Website Tips By Denver-Based Marketing Firm

Dear Business Owner,

We’ve build a few websites (and by few, we mean a lot) in the past few years and we’ve seen some stuff that could help you out as you think about hiring someone to help you with your next website design, or redesign.  These are things that could save you a lot of headaches, time, and money.  We know you’re busy and don’t speak the website lingo day in and day out.  So, we hope you take a few minutes to read through these tips to help you hire your next website designer!bookmakr-this

  1. Own Your Domain Name.   A domain name is the www.yournamehere.com type of name.  People often refer to this as your URL as well.  We recommend purchasing it directly and then giving your web designer the info and access for it. Save the account information and make sure the notifications are being sent to an email account you use on a regular basis.  All of your renewals will be sent as reminders via email.  You can reserve your own domain names here if you want.
  2. Get Admin Access.  Once your website is all completed and paid for in full, make sure you get the logins for any account related to your website. This is typically the domain access, hosting access, WordPress (or similar) login, etc.  We recommend saving this information in a safe place and if you have business partners, make sure all have the info handy!
  3. Ask your web designer if there are any fees associated with leaving their services.  It’s not common, but we have seen it where companies will charge a large fee for moving your site from their server or leaving.  Ask the question from the beginning about this.
  4. Set up Google Analytics (or similar).  One of the questions you should ask your web designer is if they set up Google Analytics, or can sync your existing account with your new site.  Of course, there are other paid programs, but at a minimum it’s a good idea to get this set up.  This will track the website traffic on your site and it’s ideal to get this going from the beginning so that you can see trends and growth from day one.
  5. Mobile Responsive.  Folks, it’s not 2008 anymore, which means that a website has to be mobile responsive to be relevant in the world.  It’s worth asking your designer if the site will be mobile responsive, but if they tell you there’s an extra fee, this is a warning sign!  There’s no need to be nickel and dimed on this feature.
  6. Ask about timeline.  Ask the web designer about their process and what to expect with timelines and milestones.  Everyone works differently and you want a web designer who will work well for you!

We know how powerful a great website can be, and we know how excited you are for a website to showcase your business. If you have questions about your current setup or a company you’re considering working with, we’d be happy to answer any questions or help you get a second opinion (either by my team or other web experts we know).

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