Spicy Web Designer Interview with Dan Lindop of Surefire Media

Dan Lindop is one half of the creative force behind SureFire Media. Dan originally started doing freelance work and has recently moved away from freelance web design to starting a company. He has been involved in many projects including working for .Net Magazine on various projects. His work speaks volumes about the skills that he has acquired since he started designing websites during university and has progressed ever since.

1. How did you first get started in Web Design? And did your education help you get there?

I first got started in web design during my year out at University. I was on a placement at a telecoms company and they got me to develop their first website. This was during the late 90s so a lot of businesses didn’t have sites. Thinking back, that first attempt wasn’t pretty but it got me into web design.

Practically all of the skills I use day-to-day have been self-taught. I didn’t really find my University course useful to be honest. I’ve always found that the best way to learn a new skill is to use it in a project situation. For example, I recently taught myself WordPress whilst producing a new company blog.

2. I see that you’ve had a lot of success designing websites for various clients in the past. What made you decide to join forces and create SureFire Media?

I started Surefire Media with a developer who I’ve worked with at another agency for years. It just so happens that we’re really good mates too, so it seemed like the natural thing to do. I’d built up a number of good contacts from my freelance work and was getting a lot of new work in, so the time was right to take the next step really.

3. Do you still take on freelance web design work outside of Surefire Media?

No. As co-director of Surefire, I bring all of my freelance leads into the company now.

4. What are you in charge of at Surefire Media?

As we’re a small, young company, I’m in charge of all sorts of things from new business, to accounts, marketing and so on. My actual job role is mainly front-end design and development and online marketing. Andy Johnston, my business partner, takes care of back-end development work and technical jobs such as server management.

One of the things I like about running my own business is that you get to have a hand in everything from initial client meetings to delivery of the final projects. It’s a good feeling knowing you get to make all of the important decisions about your business. So if things go wrong, you’ve only got yourself to blame. You don’t get that working for someone else.

5. How did you get involved with .Net Magazine’s Build Off?

I was approached by the deputy editor and asked if I’d be interested in contributing to the feature. I jumped at the chance as it’s a great magazine and good publicity for me too.

6. What inspires you to design the website that you do?

Every website is different really. At the end of the day, a good design is one that solves a problem for the client or one that communicates their message successfully. With this in mind, the clients themselves inform the design to a certain extent.

As far as design inspiration goes, there are a lot of good designers out there producing some great work. The important thing for me is to keep getting better and producing better work. It’s a good feeling when you put a design together that you’re really happy with or that the client loves.

7. How do you usually price your projects for new clients? And do you have a different way of pricing ongoing projects?

We keep our pricing structure quite simple. Basically, we have an hourly rate for all of our work. When we’re quoting on a project, we work out how long we think it’s going to take us and then apply the hourly rate. We find this works pretty well most of the time. As we’ve built a lot of sites over the years, we’ve got a good idea of how long jobs are going to take.

8. Outside of designing some amazing websites what else do you like to do with your time?

Lots of stuff! I like going to watch live bands, going to the cinema, reading, watching Crewe Alex (even though they’re awful), going out for a few drinks with my friends… Like most people, I don’t get as much spare time as I’d like though.

9. Do you listen to music or do anything to charge the creative juices when you are sitting down to design?

Yeah. I pretty much always have the radio on or iTunes. One of the good things about working from home is that you can listen to whatever you like whenever you like.