Web

Anyone looking to get a little nip & tuck or a full blown extreme makeover of their website has a lot of options and a lot elements to consider. Here are 5.5 questions to ask before you get started. The questions are designed to give you insight into a web designer’s thinking. The way we see it, there’s plenty of nuts & bolts type questions to ask but the better thinker they are, the better site & experience you’ll get. That’s where these questions come in. Hopefully these questions will help you find someone who will create a unique presence and give you the tools to help your site succeed.

1. How much does a website cost?

If you get an immediate answer or a ball park answer this may not be the shop for you. The problem with this is there’s no way to know how much a site will cost without an understanding of what your needs are and what you want to accomplish with a site. If you get an answer right off the bat, you’ll probably get a templated site that looks like everyone else and does little to differentiate you to visitors. Ideally they’ll want to know a lot about your business and your clients. So look for and expect deep, probing question.

2. What’s your process?

Many small shops don’t have a process & they wing it. Process is important because it means you’re project is more likely to avoid problems and meet your expectations. If they do have a process, look for elements of “communication” as a key area of their process. Things like “review meetings” are a good sign because you’ll be in the loop upstream in time to make corrections if necessary.

3. How will I be able to update my site?

This is a big one in my mind. Most small businesses should be able to easily update their own site with timely information relevant documents and elements that keep the site fresh. All too often however business owners are at the mercy of a web shop’s schedule. The updates don’t happen fast enough, they often have mistakes and the whole process becomes a big hassle. It becomes easier to ignore the site which then quickly becomes stale.

Instead, make sure that you have a clear method of updating and adding to your site. Insist on tools and/or functionality that’s easy to use, and learn how to use them.

4. How long will it take to finish?

The correct answer here is a site is never finished. An acceptable answer might be something like “Phase 1 will be done in 6 weeks.” There’s always room for improvements, tweaks, value-add-ons and other work to consistently make your site a better experience for your visitors. If they’re a blow-n-go shop you may find you’re abandoned 6 months down the road when you’re ready to revise/add to your site.

5. Are most of your solutions CSS or straight HTML based?

This gets a little technical but a CSS based site will give you much more flexibility than an HTML based site. CSS stands for cascading style sheets. With a CSS based site, the formatting elements for the entire site are controlled within a single file. Why should you care? It makes managing and tweaking a site much easier. Say for example you decide 3 weeks after the site launches you don’t like the font color. You can make a single edit to the CSS style sheet and the whole site changes. With an HTML based site the same change requires manually editing each and every page to make the same change. This blog is CSS based and I can change the ENTIRE look by clicking a button. That’s only possible with CSS.

Tech stuff aside, a shop that’s using CSS indicates they’re committed to the best of breed solutions.

5.5 How many other real estate sites have you done?

Conventional wisdom would say “go with a pro” someone who’s done a ton of real estate sites. But I’d challenge that notion. What you want is fresh thinking not been-there-done-that-so-here’s-your-site thinking. A shop that really understands usability, design and experiences but is light on real estate development could be just the ticket for a stunning fresh site. Remember, at the end of the day it’s not about what you think is great, it’s about what your visitors think is great. Sometimes we’re so in the bottle and can’t read the label that we need this outside perspective.

Happy hunting!