Initially, keep in mind: when choosing a “web design team,” you’re choosing a project management approach, a process, a help desk and ideally, a long term web partner. If something goes wrong, it won’t likely be a design or programming problem. It’s all about service and communication.
Each web-design is a combination of hundreds of small decisions. The technical decisions are always taken by the development team; but you need to be involved throughout the project creation for ensuring the successful project deployment.
Avoid blaming the web designers for not meeting up your requirements rather assure some important things about the company you are choosing for your project development-
Understand your needs and goals regarding the website- The concept of the project you need to get should be crystal clear in your mind and its always advisable to make a note of your requirements.
Read books, surf internet and grab the knowledge regarding the concept of your project to be built and note all the necessary key points.
Always strategise and plan the things before making any decision; the purpose of your project should be straight and clear in your mind before moving towards it’s execution.
Prime Focus Points are-
*Visibility – Getting visitors to your website.
*Usability – Delivering a easy and positive experience to visitors.
*Credibility – To gain trust of the visiting people by providing them best services.
*Sellability – It deals with achieving certain outcomes.
*Scalability – To accommodate ongoing expansion.
Purpose of the website– Every website is designed and developed with an aim, a purpose. If you are not clear about the purpose then how you can expect the results or even measure a website’s performance.
You need to explore the various types of sites and determine which one suits your business goals; a website can have multiple purposes like-
1) Informational websites-
Sites like Wikipedia, WebMD and others are information based websites. The main purpose of these websites is to provide a lot of information to the visitors/readers. ‘WebMD’ focuses on medical issues. ‘Wikipedia’ focuses on many different categories. ‘Ehow’ focuses on “How to do something”. The basic purpose of Informational websites is to pass on information.
2) Professional websites-
A doctor, an engineer, a plumber, carpenter, electrician, store owner, art collector can all have their own professional websites. They are kind of Information websites themselves but are smaller business based.
The purpose of these websites is to pass on basic information of the business to the customers. Lets suppose you hear about a dentist in town through a friend. But the friend does not have the address or contact number of the dentist. You can simply search through google, type the name and location and the related website(s) comes up. This website gives all information of who the dentist is, his contact and location, his facilities as well as services he provides.
3) Interactive websites (Blogs, Forums)
I really applaud the bloggers and readers found on passion based websites like the ones dedicated to cars, laptops, smartphones or others. In such websites, the writer generally writes with the passion about even the smallest aspects of the product or service being discussed.
For Example – ‘Gamespot’ is one of the leading websites about PC games and all other games and we see many reviews being published regularly as well as people giving their feedback. Similarly, ‘Rotten tomatoes’ is a blogging website which talks about movies and takes feedback from the crowd as well.
5) E-commerce website-
Many small/medium businessmen have realised that they can do a lot of business by shifting their stores online instead of keeping it just offline. As a result, besides the big players, thousand’s of businesses have started their own E-commerce stores. E-commerce websites are booming and the purpose of an E-commerce website is to sell the products to customers via the website itself at their door step.
6) Lead generation website-
Over the internet, today there are many single page or focused websites which have the sole purpose of lead generations. Like, an author’s website has the sole purpose of promoting a single book and collecting emails of people who might be interested in it. Similarly, there are lead generation websites made for insurance, loans or banking and finance products so that the leads are captured by the websites and the data is sold to banks and corporates who can use the data to pitch new customers in need of products.
7) Teaching websites-
Websites like ‘educatorstechnology’ have the sole purpose of teaching their students various courses through online means. These websites have a combination of videos and text along with lesson plans, thematic units, tips, etc which can help students learn a course in the comfort of their home or office.
8) Social Networking Sites-
The purpose of social media sites is to make it easy for everyone to connect with friends, family members, co-workers and sometimes even with strangers. Social networking sites now are used for both personal and commercial purpose.
FaceBook is the biggest example in this category. The purpose of FaceBook is to connect everyone with their knowns, but they also have a goal to earn money while doing the same.
If you are clear about why you have created your website and what is the purpose of it… you can easily build your reputation in both online and offline areas.
Knowing what your end goal is, can help the designer team to provide your site to be the most efficient, exciting, and popular site possible. Once you are clear about the aim of your website, you can easily explain it to others and make them understand.
Functionalities
List down all the functionalities you want in your website. For example you would like to have a functionality to update/edit text on your website, modify images in the gallery, facility to email bulk subscribers, calculate interest or amount.
This will help them in providing more accurate time-scale and costing required to complete the project and also provide you more approximate task related milestones.
Analyse the Company and Read Reviews- Always go through the projects undertaken by the companies and their completion and success rate. Read reviews regarding the company and each(several) project and analyse the things on your own.
If you are not satisfied with the reviews of the company and their projects, simply move ahead and find a better web designer for you.
If you are satisfied with the company and some projects’ reviews, their costing and other things, communicate with them clearly about your need and requirements.
Don’t stop here, go to business bureau websites and see if there are any complaints.Try hiring professionals to fill in any gaps, making sure their team includes talent covering the key areas of website production, including the following:
Planning
Copywriting
Graphic design
Development
Search engine optimization
Conversion
