Web Design Inspiration Blog | SpicyWebDesigners.com

Nikola Denić is a web designer and one half of the team managing Haragei (the other is Milan Kristoff), a web development company out of Belgrade in Serbia. Nikola has been designing since 2000 and was originally a “one man show”. Today Haragei is larger, with about 15 people (aka “samurais”) that work for them at any one time. Check out their “Dojo” today.

1. How did you get started in web design?

I think it was sometime in the year 2000, right after the dot com bubble. I tried to create my own web page in a period when the Internet was a much tamer environment than it is now. At that time, things like tables and cool flash effects were considered an achievement. Basically, I was fascinated by web pages and the process of making them. I was using the Internet for 4 years at that point so going into development was a logical step for someone who took all his toys apart to see what’s inside and how they work.

2. When did you start designing websites?

If you count my attempts to make my own website with funky gif’s, that happened in 2000, although the first project I got paid for happened in 2001. It’s funny, from this point of view, thinking back to frames and flash in them. Peaks of development were things like contact forms that send emails, but if you worked with the Internet professionally at that time, you’ll recognize that it wasn’t anything like today – there was no one you could ask.

3 What are the biggest challenges that you face in web design currently?

Originality. That essentially summarizes the biggest problem right now. Being original at a time when websites are shooting out on conveyor belts is very hard. The process that we maintain at Haragei is pretty clear – we have a goal and we are working towards it. Perhaps the hardest stage is the sketching stage; the process of going from a drawing on paper to usable wireframes and having them interact the way we imagined. Making a useful project and standing behind it in every pixel is a huge mountain that you always want to climb and is always interesting in its own way.

4. Do you code on any of your web design projects? And if so, do you consider yourself a “Front-End Coder”? Why or Why Not?

Hmm, I have to explain a little bit about myself first: I started off “old school” – as a one man show. That basically forced me to become proficient in every step – from sketching on paper, through making beautiful markups to optimizing queries in a db.

Today I let my samurais handle the design; although there is virtually no project I haven’t checked over in every gradient and typography relationship in css. This is crucial in order to be comfortable when delivering reliable products to customers, when they trust us enough with the development of their online business.

I think the real answer is that I’m both a designer and a front end coder, simply because as the project manager of all of our projects, and as the company CEO, I have to offer and stand behind Quality Assurance – although I may not do the day-to-day designing/coding work.

5. Where did you go to school and has it helped you become a better web designer?

I have B.CS. from University of Belgrade that really hasn’t done anything particular for me in terms of personal advances, but it surrounded me with very many talented people. Right now I’m considering options for a Master’s degree; I am looking to combine an internal project with the degree to really experience the best of both worlds.

6. Since you first started how has the web design industry changed? Has it changed for the better? If so, how? If not, please explain?

The industry is changing rapidly – on a daily basis, I’d say. I am honestly impressed by people who are brave enough to go into web design and development right now. For the past 3-4 years, it seems like the whole thing has been on steroids and so much knowledge has been created that in order to come into the industry today, one has to have a vision that covers the problem from every point of view. On the other hand, as I’ve said before, 8 years ago, the fight with Internet Explorer was somewhat brutal simply because there was no adequate alternative.

Also, today you have Rich Internet Applications that are very popular and we all use them on a daily basis, which means that today, with the increase in Internet speeds, you learn to rely upon the Internet almost the same way as you would on desktop applications which were virtually impossible before.

7. What are your favorite tools to use when designing a website? Why are they your favorite tools?

Paper? No, seriously, a blank sheet of paper is 9 times out of 10 the tool with which I start designing and coming up with site interactions, regardless of whether I’m working on a micro site, a flash application or a social network. Obviously, after that the whole wireframe is transferred to OmniGraff or Visio (if we’re working on a bigger project) and then to Photoshop.

When it comes to code, I use TextMate on Mac, and if I’m running Windows by some strange coincidence, I stick with Dreamweaver (although it sounds lame).

Firefox with some extensions, such as Firebug, WebDeveloper, etc, is definitely a must have for anyone in this business, so it also comes into my project building process.

8. How many people work at Haragei?

Right now we have 5 people working in-house and over 10 external coworkers.

9. What do you want people to know about your company?

Hmmm… I like martial arts; oh wait, you can already notice that from our website. What is very important for people to know about us is that we, first and foremost, believe in a specific philosophy that follows corresponding business standards. We can say it’s a matter of having a sixth sense for our clients’ businesses and we are very good at realizing our plans. Aside from that, we kick ass in all those fancy words such as xhtml/css/is/actionscript/web2.0/etc.

John W. Ostler runs operations for Eight Bit Studios, a small web development studio based in America. The company has about 11 people working for them from various backgrounds. Since 2003, Eight Bit Studios has been developing websites. When they first started they where a PHP shop that was concentrating in small boutique websites. Recently I found out about a site that they developed called “Joe Bidden’s Teeth – Teeth you can believe in” using a blending of RoR (Ruby on Rails), Google Maps API, Scriptaculous and Prototype JavaScript frameworks. The company’s focus is tied to the Viral and Social web space including developing for the iPhone and they balance this development with a focus on an agile development.

1. How long has Eight Bit Studios been in the business of web design and development?

Eight Bit was first established back in the winter of 2003 at Michigan State University.  We were a PHP shop in those days, and concentrated in small boutique websites.  After doing that for a couple of years, the partners and I went our separate ways.  It wasn’t until the fall of 2008, that I began putting the foundations under the new company with a new set of partners.

2. Where did the idea for JoeBiddensTeeth site come from?  How is the site related to the Trident engagement?  What kind of web technologies did you use in the project?  What other technologies where used as well?

Joebidensteeth.com was created by my good friend and business partner, Daniel Peck. We were sitting around watching the Vice Presidential debates, and one thing we couldn’t get over, was that Joe Biden had a killer smile. After about a week of asserting “Joe Biden has the smile of America”, we decided to do something about it.

We gathered some friends and launched the site before the election. It went viral almost immediately.  After its success and the election ending, Trident (among other teeth-friendly brands) came knocking.  Once the partnership was in place, the site was brought into the products team at Eight Bit Studios for strategic and technical development.

The site in its current iteration was built on Ruby on Rails, with support from the Google Maps API and Mapeed.com‘s pin-scaling map technology.  The game along with some of the other error handling was produced using the Scriptaculous/Prototype JavaScript frameworks.

3. What other websites are you guys producing these days?

We’re concentrating most of our efforts in the viral and social web space. This includes niche social networks and iPhone Application development. We practice and preach agile development, usually concentrating efforts on a very specific piece of functionality first, then iterating on that. Although I can’t talk about the specific projects we’re working on, I can tell you that this team is the best of the best.  There hasn’t been a more exciting time to be in our labs and a part of the web medium.

4. Is Eight Bit Studios a “one-man show” or is it bigger?  I cannot tell by checking out the site so its a bit of a mystery

Eight Bit Studios is currently a 11-(wo)man show. We work with some contractors depending on project needs. I’ve kept the team small on purpose.  We need to be able to communicate and collaborate at a very intimate level.  When you can provide that channel and compliment it with mutual respect, our ideas and shared expertise gel.  This formula is very rare and I am blessed to be apart of it.

5. John, what is your role/job at Eight Bit Studios?

Besides operations, my efforts have shifted slightly into marketing and concepting our viral products.  I try to stay actively involved in all aspects of the company including the technical work.  We all have shared roles within the company and I think that’s what keeps it fun.  We have a motto, “If it feels like work, you’re doing it wrong.”  Any time you start doing something you’re not passionate about, it’s easy to get tunnel vision on a concept.  We’ve learned that doesn’t work in a creative environment and as a result, we do everything we can to change the way we think about “work”.

6. What is Eight Bit’s focus when it comes to designing websites?

We spend 50% of our time identifying our user-types and their main goals when coming to a site.  Many of us come from a video-editing/animation background, so this usually involves lots and lots of story boarding.  We’ve subscribed to the “less is more” philosophy and do our best not to clutter the web space.  Not until we have identified the functional needs and behaviors of a site’s assets, do we start making design decisions.  The process is extremely creative and collaborative and has proved to be incredibly successful.

Shawn Johnston is the Creative Director from BlackWave Creative in Parsippany, New Jersey in the United States of America. He brings with him 13 years of professional design experience. BlackWave Creative is developing a custom CMS called Kimera that is launching in late spring of 2009 that is PHP/mySQL based. Even though the company itself is only a year old it has a good team of talented people including Shawn who bring their professional experience to BlackWave Creative.

1. How long has BlackWave Creative been in business since?

Blackwave has been in business for one year, and in earnest for 4 months. My professional experience extends back 13 years.

2. What are some of the benefits of hiring your web design company?

Blackwave works at a very polished level of professionalism and personal responsibility to our clients. Our motto “We are what we make” states this perfectly. Every project gets our total focus, creativity and dedication. Every time, no excuses. To compliment this, we pride ourselves in our creative and out of the box approach to web and brand design. We’re not big fans of grids and boxy trends. We try to inject personal touches, and unique elements into every design we do. To round this off, Blackwave is a 21st century business in that we don’t believe in office fronts or superfluous overhead costs. We’re essentially a band of freelancers, and we want to keep it that way. It keeps us nimble and low-cost without sacrificing integrity or our passion for what we do.

3. Does your company work off of a proprietary platform that was built-in house or do you use pre-built platforms (WordPress, ExpressionEngine, osCommerce, etc.) to run your clients online web presences?

We are in the process of developing our own CMS called Kimera which should launch late Spring ’09. The back-end is PHP/MySQL based and eCommerce enabled with a healthy dash of AJAX drag and drop, with
template selections, and common JavaScript plugins like coverflows, accordions and popups to name a few. The front-end is all table-less web standard CSS with plenty of JavaScript functionality. We’re putting it together based on two precepts…what do designers want and what do customers need? Designers want easy to add JavaScript plugins and simple creative customization and customers need ease-of-use and intuitive interfaces and Kimera will have these in spades. We do work with commercial CMS’s like Magento and open-source systems like WordPress, but often they’re a lot like driving a tank to pick up the mail. Kimera will be designed to be light weight and transparent for faster load time, quick page views and superb search engine optimization.

4. What are some of the most frequent questions people ask about your business and how do you answer them?

People often ask about our freelancer collaborative setup. It’s a somewhat less well-known way of doing business that does require good communication and teamwork. But with the right mix of personalities it
works very well. My common answer to this question is to quote the Musketeers, “all for one and one for all.” The egos get parked at the door at Blackwave. We’re about the work, not accolades.

5. Do you have a physical office where clients can come in for a consultation or does the office run virtually?

As mentioned above, we’re a virtual outfit and plan to remain that way. We meet clients wherever they’d like: local coffee shops, restaurants, or their offices. Whatever they need. This often works in our favor.

6. What is your company best known for in the web design industry?

As a relatively young design company, we’re still making our mark. Having said that, during my freelance career I recently was included in a Smashing Magazine article highlighting hand drawn elements in web
design. This goes back to what I said earlier about adding personal and unique touches to our designs. We follow the design trends close enough to be relevant but we always try to push every design a little (or a lot!) off the beaten path.

7. Do you employ freelance web designers either on-site or off-site, part-time or full-time?

All of the above. We have one full timer, another on part-time retainer and a few we bring in on an hourly basis. Each designer has a style or a set of strengths. We try to match the project with who we think will be able to use their strengths to give the client what they’re looking for while standing up to Blackwave’s standards.

8. How does your company feel about outsourcing?

If by outsourcing you mean to places like India or China, on principal we’re not against it provided the workers in those countries are being paid Western level incomes and in acceptable working conditions.
Anything less is exploitation and we are firmly against it. We don’t use it ourselves as the time zones and language barriers present enough obstacles to make it a less than worthwhile endeavor. In web development and design, you get what you pay for. If you’re paying bottom dollar, you’re going to get less skilled designers and developers and your final product will reflect that. I think that most clients out there understand that.

Melissa Connolly is one half of the husband and wife team at emTwo Web Studios from Charlotte, North Carolina in the United States of America. Together with her husband Sean Connolly they’ve built a small yet very focused web design company. Melissa has been designing websites since 2001. emTwo Web Studios designs for ExpressionEngine and WordPress but they also develop for other platforms at well.

1. How did you first get started in web design?

I first started doing web design after I started blogging in 2001.  I began by designing my own blog, which looking back on it now, was horrible. But we grow, right?  At the time, “blog skins” were pretty popular and I think I had at least 20 different “skins” for my blog.  Every now and then I would get a comment from a reader who wanted me to design their blog.  At first it was a hobby…and then it grew into a passion.

2. How do you find being a husband and wife team in the web design industry?

We love it.  We absolutely love working together.  Sean does most of the coding, while I’ll come up with the concepts for each site.  He keeps me spirited and optimistic while I keep him practical and realistic.  We compliment one another really well.

3. How long have you been doing freelance web design?

I’ve been doing freelance work since 2002, though during that time I held a “regular” job which paid the rent.  In June 2007, I quit that job and jumped head first into our business and we’ve been thriving ever since.

4. How do you usually price your web design projects?

We quote each project with one lump sum price. This puts the exact dollar amount in front of our clients from the very beginning so they know what to expect and how much it will cost.  Should they need additional items that are outside of the original scope, they know that it will cost more.  This keeps “The Scope Creep” in check.  On rare occasions we bill by the hour, but that’s mostly for maintenance and upgrades.

5. Where do you get your inspiration to design websites?

From everything!  Is that too broad?  I find a lot of inspiration in my own environment; from the clothes I purchase to the branding on my dogs all-natural pet food products to the various magazines we read to the wide assortment of video games we play. I also peruse most of the CSS galleries to see what other designers are creating.  Photography sites also really inspire me.

6. How do your clients usually find you? Through word of mouth? Agencies? Or something else?

I get about 85% of my clients through word of mouth/direct referrals.  The other 10% come through google or the ExpressionEngine Pro Network or various social media sites that we use, like Twitter and Facebook.

7. Do you design exclusively using ExpressionEngine? Or do you use other CMS systems to design for?

We LOVE ExpressionEngine and WordPress and develop for both platforms.  We also develop for other platforms like Movabletype and Ning.  We aren’t afraid to work with something new, so we’ll use whatever CMS is the best solution for our client.

8.  What tools can you not work without when designing a web design project?

For designing:
Photoshop and Illustrator of course
ColorSchemer or ColourLovers
Typetester

For development:
Notepad++
Web Developer Toolbar
Filebug

Abhishek Mishra is one of the guys behind MADETOKILL a two man web studio based in Bangalore, India. Together he an Shaabi have began to build a web design firm that is focused on creating some excellent websites and web applications for their clients. Even though MadeToKill has only been in business for the past 7 months now but they’ve been designing websites and web applications for the past 7 and 8 years respectively. Together, Abhishek and Shaabi are building MadeToKill on a daily basis through attention to quality and flexibility for their clients.

1. When did you first start designing websites? When did Shaabi been designing websites?

I’ve always loved doing art be it with crayons or with a light pen and have been passionate about computers & programming ever since I saw a computer . This goes back to the year 2000 when I started programming. And soon, I started dabbling with some Photoshop. This opened yet another unexplored space to explore – the web. Shaabi and I started working on CodeFire – a secure web app to host programming contests in universities. That taught us a lot about HTML, CSS, and PHP. Things keep getting better and better ever since as we keep working on new projects each day.

Shaabi started designing websites way back in 2001. He’s been more into the functionality side of web design since the beginning. He loves coming up with amazing ideas on how to model and organize the database and creates custom frameworks from scratch for any project that we do.

We are software engineering students, and we love doing web design work in our free time.

2. How long has MadeToKill been in business since?

MadeToKill has been in business since 7 months now. Earlier we used to handle all the work through emails and recently we came up with our website www.madetokill.com to showcase our portfolio. We are working on integrating a blog to our website to share what we have to say to the community and the enthusiasts.

3. Outside of you and Shaabi does anyone else work for MadeToKill currently either on a fulltime, part-time or contract basis?

Nope, we just a team of two.

4. Where idea you get the idea for the name of your business?

When we set out to start the business we were completely out of ideas as to what we’re going to call it! The other day I was browsing through my collection of vector art, where the dead bird’s image grabbed my attention. And, we said okay, let’s call ourselves MadeToKill, which stands to send out the message that our work is killer, and hence our websites are ‘made to kill’.

5. Where is your company based? (City, Province/State and Country)

We are based in Bangalore, India.

6. How do you usually get the projects that your web design company works on? Agencies? Advertising? Word of Mouth? Or something else?

We depend on Advertising and Word of Mouth for getting projects. Besides that we’re working on creating presence through our upcoming blog too.

7. How do you involve clients in the web design and project process?

We communicate to our clients through emails and Skype. We ask them to fill a questionnaire to assess the scope and needs of the project. Then, we prepare a mock design, if our client agrees on the design; we start off with the work. We keep communicating with our client as the project goes on.

8. What are some important things that you would like to tell potential clients about your company and the work that you do?

We assure great quality and flexibility with our client’s needs. Since, we’re students, we do take a little more time over projects we do. But, we assure you that you website will be backed with the latest and the best in the world of web design and web app development. You would also be pleased to know that we are always ready to fix any bugs and add new features in the project you got done from us.

Bistrian IOSIP is a web designer from Galati, Romania who started Supraelastic, a small web design studio. Even though Bistrian is the only full-time employee of the company currently (the other two are contract/part-time) this web design studio produces some amazing web design. The web design firm boasts excellent on-time delivery and post-implementation support to its clients and focuses on results.

1. How long has your web design firm been in business?

To be honest all started a long time ago, like 8 years back to be more precise. I was a started using Geocities page builder in an internet cafe and a few months later got employed for the 1st time as web designer. From that point things evolved fast.

Most of my experience was spent as freelancer. Few years ago I was started full-time freelancing as bistrianiosip.com than migrated recently to the agency title. Sounds fancy, we prefer to describe ourselves as a small but powerful creative team. The company is registered in 2008 so we’re quite fresh as an agency.

2. Where are the majority of your clients from?

Our clients are spread worldwide but I’ve been working mostly with US, Canadian and some UK customers.

3. What kind of experience can a potential client expect from your web design firm?

First off professionalism, fast turnaround and respect for the deadlines. Second we really talk a lot, we do our homework researching the competition and we focus on delivering results.

4. What is the biggest challenge that your web design firm has faced?

We are facing our biggest challenge right now, we’re planning and working on two free web apps which we are planning to launch in a few months.

5. How many people does your web design firm employee? Part-time? Full-time? Contract?

We are only three people right now; however I am the only one full-time employee at this point.

6. How do you set your company apart from the rest of your competition?

So far I’ve succeeded to amaze my customers with a bullet-proof service, on-time delivery and post-delivery support. Seems that there are so few people that care what’s happening after they deliver a project that I am always getting greetings for the service and support I provide as well as for the quality of the work.

7. How do you go above and beyond to service your clients better?

I always considered that my work doesn’t end when I hand in the files and collect the payment. I always tried to help and be very responsive even if the customers encountered any further after-delivery issue, no matter if it was someone else’s fault or lack in attention.

Anyway I am always happy to see my solutions working on-line and delivering the expected results. That’s the true happiness for me.

Robert Podgorski is the creative director at Black Moon Development in Poznan, Poland. Black Moon Development was founded back in 2005 the idea behind their brand comes from being raised on sci-fi games, movies and books and the idea of a group of astronauts on a mission. The company currently has 6 employees, 1 intern and a few freelancers that handle some work on various projects.

1. I found it interesting that you guys are located in Poland. Why did you decide to launch and brand your company the way that you have?

Well – it was natural for us that we need to be honest with our clients – and that we shouldn’t pretend to be somebody else.

Since we’re rather small company (and we were even smaller back the time we were starting BlackMoon) – w decided to have a website that reflects that.

And since we’re all raised on sci-fi games, movies and books (and we still love those) – the idea of a team of astronauts on the mission to the moon came up pretty naturally.

2. How big is Black Moon Development currently in terms of employees?

We currently have 6 employees, one intern and few freelancers that co-operate with us.

3. How long has Black Moon Development been in business and how did it all start?

BlackMoon was found in 2005 – and at first there were just two people in a tiny, one-room office. We had some work experience in big web design agencies – and decided to start our own business. The main goal was to have fun at work – and we were hoping the money will follow eventually. It pretty much worked out

4. What is the biggest challenge that your company faces today? How are you working to remedy this problem?

We have some problems (who doesn’t?)

First of all – we have millions ideas for our own, private projects – but unfortunately there’s never enough time to work on those, which is a bit confusing.

Second thing is that there are several people who smoke at the office – and when your friends smoke – it makes quitting quite impossible.

So I guess we need all to quit at the same time – and use time from cigarette breaks to move our own project further.

5. What are a few things you want people to know about your business?

I would like the people to know that we can help them doing their business.

I would like them to know that they can trust us – and that they should tell us their needs – and we’ll come up with a idea how to make it happen.

(You might be surprised how many people come to us and start the talk like “I want site in blue color, similar layout to mycompetition.com and with nice flash intro” – and when you ask them “why?” – it shows up that they have a clear goal of what they want).

And of course I would like everybody to know that they should go to http://blackmoondev.com if they need great quality website

6. Does your company offer Search Engine Optimization and what can customers expect? Do you point them to the professionals or do you have someone in-house who does this for your customers?

We don’t offer SEO. What we do is to try to convince the clients that they should take care of an excellent material on their site – and traffic and high page rank will come by itself. Of course we develop the sites in a way that they’re easily reachable by robots and so on.

7. How do you usually price web design projects for your customers?

We have two “out-of-the-box” solutions – which are blog-type site and e-shop. We have a fix price for that and a long list of features each site has got (custom, beautiful design included). Majority of our customers finds one of those suitable for them. For projects that have some new, complex functionality – we price those individually.

Greg Althoff is the co-founder and creative director at BLK+MTN in Denver, Colorado in the USA. He and his partner Stephen Till (who oversees Print Design) formed BLK+MTN in February 2008 and since then their company has grown to 3 full-time employees and 11 freelance web designers since it first started.

1. How long has “BLK+MTN” been in business for and how did the idea for this business begin?

BLK+MTN has been in business since last February. The idea came from Stephen, who had approached me back in November of last year. His brother had decided to move on and stop designing for Stephen and his company, A Size Too Small. He heard that I had decided to go back to freelancing full-time and wanted to expand the business. Stephen had started a few things in the past like Japan Implosion and A Size Too Small. He has also been in many bands over the last 10 years. His expertise was mostly in music, screen printing, and marketing. We quickly re-forged our friendship and headed into a business relationship.

We knew that we wanted to turn the heads in Denver and beyond by staying creative and helping the little people. So we both have deep passions for people and the arts.

2. What considerations do you take when talking to a client for the first time about web design and designing their website?

Some things we consider right away are: the clients target audience, how much information they are wanting to get across and what the most important parts of that is to highlight, is this client going to need a lot updating.

3. How many people are in your organization currently?

We have 3 full time and 11 other freelancers that we work with on a consistent basis. The skills range all over the art + media spectrum.

4. Do you have a process or a particular development lifecycle when it comes to developing web projects?

For the most part. It’s something we’re always refining. The more clients you get the more you’re able to refine your strategies and processes. We tend to work with a lot of non-profits, artists, and smaller businesses. So it’s a lot easier to work one on one and create great results.

5. How does your company deal with concerns of Search Engine Optimization when it comes to Flash-based design on websites?

We don’t make many Flash websites anymore since the 2.0 movement. But beyond making the text selectable and adding meta-tags we would hire an outside source for SEO.

6. Does your company offer Search Engine Optimization to its clients or do you usually recommend that they work with someone more skilled in this area?

We usually point them to other businesses that specialize in SEO.

7. Does your company design for e-commerce web presences and if so what e-commerce shopping cart platforms have you built web designs on?

We have just teamed up with a local developer here who has been making wonderful CMS and e-Commerce solutions. We had been looking around at various companies and what they might offer but a lot of times you either pay too much or don’t get the amount of options needed for most businesses. This way we can make anything and apply it to the client’s needs.

8. Has your company won any awards for web design?  If so, which ones?

Yes we have! But to be honest I haven’t kept track of them all. It’s been between local addy awards and online design awards.

Kyle Hosick is the President of Addrenaline Media a company based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Addrenaline Media was started in 2001 because Kyle saw a huge niche that he was working in at the time, online media. His firm boasts some big clients including Nintendo, Siemens, Yahoo! Canada and many others.

1. How did Addrenaline Media first start? And how long have you been in business?

We started in 2001. I started the company because I saw a big niche within the industry I was working at the time. The niche had a huge void in area of online media and I thought to jump in there at that time and fill that niche.

2. What is your company’s approach towards web design and how do you involve the client in the process?

We work with the client at every step of the process. We often communicate with our clients once a day as we work toward completion. The client gets to approve everything from the initial mock-up to the choice of color, fonts, layout and photographs. We send links to projects so the clients can view the drafts in a real world scenario and offer comment throughout.

3. I see that your company offers Search Engine Optimization for website owners looking to improve their presence. How do you quantify the efforts your company puts into search engine optimization in terms of ROI to the customer (aka client)?

In terms of SEO, our clients start seeing results and then offer us testimonials. There is no real way to make “promises” in that realm about where people will rank or how much business they will pick up. We simply walk new clients through other SEO campaigns we have worked on and show them rankings, results, placements and break down the process, in terms of the steps we took to improve the Search ranks for previous clients.

3. Do you ever hire freelance web designers for things that cannot be done “in-house”?

We have in some cases. But we don’t make it a practice. We have the whole team in-house, and our years of experience have allowed us to determine exactly who we need full-time and we have been able to maintain that team.

4. What e-commerce platforms does your company support and customize in terms of website design for your clients?

We use several; it depends on the client’s needs and the type of products being offered.

5. Do you use Web Analytics to help your customers make decisions about their online businesses or online business channels?

In some cases yes, but not always. Many of our clients come to us because they want a great looking, unique design. They know the need a site for their business but aren’t necessarily hooked on results. We walk them through the type of reporting we can do and then offer those results to them with our feedback. Conscientious clients take our advice, others do not.

6. At the end of the day, what do you want people to know about your company?

We provide great service, plain and simple. If you call or email us we get back to you within an hour, not days, or weeks. That has been the cornerstone of our business. We hear from some new clients that they put out requests for quotes to 4 or 5 companies and some aren’t getting back to them for days. That initial call (and the response time) sets the tone for the business relationship – you have to provide great service, promptly.

Taylor Romero runs Liquid Fire LLC a web design firm based in Denver, Colorado. He originally started about 10 years ago and even though he was a teenager when he started. In 2002, he started officially designing websites and formed LiquidFire LLC in 2007. His business has been progressing ever since with a focus on providing excellent service and developing his company’s secret weapon, ContactTRACS.

1. When did you first start to design websites?

I started when I was 14, so (mental math) about 10 years ago. Of course it wasn’t what it is today, but cut me some slack; I was just learning who girls were.

2. Has your education helped you in your Career as a web designer?

Um, that’s questionable. I say that because most my time is spent running a small business rather than anything I learned in school (I was a computer major). The one thing I had never anticipated was how much work went into running a company and how it would take away from my time doing anything else… but, luckily I’ve been able to bring some peeps in to help me out.

But back to the question, yes and no. I got my degree in Computer Information Systems. I consider myself more a programmer then a designer because I can always outsource to good designers, it’s tough to gauge how good a programmer is until they screw you (which has happened on more than one occasion). But, truthfully, I enjoy programming more anyway. I was able to test out of some of my classes, but the ones I couldn’t, like my Oracle classes, helped me understand the theories behind the practices I had been using for years. I was lucky that I could just turn in actual work projects for homework which meant no homework!!!

Since I did the whole thing backwards (found my career before college) it really helped learning the theories. But, had I not used the concepts in the real world before hand, I would have undoubtedly found many aspects of it useless (simply for the fact that I wouldn’t have actually used them in practice).

Would I go to college if I had to do it all over again… yeah, probably.

Point of story: Be cool, stay in school.

3. Where are you currently based? And how many people are in your organization?

We are based in Denver Colorado right now. Well, 2 out of 3 of us are. I grew up in few different places and ended up in San Diego for a few years. That is where I decided to start growing up a bit. I hired the best damn programmer in the world named Dan who has helped me punch out more projects efficiently, cost effectively, and more reliably then I ever thought.

Then, about 6-8 months later I brought in Rebecca who has been our client liaison and project manager ever since. She has her own gig called The New Pink (http://thenewpinkmarketing.com). Together, the three of us have been… ouch, I just cut my finger trying to replace the ribbons in a client’s cd/dvd label printer. Dang, I cut it good, ah man; I’m going to get blood on my keyboard. On well, I’ve got sacrifice, bruised and bloody, our founding fathers would have wanted me to press forward.

Ok, where was I? Oh yeah, the 3 of us, Rebecca, Dan, and myself are getting so good that now I guarantee we can beat any larger design shop’s price, quality, and customer support. In fact, I throw the challenge out there, if you’re someone looking for a website, send us the proposal you currently have and we’ll meet it point for point but for considerably less… and if we can’t, don’t go with us.

4. I was reading through some of your blog posts and noticed that you make mention web analytics a number of times? Do you think that this is something that web designers should take note of and have a basic understanding of?

Analytics aren’t so much the job of the creator as it is the job of the implementation team. When I design, or my designers design, or someone who designs… designs, and sends me the PSD, it’s my responsibility to ensure it does what it’s supposed to do. Of course there will be situations where the designer will need to make revisions because what they laid out is impossible to work with, but more often than not we are able to take any design and make it SEO friendly.

But now a rant: Any firm that puts form over function is a firm that is ensuring your… um… unsuccessful… Not necessarily failure, but show me a site that does millions in revenue that is flashy and fancy.

Let’s take a look at the top websites in the US according to Alexa: http://www.alexa.com/site/ds/top_sites?cc=US&ts_mode=country&lang=none

You can see that starting from the top, each site gets progressively more complex, but NONE use Flash as an integral part of the design. I’m not saying that simple design (minus of course MySpace) resulted in their success, I’m saying that in order to capitalize on that success they needed designs that worked, not designs that made you sit 30 seconds for a loading screen.

That kind of blatant, unintelligent, misguided approach is what firms who care more about a profit then the success of their clients produce. It’s bad for everyone and does nothing but force me to spend 15 minutes explaining to new clients that I can make that crap if they want to, but that I recommend they look at a website that they actually spent money at as inspiration.

Ok, I’m done ranting, sorry about that =)

5. How do you usually price out web design projects?

We usually price out on a per project basis. No client wants Option A or Option B. They want this from Option A, that from Option B. I enjoy listening and brainstorming ideas and together coming up with a perfect solution to help them grow.

Fortunately, we are able to come in at very competitive rates because of our secret weapon: http://contacttracs.com

This system allows us to make badass websites with no back-end work. I’ve been building it for what feels like forever, but it’s nearly done (all that really remains is the training videos I’m currently about half done with).

Using this system it’s very easy for me and the gang to get in and build kick ass systems.

In fact, had I had ContactTRACS when I started my company, I’d be twice the size I am now, easily. But, that’s another story. =)

6. How do you usually find your clients?

All our clients are word of mouth right now, I have never really done anything marketing wise but soon I would like to have the budget to do some advertising. But, who knows when that will come to pass. But, turns out, produce good work and people talk about you to their friends and coworkers, so for now we’ll stick with great work and word-of-mouth advertising.

7. Does your company hire a lot of freelance web designers or do you try to keep design in-house.

I prefer to outsource designs because it gives us more time to focus on rock-solid code. Here is a note for designers looking for some work:

Never ever send me a resume. I don’t care who you worked for, what education you have, or the plethora of applications you think you know. I only care about the work you produce, so send me a ##@% portfolio…. sorry, that came out like a bit of a rant. So far only 2 rants this session, not bad considering these are like the only two things I have to rant about… I guess besides politics & religion =)

8. How long have you been in business?

2002 is when I officially started LiquidFire. 2007 is when I became an LLC.