There are many, many different types of web designers who all specialize in different areas of website design. There are inexpensive designers who focus on very budget websites, and there are multi-national corporations that build websites for the largest companies in the world.
Is that all? No. Not even close.
The issue is that you can call up a developer you find on Google and start talking to them, but if you aren’t sure which type of developer they are then you can either pay way too much for what you need, or you can pay what you think is a great price but be completely disappointed with the results.
Let’s go through some of the different types.
“One-Man Band” Developers
The largest number of website developers – maybe 90% or more – is one guy or gal, who does everything themselves. They are inexpensive because they have no overhead. They work out of their homes, often have other jobs, and are only supplementing their income doing websites.
You are also talking to the person who is doing the work, so it is very direct and at least in theory can be speedy.
But, there is so much to know to do a good professional job of it. To find a person who knows it all is rare – and they probably aren’t doing websites out of their spare bedroom for $750. So it is highly likely the person you hire doesn’t really know enough about one or more aspects of website building. In short, you are not going to get a professional website. Warning: There is a lot more to it than just that it looks good.
The one-man band can easily get overwhelmed (if he has TWO projects going instead of only one) and can go out of communication.
OVERSEAS DEVELOPERS
There are thousands of low-priced developers overseas. Some of them pretend to be U.S. based and may even have one U.S. based salesman. This is usually easy to figure out. The pluses are they are inexpensive (paying low wages in places like India or Romania), and they may have good technical skills. The minuses are mostly just as obvious: language problems, time zone differences can be a killer, lack of familiarity with the culture or industries you are dealing with. Quality also varies wildly and, being out-of-country, there is little you can do if you run into problems.
OUT-SOURCERS
The opposite of a one-man band, they don’t do any of the work themselves. They sell jobs then farm out the actual work to a one-man-band or overseas developer. Often, they pretend to be a real company. They do have one advantage, potentially, over the first two categories – they are normally U.S. based, may do a much better job of maintaining communication, and are at least theoretically responsible for managing the project and getting you what you paid for. In turn, they are usually somewhat more expensive than the first two categories. But quality issues are often still a big problem.
INDUSTRY SPECIFIC DEVELOPERS
Now we have a very different fish. This is a real company – and they can be very large. I know one that specializes in lawyers and has over 400 staff. They specialize in one (or sometimes a few) industries, such as dentists and chiropractors. Their value proposition is two-fold a) they really know your industry; and b) they have a lot of prefabricated material that makes it possible to deliver a website with a lot of pages and functionality, relatively inexpensively.
They have the liabilities of any large business – getting lost in the crowd and getting poor service. But also their familiarity with their industry and how to market for it may be quite superficial. Don’t assume because they have hundreds of testimonials from happy dentists, that they actually understand dental marketing.
Typically the way they work, you pay a medium-sized amount monthly for your site. You don’t actually own your website. They own the content and host the site, and if you ever want to go away, you have to start over. And that monthly amount adds up – after a couple of years, you could have had a very nice custom-designed site that you own yourselves and can host anywhere and modify to your heart’s content.
SMALL DIGITAL AGENCIES
Certainly, I’m prejudiced in favor of this category, since that’s what we are. I will restrain myself from launching into pages on the glories thereof. The pluses are, if they are good, you get a lot of personal attention, understanding of your business and needs, and excellent communication handling. They can produce great sites very well suited to your business.
So what’s not to like? They are going to be relatively expensive, and probably take longer to get the job done. They may have to learn your industry on the fly if they aren’t already familiar with it. And some of them work in oddball systems nobody else knows and can be a problem to move away from them.
But if you get the right company, you are going to be very happy with the result.
LARGE AD AGENCIES
You would think this category would be great if you’re a bit of a larger company and want high-quality work with great service. Surprise: Most large ad agencies don’t actually do their own websites, they sub-contract them. So see whatever category their vendor falls in, and all the liabilities of that, and factor in the extra 50% or more you are going to pay for having “Blah, Blah and Blah” do your website.
MEDIA CONGLOMERATES, PROBABLY USED TO BE A PHONE BOOK COMPANY
These companies are pretty much the worst possible choice. They trade on their name, slick advertising, and high-powered salesmen to get the job. They actually don’t know anything about the web or internet marketing, and the work is usually done by minimum wage workers who know almost nothing about websites.
Harsh, I know. Don’t believe me. Check out their actual work and results.
So what should you do?
The first step is to go through this list and decide which type of developer you believe would best fit your needs and your business.
Secondly, you are going to want to talk to the type of developer you chose. Get them on the phone and explain to them what exactly you are envisioning. Be specific, the more detail the better. It’s better to give too much detail rather than leaving something crucial out and regretting it after you make the first payment.
Third, you’re going to want to research the quality of service that others have gotten from this specific developer. If you are considering thirteen05 creative, you can easily read our client reviews here.
Lastly, you’re going to want to take the dive. Once you find a developer that can produce what you need and you see that others have had great success, get started RIGHT AWAY! Why wait? You’ve come this far, you obviously have a need to get a website made. So have them begin working and get your perfect website before you know it.