers are experts at adapting to design styles of their clients requirements. But since you’ve already done a little bit of research into the visual style of a website that would serve your business and your business goals, it’s always good to look at the work they’ve done to see if I could possibly align with the vision you have.

It’s always best to work with someone who you can click with easily when it comes to design and visuals.

This will make giving feedback on the designers work throughout the project so much easier. And it’s far more likely that you will end up with a website that you love at the end of the project.

So have a look at their portfolio (you can see mine here) and their past client work and see if it resonates with you and the vision you have for your website.

➔ Their own website

Speaking of looking at a designer’s portfolio and their design style, it’s also good to take into account their overall website. Is it something that stands out to you? Does that impress you? Because if these are things that the designer can do from their own site, it’s a good sign that they’ll be able to make you stand out in your industry with yours.

While I do recommend having a good look at the designer’s website, it is also fair enough to expect that are designer’s own website might not be the top priority on their list while they’re busy working on great sites for their clients.

I know I can definitely be guilty of this when there is lots of little improvements I’d like to make my own site, but hopefully you can get a sense of the work I do and the style I have.

➔ Easy next steps

When you’ve done a bit of research with reviews and portfolio work, I think it should always be easy to take the next steps. The designers you contact should make it really obvious how to do that.

We all have our own communication preferences so it is also good to see a designer having a variety of ways that you can contact them. Is their email address easy to find? Is there a contact form?

If you prefer getting on the phone with someone, maybe a designer who doesn’t provide a phone number isn’t the right designer for you. If you prefer a Zoom call so you can meet the person face-to-face, all be virtually, the right designer for you will have this option clearly laid out on their website.

➔  Connection on the call

Whatever way you decide to contact the designer, I think it’s always a good idea to end up on a Zoom call with someone if you’re going to commit to working with them for a few months.

Also not forgetting that your relationship with your web designer is a long-term one within your business. When you get on this call it’s a great chance to see what kind of person they are behind the reviews and the portfolio.

What are they like to chat to? Do you feel comfortable with them? Is the call an enjoyable and enlightening experience?

➔ Their process

Beyond getting to know all the designer a little bit on the call, it is important to get to know their process.

You want to make sure that you have a clear understanding of what working with them will be like for you.

You want to find out what information you need to provide them with, how the timelines of the project will work and how is everything managed and kept track of?

➔ The technical aspects

It’s also very important to know the technical aspects of the website that the designer will create for you. What platform will they design it on? Is it WordPress, Squarespace, Shopify etc?

How does the platform they use inform how the website will be maintained?

When the project is over are they going to hand it all over to you and never answer your emails ever again? Or are they going to be a partner that you can work with long-term to maintain and update the site so it always performs well?

➔ Responsive design

We all know how much time we spend on our devices, especially mobile. It’s really important that your website will be designed with this in mind. That your users will have just as good of an experience viewing your site on their phone as they would on their laptop or desktop.

There are certain limitations when it comes to designing for mobile that aren’t necessarily there for desktop since you have more space to work with on desktop.

But the important thing is that the user experience is considered and mobile users aren’t going to have anything to turn them away from using your site.

➔ Communication style

Similar to getting to know the designer on the call and if you feel like you could have a good relationship with them, it’s also good to know what’s the communication style?

Will everything be done through emails and Zoom calls?

Can you get a sense whether the communication will be organised or all over the place in a way that wouldn’t suit you?

➔ Long-term relationship

And again, avoid seeing a web designer as someone who will come in and do a job and leave your business. A good web designer will offer maintenance packages and support throughout the life of your website.

You don’t want your website to be lovely, shiny and new when it’s launched and then whenever a glitch or an issue comes up there is no one there to fix it. The long-term life of your site is important and to be honest a website is never really finished.

They’re always going to be tweaks and improvements that you can make as your business grows and changes and you want to make. The person who is going to help you implement these changes needs to be easy to deal with.

This will make the experience a lot more pleasant. You want to find a designer who feels like a long-term collaborator who you can trust and will deliver the best work they possibly can for your business.

Next steps to take

In the end, once you have figured out what your business needs in terms of a website, and followed the steps above, it’s up to you to decide who the perfect fit web designer for you is.

It is a choice that could have a big impact on the growth of your business, on your stress levels and how you are seen in your industry.

So although it is a big decision, I hope that what I’ve broken down for you in this post makes hiring a web designer feel less overwhelming.

Your intuition and your instincts have gotten you this far in your business and I’m sure you will continue to make the right decisions for you.

Book a call with me if you’d like to see if I’m the right web designer for you.