selection

This offers some thoughts on selection and management of web designers.

It covers -

• introduction
• cost
• credibility
• performance
• sustainability

     introduction

Choosing a web designer is like choosing an architect, a doctor or a veterinarian - it involves questions of trust rather than merely expertise, price or availability to meet a specific deadline.

It is important to remember that web designers may offer advice but are typically hired to undertake design, not to conduct a market analysis or create a marketing strategy. Some will of course provide those and other services - and kindly write your brief about what you want them to do - but you will typically be charged extra or get something that is outside their capability.

It helps to know what you want and why you want it: designers will on occasion give clients what the client asks for rather than what the client wants or what the client really needs.

A valuable maxim is to know your clients and see your site or your services through their eyes and their mouseclicks. Are there more disadvanted people in your target demographics than the overall population? Is accessibility a greater than usual concern? Do your staff and third parties need to be able to cite 'intelligible' URLS in email, media releases and print publications - inhibiting reliance on dynamically generated pages or long concatenated document identifiers.

It is also important to remember that not all sites (and any functionality behind those sites, such as e-commerce catalogues and payment systems) are the same. Some are more complex than others.

The better business analysts warn about letting technology rather than outcomes drive projects - and more broadly determine outcomes - with some major corporate content management systems (CMS) for example proving to be user-hostile and so fragile that the client is locked into support by a service provider despite the sales pitch the project would be self-sustaining.

     cost

As preceding pages have noted, there are no formal industry-wide standard rates that are publicly available or accepted by web designers. That is an issue because pricing -

• varies considerably
• is not necessarily indicative of quality.

Some designers (and design suppliers) will provide superlative performance at very affordable prices, whether because they are keen to build a profile, are eager to keep staff occupied, are unaware of what competitors are pricing or - there is something to be said for artistic temperament - simply like the client or client's project.

Others will price work significantly higher than their competitors, for reasons that include gullibility on the part of past clients, clients (eg some government agencies) with a relaxed attitude to spending, recognition that work will involve substantial overtime to meet a tight deadline, or as a mechanism for turning people away without having to say no.

The characteristics of local markets vary. Some designers in Canberra, for example, have waxed fat over several years because government clients were reluctant to source work interstate or were simply unprepared to seek comparative pricing.

For small NGOs and SMES, with sites that are less complicated than those of major organisations and that may have more of a craft rather than industrial aspect, prices may be lower because the client is prepared to wait or simply because the project can be fitted into the designer's schedule. One designer in Sydney commented that

given our overheads - the zinc coffee table and cute PAs don't come cheap - we won't get out of bed for under $1,000 a day

A competitor responded that

I don't have their coffee table or their cocaine habit. I can use a junior designer to do a quick job that is very spare but has a bit of zing and matches a small business's budget

     credibility

How can you tell whether a designer is credible, given that there is no certification (lawyers usually have degrees and must have formal accreditation such as a practicing certificate but a designer can be self-taught, self-tested and entirely independent)?

Are they, for example -

• aware of (and comfortable with) 'credibility' principles such as those highlighted earlier in this guide
• familiar with the accessibility standards highlighted here as part of the Accessibility Guide elsewhere on this site
• committed to listening to your objectives and offering prsuasive advice if your design requirements conflict with functionality?

One indicator is identify the designer's past work. Does the designer have a track record? Is she a novice? Is he someone who is biased towards art statements rather than humble commercial sites? Does he listen?

Another indicator is to seek feedback from the designer's clients? Their sites may look great, but was the product delivered on cost and on time? Was expensive remedial work required? Has the site indeed been extensively reworked by another designer?

Most prospective clients want to deal with the actual author of a prototype or of work that has been offered as an example of capability. That is an issue in large service providers, where the person doing the sales pitch may have little relationship with graphics or code specialists and little responsibility for their work, being rewarded on the basis of sales rather than on whether they deliver. Use of design teams - remember that much work is collegial, anonymous and subcontracted - means that the people who worked on past sites may not be the bodies who work on your site.

     sustainability

The history of web design is littered with the decomposing corpses of projects that "seemed a good idea at the time" but proved to be unsustainable. One consideration in choosing a designer - and in mapping out what will happen to a site once the design is completed and that site (or the latest remake) is launched - is can it be looked after.

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