On almost a daily basis I am met with the challenge of explaining WHY you need to understand the VALUE of the web design and development you are being quoted.

YES, you can get something cheaper and YES, it will be cheap.

YES, you can get a website done in two days and YES, it will look like a million others out there already.

Will it be designed well – odds are it will not. Is the html code optimized for the search engines – probably not. Was the template built with Flash – probably. Is Flash SEO (search engine) friendly…no.  If it is a template site and soooo generic that it can be applied to ANY type of business – just put in your logo and your words… you can bet the farm that it will be equally generic and sterile to the consumer.

Now, let’s think about this for a minute. To WHOM are the template sellers trying to sell?  Your customers?  No, they’re trying to sell to YOU. They were designed to sell you the cheapness and ease of having this 3 step website up and running in 5 minutes for five dollars. (did I forget to mention what you will have to continue paying each month AND that you won’t own the site anyway?)

Are you thinking about this…go ahead, I’ll wait…

Did you just realize the trap you fell for? YOUR customer is going to be looking at something that you bought for YOU and not for them? The site that you now have your brand on is something you bought because it was cheap and easy…NOT because it was designed and developed with your customers or audience in mind. You are asking your customers to get a sense of you and your business or organization from something that is created to be generic?

As far as the customer support that goes along with these…I don’t even have to go down that road do I?

I’ve often won­dered why it is that peo­ple don’t under­stand the axiom, “You get what you pay for.” Peo­ple who don’t under­stand a process uni­ver­sally seem drawn to the low­est price. There is a difference between buying something like a new car – from dealer to dealer they will all be exactly the same. So YES! Go for the lowest price you can. That is a “known quantity” and has an absolute cost and value.

But, what about an “unknown quantity?” What if your house needs painting? Now we come to the issue. You can go with the place that offers the low­est price, and you may get lucky. Odds are, how­ever, that you will get what you paid for. Write this down too…

Price is only an issue in the absence of value.

I myself fell victim to this same trap not two months ago. After the ice storm this winter I had 2 trees that needed to be cut down. Instead of going with a reputable firm that would have charged me $2800 to fell these tress and haul them off I picked someone off of Craigslist because he was…cheap. I did my homework. I asked for proof of his insurance. I had him give me a quote. We made a deal and he went to work. To keep this painful story short, he hit the side of my house with a crane! He will not fix it. I called his insurance company only to find he had defaulted and had no coverage! So now I have to pay for the repair as well.

It was an expensive reminder that you do get what you pay for and you also get what you deserve for going the cheap route!

I found this list that I think is a good guide for folks shopping for a website – maybe it will help you.

“Here’s a quick list of things to help you avoid this problem.

1. Do your home­work: Ask them if they are actually a DESIGNER! There are many “brokers” out there that will sell anything. Ask to see THEIR port­fo­lio. Ask them their point of view on design and website architecture…If there is no port­fo­lio, don’t hire that designer. If the port­fo­lio looks like it con­tains a bunch of work from the late 90’s, don’t hire. If you don’t like what you see in the port­fo­lio, don’t hire. Ask for ref­er­ences. No ref­er­ences… Well, you get the point.
2. Expect good com­mu­ni­ca­tion: If you don’t get a return call or e-mail within a rea­son­able time, assume this will be the norm. If you value com­mu­ni­ca­tion, hold out for a good com­mu­ni­ca­tor. Some techies have bad peo­ple skills. This should be pretty easy to spot.
3. Sign a con­tract: Would you let a builder start con­struc­tion on a house with­out one? So why wouldn’t you do the same for a HUGE part of your busi­ness? If you don’t sign a con­tract, you’re deal­ing with an ama­teur (on both sides).
4. If you see a design menu with prices, run: Pre-pub­lished price lists may seem like a good idea, but you get the same results as walk­ing into a tat­too stu­dio and pick­ing a tat­too off the wall. It isn’t yours, and it isn’t unique to your business.
5. Ask ques­tions, expect hon­est answers: No one knows how to do every­thing. If you find a designer who can’t do every­thing you want, odds are he can sub-contract the parts he’s not good at. It shouldn’t mat­ter to you, but dis­clo­sure should. Find out what your designer’s strengths and weak­nesses are. We all have them. If we didn’t, you wouldn’t need a designer. Remem­ber, if the answers you get sound like something is not quite right, they prob­a­bly aren’t.
6. Know the dif­fer­ence between Design and Devel­op­ment: Design­ers typ­i­cally do the visual part. Devel­op­ers typ­i­cally make the site do things. Don’t hire one to do the other. Again, ask for the one you really need.
7. Don’t hire a rel­a­tive: Ever… Even if it’s free… Enough said.
8. Tables are dead: No mod­ern designer worth his salt uses tables. If your designer doesn’t use CSS for lay­out, you’ll need to redesign very soon anyway.
9. Expect to pay for ser­vices ren­dered: Ask­ing a designer to “whip some­thing up” and let you take a look so you can decide is like ask­ing a restau­rant to make you a meal and let you pay for it if you like it. What would you expect the waiter to tell you if you asked a ques­tion like that?
10. Don’t make hasty deci­sions: The state­ment, “Poor plan­ning on your part does not con­sti­tute an emer­gency on mine” should be taken to heart. Think things through and real­ize that there is time to do it right. If there isn’t, you’ll invari­ably have to do it again.

You don’t have to hire us but please, hire some­one com­pe­tent. There are too many folks out there getting burned on a daily basis.