Your website serves as the virtual office for your business, and just like a physical location, it can use some sprucing up every once in a while. When it comes time to make a change, most business owners seek out the help of a professional web designer to make sure the project is done right. Here are some things to look for when choosing a web designer for your website.
Website ownership
Before you get into the specifics of color palettes and call-to-action verbiage, it’s vital to choose a web design partner that will allow you to retain control. While it may be tempting to choose a provider who offers to do everything from URL purchasing to hosting to security for you, it’s important to ask for details.
If a web designer wants to make it easy on you by setting up your website hosting account, great! But if they do so in a way that means you’ll lose your entire website in the event you choose to work with another company or designer, that’s not great. While you never want to start a new working relationship with the expectation that things won’t work out, when it comes to your website, it’s a good idea to have as much under your company’s control and ownership. This protects you from a lot of stress, headaches, and issues later on.
Past work
Web design is an art form, and like any art, it’s a good idea to make sure you like the artist’s style before you invest in their work. While many websites are based on templates and it’s easy to switch out colors and photos, it’s important to make sure that you like the overall look and operation of a web designer’s portfolio pieces. Web design is a competitive field without much oversight so it’s in your best interest to carefully vet any potential web designers to ensure they have experience and are capable of creating the look, feel, and operation you’re looking for in your new website.
SEO knowledge
There are three types of SEO that affect the performance of your website and it’s crucial that the website designer you choose is familiar with both on-page and technical SEO. On-page SEO primarily revolves around using the right keywords for your topic. If you are providing the content (also known as copy) for your website, a web designer won’t need to do much on-page SEO, but they’ll need to expertly create your site for perfect technical SEO results. This means that every page has a title and H1 tags, your site is crawlable by search engine bots, among many other to-dos. As a website owner, you may not see much of the technical SEO work a web designer does for you, but technical SEO is primarily designed to be used by search engines, not humans browsing your web page.
Security
A website designer should help you to create a website that is secure and can safely handle information from your web visitors. This starts by having a website protected by an SSL certificate and continues through choosing trustworthy and safe plugins to enhance your website’s user experience. If your website is designed to process payments or collect private personal information, it’s important your web designer is capable of correctly and securely handling this information.
If you’re looking for a trustworthy web designer, you’ve come to the right place! Tolbert Marketing and Events has the skills and experience you need to craft a high-performing and beautiful website. Check out our work online or contact us today to learn more!
