Is it really possible to hire a web designer and manage to go all the way from the start of your website to the very end with out a moment of frustration and disappointment? I think it is! It is a matter of knowing how to explain your needs to your web designer and also allowing him to advice you what the best options are for you.
So let’s start by asking ourselves what a web designer needs from you;
It is good to start by informing your web designer of the business you are conducting. Giving him a brief description of what you do should be more than enough. It will help if you provide your web designer with links to your competitors. Let him know what you like and dislike of your competitor’s website. Once you have shown your web designer links to your competitor’s websites, it will be a good idea to show him other links to websites you like. Let him know about your color preferences, layout and graphics you would like your website to have. Provide your web designer with the content for your website in an organized manner. The best way to give your content to your web designer is in a word format or text format and you should actually use a word file per page in you future website. Let say that you have 3 pages; Home, about us, and our mission then you should have separated files for each page. In addition to that you should include a separated file called instructions. You will use this file to explain the web designer how to proceed with the content you have given him. Give your web designer THE FREEDOM TO DESIGN! One of the major catastrophes in web design is when the client thinks he can design a website. Firs of all; web designers are not the same as graphic designers. There are many variables to consider when you design for the web. Designing a website is not the same as designing a paper flyer.
Allow your web designer to design, he knows better than you. The one thing you can do is to let him know if you like what he is doing or not, and make suggestions but always listen to what he has to say. A good web designer will confront you and your ideas if you are going in the wrong direction. There are several stages when designing a website; the first one is creating a mock up. Your web designer will create a sample template of your website to illustrate the layout, colors, and the position of all those objects that will make your website com alive.
This first stage is crucial. You need to be very positive that you like the mock up before you give the ok to start designing your website. The reason is very simple; a mock up is nothing more than an illustration. What comes after that stage is the real deal; converting the template into a fully functional website. Trust me when I tell you that you do not want to tell your web designer to change the color of the back ground once you have approved the mock up. Your web designer will most probably get a tantrum and after that he will have to charge you an additional fee for extra labor. One final issue which is major and contributes to the patience of a web designer is the grammar of your content. Web designers are not secretaries. A web designer will gather together all the information you have given him for your website and he will make this work on the web. If today you give your web designer the text that belongs to the about us page, but tomorrow you change your mind and you send him again new text for the about us page he will not be very happy.
I have been designing websites for a long time now and these are real facts that occur to me as well as to many web designers out there every day. You can have a web designer create a great website for you, but you need to know that everything that relates to the web takes a long time to accomplish so the more you help us the better your website will be designed.
Designed By Lucas
