Choosing the Right Web Design Company in Sydney

Nowadays, people look at a website before they do any business with a brand. In a way, your website is the face of your company on the World Wide Web. There are many providers of services like website development and website design in Sydney. Choosing the right company may be difficult when there are so many agencies that are claiming that they are the best.

How to Choose Your Website Design Company in Sydney

How do you even know which company is telling the truth and which one of them can represent your brand best? Here are some tips that you can follow to ensure that you choose the right company to work with:

1. Create a list of needs and goals for your website.

First, you need to make sure that you know what your goals are and what you are trying to accomplish with your website. Even if there is a cornucopia of website design companies in Sydney, some may be able to do some things better than the others. By having a list of what you want and what you need, you can narrow down your options to service providers who are capable of helping you reach your goals. Remember that your website is not just a page—it is a marketing tool that can potentially make or break your company.

Here are some things that you might what your website to do:

• Be able to generate leads
• Be able to sync with your company CRM software
• Be able to integrate your marketing automation tools
• Be able to link your email marketing platforms
• Be able to collect payments or donations
• Be able to let users fill out forms directly on your site and submit to your team

You also need to determine whether you want your website to have features like:

• User-friendly navigation
• SEO optimised content
• Conversion-optimised pages
• Ecommerce functionality
• Secured online forms
• SSL certificate and HTTPs protocol

Keep in mind that, again, your website is more than just a page. It is an extension of your business. Your website should have all the features that can help you achieve your goals. Having a list of your needs, goals and features can help you—and the website design company of your choice—ensure that all your requirements are met. Aside from that, this list can also help your design agency give you a quote for how much it might cost for them to create your website and how long before they will complete it. Knowing the cost and the estimated time of delivery of the website will give you a more realistic expectation.

2. Give a chance to both national and local website design companies.

Once your list of needs is ready, it is time to search for web design company candidates who can work with you to reach your website goals. Make sure that you look at a website design company in Sydney, as well as companies all over the country. Of course, if you have some matters to discuss in person, then choosing an agency near you makes the most sense. However, if you think that you can manage to get your message across via online platforms, then it is not such a bad idea to entertain proposals from further areas. After all, there are many companies out there with different experiences, portfolios, services offered, and agency culture.

3. Make sure to check the web design company experience, culture and portfolios.

Experience, culture and portfolios are three important things to check when looking for a web design company to work on your website. These three things can help you get an idea of how your website will be managed, if the company can meet your goals and standards, and if the designers are skilled enough to be your web design agency.

Experience – You want to make sure that the design agency that you found actually has experience with web development and design. You may want to ask how long their design company has been around or whether they are a startup. This does not mean that you should discriminate against startup design companies, but you do need to see some proof that they have what it takes. You need to make sure that the company has the ability to make the design and development process simple and easy. You also want to know if they can provide you with support for your website after it has gone live. Determine if their team has ongoing marketing services to help grow your business. Lastly, you want to make sure that their team can meet your goals and needs.

Portfolio – A website design company’s portfolio is one of the best ways to assess the skills and capabilities as a design agency. But keep in mind that having a pretty website is not your only goal. You need to take note of how user-friendly their designs are for your prospective visitors. A simple website that is easy to navigate can outperform a gorgeous but complicated website any time of the day. A portfolio can also give you an idea about a company’s creativity, industry experience, complex coding abilities, and more. Here are some points to review when looking at portfolios:

• Are they creating mobile-friendly website designs?
• Are they following the latest design threads?
• Are all the elements of their website design consistent?

In the case that you like what you are seeing in a web design company’s portfolio, but you don’t really see your industry in their samples, you can ask them what they can do for your company.

Culture – It would be easier for you to work with a company if they have the same culture as you do. Their business culture can help you determine if a certain company has a personality that is similar to yours. You can learn more about their culture by checking their social media accounts, their team pages and their community involvement. This is an important factor when choosing your web design agency as this can determine how easy or difficult it will be for you to work with a certain company.

4. Take time to read testimonials and customer reviews.

Other than their portfolio, you can tell how effective and efficient a website design company is by looking at what their past clients say about them. You can see how happy or satisfied their clients are through online reviews. You can find reviews from websites like Google, Facebook, and Yelp. You can also find some highlight testimonials on their website. Be more vigilant and dig a little deeper if the only reviews you see are from their own website.

Questions You Should Ask When Looking for a Web Design Company

Once you have done your research and picked some of your favourite web design companies, the next step is to meet with them and conduct a bit of an interview to get to know them better. Here are some questions you should ask to make sure that you are choosing the right people to handle your website:

1. Ask if they are using a content management system to power the websites they develop.

First things first, content management system or CMS is a website platform that makes it easy for people who have no technical experience to update their website on their own. Not many people know about CMS, so if you ask about it during the interview, the design agency representative should be quite impressed. As you know, developing a website involves some codes, HTML or CSS to edit. It can be tricky if you are not using a CMS.

Obviously, you want them to say that YES, they will be using a CMS for your website.

2. Ask if they have developed any other websites in your industry.

You should see some samples of their work in their portfolio. If they have a sample of a website under your industry then, great! You can also just ask about what they can do for your company. If they don’t have any samples of websites under your industry, you may want to ask them about it. Different website design companies in Sydney, or anywhere else, have different specialties—you would want to know if a certain company specialises in your industry.

3. Ask if you can meet the team that will be working on your website.

Again, you want to make sure that you would enjoy working with the people you hire for your website. You want to know if they share the same culture and views. It will be easier to communicate your ideas to like-minded people.

The Takeaway

You should choose your design agency wisely since they will be responsible for the face of your company on the World Wide Web. You only have one shot at a first impression, and you want to make sure that you leave an excellent impact on your target audience.