Free guide
How to hire a web designer and still be happy a year later.
Most bad website stories have the same ending: the designer disappears, the site is stuck in their account, and the owner starts over. This guide covers what to prepare, the questions to ask, and the warning signs, whether you hire us or someone else.
No sign-up, nothing to download. Written by a team that has been building websites for 17 years.
Before you talk to anyone
An hour of preparation makes every conversation shorter and every quote more accurate.
What the website must do
Bring in phone calls? Collect leads? Sell products? Recruit staff? Pick the one or two jobs that matter most. Everything else is secondary.
Who you are talking to
Describe your best customer in a sentence. A designer who understands who is visiting will make better decisions than one who only sees your logo.
Sites you like and dislike
Collect three or four websites, yours or anyone’s, and write down why. It is the fastest way to explain taste without design vocabulary.
What you already have
Your domain name and who registered it, any current hosting, logins you can find, logos, photos and text. Knowing what exists avoids surprises.
Who will provide content
Decide who writes the words and supplies photos. Content is the most common reason a project runs late, so settle it early.
Who looks after it later
A website is not finished at launch. Decide whether you want to maintain it yourself or have someone handle updates, security and changes.
Ten questions to ask every web designer
A good designer answers these easily. Get the answers in writing.
1. Who owns the website, the domain and the content?
You should, from day one. The domain should be registered in your name, and you should be able to take the finished site and all of its content with you. If the answer is vague, treat it as a no.
2. What happens if we part ways?
Ask exactly how the handover works: files, content, domain and hosting. A confident designer has a simple answer. This is the question that separates partners from landlords.
3. Is there a long-term contract?
Long contracts protect the vendor, not you. A designer who is good at the job can afford to let you leave at any time.
4. Who hosts and secures the site, and what is included?
Ask about backups, security scanning, software updates, uptime and what happens if the site is hacked or goes down. “Cheap hosting” often means none of those things.
5. Who do I call when something breaks, and how fast do you reply?
Look for a named person, a real phone number and a clear response time. Problems rarely happen at convenient moments.
6. Is the site custom, or a template with your logo on it?
Templates and page builders are not always wrong, but they are often slower, heavier and harder to secure. Ask what the site is built on and why that is right for you.
7. Can I see similar work and talk to clients?
Look at live websites, not just screenshots, and read independent reviews. Clients who have stayed for years are the best evidence.
8. How will people find the site?
Clean code, fast pages, mobile-friendly design and sensible page titles should be built in. Nobody can honestly guarantee a Google ranking, so be wary of anyone who does.
9. What is the total cost, including hosting and ongoing care?
Ask for one clear quote covering the build and the monthly costs afterward, with nothing hidden. Surprise fees are a sign of a problem to come.
10. What do you need from me, and how long will it take?
You should get a realistic timeline and a short list of what the designer needs from you. A designer who does not ask anything has not understood your business.
Warning signs
Any one of these deserves a second look.
Guaranteed #1 rankings
Nobody controls Google. Promises like this are sales tactics, not strategy.
The site lives in their account
If the domain, hosting or design files are held in the designer’s name, you are renting your own business.
Pressure to sign today
Good work does not need a countdown timer. Be cautious of discounts that expire before you can compare.
No named person or phone number
If you cannot find out who will answer when you need help, assume nobody will.
A vague scope
“Website design” is not a scope. Pages, features and what happens after launch should be spelled out.
They vanish after launch
Ask how long they have been in business and whether clients stay. Longevity is hard to fake.
What a good project looks like
Whoever you hire, the shape should be roughly this.
A conversation
The designer learns what the business does, who it serves and what the site must achieve.
A plan and a price
You see the scope, the timeline and one clear price before any work starts.
Design and feedback
You see the design and give feedback before it is built, not after.
Build, launch and care
The site is built, tested and launched, then kept secure and current by someone who knows it.
How pricing is decided
We do not publish a rate card, because two websites that look similar on the surface can need very different amounts of work. These are the things that move the price, whoever you hire.
Size
The number of pages and how different they are from each other.
Features
Forms, booking, online payments, members areas and anything that needs to connect to other software.
Content
Whether you supply the writing and photos, or you want help creating them.
Ongoing care
Whether the designer hosts and manages the site afterward, and how much change you expect.
Whatever the number is, it should arrive as one clear quote before anything starts.
How we answer these questions
Since we ask everyone else to be straightforward, here is where we stand.
You own it
Your website, domain and content stay yours, and if you ever leave we hand everything over.
No contracts
No long-term contracts and no pressure to stay. We want you to stay because it is working.
Handled for you
We host, secure, update and change your site, and work proactively on SEO and Google Ads. See how management works
A real person
You talk to the people who built your site. We reply within one business day, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5pm Pacific.
Proof, not promises
5.0 from more than 100 reviews on Google. Read them or see our work.
An honest second opinion
Already have a designer? We will review your site for free and tell you plainly what we find. Get an audit
Want to talk it through?
Tell us about your business and what you are trying to do. We will tell you honestly whether, and how, we can help.
