5 questions you should ask a web designer before you hire them!

After countless interviews with various web designers I thought it was high time that I put together a list of questions that you can and should ask your web designer before you hire them on your next web design project.

1. “How experienced are you with AJAX (Asynchronous Javascript and XML)?” – It is not as important to understand all the finer working of AJAX however it is important to understand that AJAX can make your website faster and perform better. If your web designer does understand this then chances are you are going to end up with a site is not only a beauty but also a high performance “sports car” of web technology.
2. “Do you support the web development projects you are involved in?” – This question will give you some insight into how flexible your web designer candidate is. Chances are if they produce a web design and implement it and then move on they will not support your company’s website further down the road which can mean added costs, more headaches due to customization that only the original web designer understands or a host of other problems. The point is simple… hire someone with the expectation that you want to keep them or be able to contact them should anything go wrong.
3. “Do you design your website in a ‘web standards compliant’ way?” - Web standards are a growing concern because these ‘standards’ give web design structure. If you build a house today chances are there is a building code that you had to follow full of specifications but a 100 years ago there probably wasn’t much in the way of building codes. The same goes for web design. When website first started being designed there wasn’t much in the way of ‘structure’ (except for a little HTML) and since then there has been improvements to HTML, the birth of CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) and so much more. Web standards is still in its infancy but having a website designed that follows these standards will make it easier to update and run well into the future.
4. “What projects have you been involved with in the past 6 months?” – Asking this question gives you a good answer of the skills and knowledge your web designer has currently. It also tells you how “out of practice” your web design candidate may actually be. If you are looking for a web designer to develop an ecommerce website for your store and they’ve only ever built standard websites they may not have the subject matter expertise needed to understand the project which could result in delays or a web designer walking off a project before it’s finished.
5. “Can you meet with us in person?” – Now this question is more ‘situational’ if you are looking to interface with in person. Now, personally for me I would rather meet people face to face then have them working remotely. Some reasons why this is important is that the web designer is more involved as a part of the online business unit of your organization when they are working face to face with you and can provide and gain greater insight then simply discussing through an email or talking over the phone or VOIP. If this sort of thing doesn’t bother you then chances are the question will not have as much merit for you but it is something to think about before you hire your web designer.

It is important to know that “Not all web designers are equal!” Some web designers provide the initial design of the website and that’s it. You are then left to figure out how they designed the website, the logic they used with any custom coding and countless other booby traps. If you are going to hire a web designer make sure that they will stay on (for a fee of course) after the initial web design is launched. After all, you don’t want to have to be learning HTML, CSS and/or Javascript while you are running your business. You’ve got better things to do. Like, running your business!