How to choose someone to build your website

Every web designer’s portfolio looks good. That is what a portfolio is for. It tells you almost nothing about what working with them is like, which is the thing you are actually buying.

Here is what I would ask, including of me.

Who will actually do the work

At an agency, the person who sells you the project is frequently not the person who builds it, and the person who builds it may change halfway through. That is not automatically bad, but you should know before you sign rather than after.

Ask who you will be talking to week to week, and whether that person changes at any point.

What happens when you disagree

You will not love every decision. What matters is whether there is a point in the process where you are formally asked, before it is expensive to change your mind.

Ask when you get to review, what you are reviewing, and what happens if you want something different. If the answer is vague, the revisions conversation will happen later and it will be awkward.

Whether the price can move

A range is fine at the enquiry stage. What you want before you commit is a single number attached to a defined scope, with what is excluded written down as plainly as what is included.

Ask what would cause the price to change. Anyone honest has an answer, and it is usually: you add something that was not in the scope.

What happens after launch

Plenty of sites are delivered and then abandoned, with the owner locked out of their own content. Ask whether you can edit the site yourself, whether you are trained on it, and what support exists in the first month while real people are using it.

The unglamorous question

Ask what they will need from you, and when. A designer who cannot answer that has not thought about the project as something you both have to fit around real work.

If someone answers all of these clearly, you are probably in good hands, whether or not it is me.