Website 101 is  going to be a blog installment series focused on helping you get your business’s website up and working. This first installment is going to focus on how to choose a designer, and if you’d rather do it yourself. The pros to hiring a professional designer is that the professional will understand the basics, the standards, and how to really bring your vision tp life. If you decide to do it yourself, you’ll need to familiarize yourself with the platform that you are building on (like word press). While you are able to use YouTube and other online resources to learn the platform, a professional will have already known this and been able to build the site quicker and more efficiently.

Before hiring a professional web designer, you should ask yourself several questions regarding the project. First: do you have a deadline? If you have a short timeframe to have the website completed, then a professional web designer is the way to go. There is no learning curve that you have to worry about when hiring a developer. However if you don’t need the website quickly, then you could opt for the do it yourself route. The next question to ask yourself is “what are the required elements of the site”. This means to ask yourself “Do I need a photo gallery for my speaking events or as a portfolio display?”. If you answer yes to any of these mandatory features questions,, you’ll want to revisit your theme search criteria.

When comparing designers and agencies, it’s important to look at their portfolio. If they don’t have their portfolio readily available, be sure to reach out to them and request at least two examples of their previous work. However, remember that these are businesses, they are agencies. Do not ask for resumes. While you are hiring them, it is not right to treat them as employees. Also, you want to be open minded and respect that your agency that you hired is more knowledgeable about marketing and web design and will suggest things only to make your site better for your customers, you, and Google.

After choosing your agecny, it’s important to make sure that you both are on the same page regarding the build and everything that it entails. You’ll also want to make sure that you will own the website, are able to make changes on said website, and where the site is hosted after the design is complete.

Here at Blue Shift Web Services, you own your site outright, we provide a thorough training at launch so that you know how to manage your site yourself, and offer a maintenance package which includes hosting if you’d like to let us handle your site for you. In addition to this, our simple web design process allows you to have a website complete as quickly as two weeks. Everything can be handled online as well, making our services convenient for even the busiest business owners.Get started today and learn more about our web design packages here: web design service.