The little-known secret of how to actually choose a web designer
informationhighwayman.com
informationhighwayman.com
Instead, the client is. Once the client has established his or her goals, and worked with marketing/sales/engineering/architects to determine what pages will be built with what functionality, then you hire a graphic designer to produce a "look" that achieves those objectives in the visual realm.
And depending on what kind of objectives you have, you may want a "clean" style or not -- maybe a "grunge" style instead, depending on your market. You may want "modern", or you may want "retro".
And when the author says "...are not actually designers at all. They are artists." Yes, that's the point. And artists are extremely important in seamlessly merging your brand together with your website's functionality.
But if the author is talking about "web designers" in general, then there's barely anything to talk about at all, because it's become such a vague term that nowadays it's practically useless. There are graphic designers, interface designers, information architects, and so on...
To "actually choose a web designer" you need to have a clear idea of what your objectives are for the project and then interview with an open mind. Find somebody intelligent with a strong portfolio. No silly checklist is going to outperform you as a thoughtful decision maker. Litmus tests are used because they are easy, not accurate.
Meta: wait, I guess that's every blogger and comment on the Internet ever, isn't it?
rolling eyes
It's about copywriting.
If your primary objective in hiring a website designer is something like SEO, improving conversions, or otherwise directly generating more revenue, obviously language like "ROI" and "Generate more business" can be a sign that a firm is focused on those aspects of design for the web. If I was looking for a firm that specialized in that area, I would prefer case studies that demonstrate concrete improvements to just an argument or mentioning certain buzzwords.
But lots of web design firms help their clients meet objectives besides immediately increasing business. For some companies, branding doesn't matter at all. But, for some companies, like say a fashion label, branding is extremely important. If they hired a designer who was focused on "ROI" and so forth, they would likely not only get a terrible product that doesn't match their needs, but see very little in the way of new business.
The "secret" of hiring a web designer is just being clear about what you want your new design to do, what your goals are for the design. Whatever those goals are, you should select a few designers whose work looks like it speaks to your goals, and tell them directly about what would constitute a successful design. Ask for examples of times they've successfully reached similar goals for a client in the past.
I think that in many cases (and I'm not a behavioural psychologist or anything), consumers make irrational decisions when shopping... usually based on an emotional response. Personally, I would much rather hire a designer who has experience making "beautiful", "modern", "clean", and "usable" websites than one who claims they will somehow magically pump out a website that immediately provides a high ROI.
Web design is an iterative process that starts from a nice, clean base and improves through A/B testing and similar experiments.
My website exists to sell product. My job is to improve traffic and conversion. Anyone who isn't going to directly contribute to that effort is at best deadweight, at worst pulling in the wrong direction.
I'll give a potential hire the benefit of the doubt based on their website, but if we exchange more than two e-mails and he isn't talking about traffic and conversion, he isn't getting hired.
I'd require very little persuading to hire OP, based purely on him referencing Drayton Bird. The converse is also true - I wouldn't consider ever hiring someone who can't quote chapter and verse on Commonsense Direct Marketing.
Do you believe someone can't be a competent marketer without having read that specific book?
That's if the book really is any good. I'm going to go check it out after your roundabout recommendation.
Look at a site like Vimeo and tell me that beauty and passion aren't critical aspects of this design. Then head on over to AirBnB or Kickstarter or Etsy and tell me that they didn't put a huge amount of design thinking into making a clean, modern site that makes the visitor feel like they are making a difference by participating in a consumer revolution.
Good design extends far beyond logos and colour swatches. To have good design means that you've thought through every interaction path so that you can manipulate how your visitor feels when they use your site or product. You need to connect with their limbic brains first, and only then are you in the best position to really understand how to maximize their ROI.
TL:DR; this is bad advice. Don't hire a designer that only cares about “business objectives”, “return on investment (ROI)”, “your revenue goals”, “lead generation”, “increase sales" because chances are they are also busy with real estate and network marketing. The author knows who not to hire, not who to hire.
If the conversation flows in the opposite direction, you have a problem.
It's not like you hand everything over to a designer and say "achieve my business goals", it's a collaborative process where you make sure your business goals are met.
I am probably using the term "like" a little broadly, as I don't just mean visually appealing, but more so a design that meets my requirements and fits my purpose. Ultimately, I need to judge that, not the designer.
I think this statement is almost backwards. The reason "designers" use buzzwords is because it gets small business owners on board with them. Advertising your design services in a cookie cutter, predictable way is OK if you have the portfolio, skills, and actual marketing knowledge to provide business value. I don't care how great your copy or copywriter is, the text and UI has to be seamlessly integrated into the experience so there is NO distraction and the message can be properly conveyed. This takes an artist...
Bottom line- this guys is missing it
I think this guy is just wrong. A designer's job is to design. It's not his/her job to use buzzwords like "business objective" or "ROI" - it's his job to create a functional, relevant and aesthetically-pleasing website. And, frankly, I think words like 'clean' and 'modern' are GOOD.
As a web consumer, I know I think higher of companies with clean, functional, modern websites. It means they have a clue.
What this means to business-people/developers: you can have all the functionality and low prices in the world, but if no one can get what they want in time, it's all useless. There are no sales if the user can't get to the "Sell" button. There are no ad views if the content is hidden somewhere in .html files or is unreadable.
Actually art is not really about beauty. Serious art is a lot like business, but with one important difference: art is about attracting a very select, discerning audience (while ignoring or even actively repelling the non-discerning audience). The way art works is that this very select, discerning audience will be willing to pay money to establish that very fact. In other words, art is about extracting money in exchange for exclusivity. Most businesses, of course, work in an entirely different mode: they extract money in exchange for service.
On the other hand, it is also not necessarily about beauty. I've played plenty of ugly music that is still great.
Speaking as an artist, I can assure you that is exactly what art is about. Additionally: all people are the same, and have always been.
Even when you do not actively try to play for an audience which has exclusivist tendencies, your art (music) will invariably end up used in a very specific way. There are invisible relations of power behind most of the things that people do, art and music being no exception. In school, we were taught that it is not nice to be exclusivist, however that is not how the world works. Similarly, in school we were taught that desiring power is a bad thing, while it isn't in fact (as long as this desire is productive).
Take a simple example: a guy meets a girl (or the other way around) and asks her what music she listens to. Music taste is a way in which connections are established between individuals (connections between people have a lot to do with power so stay with me...). Now this connection will mean relatively little if the music that both the girl and the guy like can be commonly heard on the radio. The connection will mean a lot if the music they both like is relatively obscure. And it's not just music. Anything, really, that is rare and is shared between two individuals becomes special -- i.e. becomes a nearly fetishistic object signifying the commonality between the two individuals. It's very beautiful actually. And it's all based on exclusivity. Side-note: the "commonality" I am talking about probably has a lot to do with Shannon's entropy and information transferred between the two individuals.
Fair enough. I suppose I can only speak for myself, and to a certain extent I can speak for other artists I know and have talked to about these sorts of things. So yes, please assume that everything here is a gross generalization. Also, please accept my apologies is this whole digression is off-topic. It is something of particular interest to me. If I should shut up, just let me know.
What you're talking about is a popular line of research for musicologists. The way art is used to reinforce social bonds is an important part of why people make art. That doesn't mean that, for artists, that is what art is "about." Any object once it's released into the ether will be used or misused as the people who encounter it see fit. I am responding to the notion that artists are craven elitists whose primary goal is to have their art acquired by rich people in order for them to show how much better they are than the plebes. Rich people do and have done that, but in my experience, if that layer enters into the creation of the art itself, it is generally the artist thinking, "how can I trick some dumb tasteless (bourgeois) rich person into giving me money so I can keep making art." Artists make art because they have to. If it were about getting a paycheck they would have gone into investment banking.
There are some people running around painting or playing a musical instrument who are not like this, who do it because they majored in it in school and some inertia keeps them doing it even though they have no inner drive and no commitment to producing authentic work. I've met them, and I've seen them play. Frequently they are stunning technicians, but I tend to take the 19th century Aestheticist view and say that what they produce is not usually art. Given a double-blind test, could I distinguish between those who have standards and those who don't? I don't know. Again, I like the old-fashioned view that what matters is the-thing-itself.
I am by no means suggesting that artists do not or should not take their audience into account. Art is not effective if it conveys nothing to anyone but the artist. Also, clearly, artists produce different work depending on whom it is for. Mozart, for instance, had a different style for his "public" works, such as symphonies and concertos, than in his music that is intended for connoisseurs, such as string quartets. I don't think this is the same as what you're talking about, though. Taking into account comprehension levels of your audience is part of the craft, and does not preclude producing an authentic product. It does not mean that aesthetic goals are secondary to financial ones.
Sorry, but in reading this and your other reply, it seems more like you're projecting your own issues concerning power onto art itself.
Regarding projection: where did I talk about my own personal issues?
As for projection, it seems like you reduce all of art to power transactions. Sometimes people just make things, you know?
They do, but once you get into anything that matters, you enter power transactions. I am personally not very interested in things (including art) that don't matter; perhaps you differ with me on that.
Regarding aesthetics, I used to like sunset photos, then I used to like black-and-white photography with people in it, then I started to like pensive neutral landscape photography, and now they all make me vomit. Where does aesthetics come into this? Whatever it is, it is so fluid and relative to social norms and self-image (power structures again!) that it is probably not worth talking about without that context.
As a professional entrepreneur running my own company my career began with freelancing and instructing in web/print design. I won't claim to speak on my years of experience at that time of specific "business" knowledge as the author mentions (ROI, revenue goals, etc), nonetheless I never felt it appropriate to market my business skills on my design resumes and portfolios. While I agree wholeheartedly with the importance of understanding business models and revenue goals, I also feel it's not in the web designer's best interest to include these skills on a design portfolio.
All in all - it should be apparent that just because a web designer includes "buzzwords" such as "clean" and "modern" it certainly doesn't mean they don't grasp concepts such as ROI or revenue goals.
These are qualities that any web designer worth their salt will have demonstrated in their portfolio. They will show, not tell, how good they are.
As for the rest of the article, I think it demonstrates the author's skill more as an online marketer rather than a graphic designer. He did get to the front page of HN after all.
I don't know about his world but in mine the marketer worries over conversions and ROI and WORKS WITH the web designer to achieve those goals. Somewhere in there a copywriter is involved. In my office we refer to this as a "web team". Is this a new concept? Can I patent it?
Some projects are purely design-driven, the site just needs to look great (say, for a fuzzy image campaign), and that's simply the job that the client needs to get done.
Other projects (and I like to believe the majority of launches) are clearly business driven and the site needs to accomplish specific goals to meet strategic objectives. In that case, OPs approach makes a lot of sense.
Everything else is human interaction, not browsing through a catalog.
When just starting out, should you be seeking funding, I'd recommend sticking with someone focused on aesthetics - the guy he tells you not to hire. Pretty goes a long way with angel investors and venture capitalists.
information highway man
Award 12 million points if he argues the case
Firstly, that he knows so little about design that he thinks recognizing the importance of branding makes him sound knowledgeable.
he knows so little about marketing that he believes brand
He does not understand how to present a unique value proposition—that most basic element of selling. And he certainly does not understand what matters to your business. He is just an amateur
----
Well I'm no information highway man, but first semester of first year university we did a subject that taught us using gender-specific language when it isn't required never gains you a sale, but may well lose you some.
The author sure lost me with his apparent assumption that only men run web design businesses.
One might note that I took the least extreme position possible: that gender neutral language is harmless; but gender specific language may offend so it makes sens to use the neutral form.
One may also note that there are much more extreme positions available: that the author's language choices displays an underlying current of sexism that is found though out the IT, business and web communities. I didn't say that because I don't think it is true - but perhaps I should have because I'd have started a discussion instead of just getting a downvote.
One might also note that someone could disagree with me and reply, instead of a lazy downvote.
There are all kinds of business-y books out there about copywriting for email marketing etc, but you will never learn the fundamentals from them.
I actually stopped reading when you used the phrase "babbling like a retard". As a Christian like you profess to be, I would probably look a little more closely at the words you choose.
Q: how do you know if somebody is from the US or Europe?
A1: I take offence at that question.
A2: I don't take offence at that question.Looking good but speaking poorly is the message he's trying to get across, not being mentally challenged.
What's the religious link to the word "babbling" or "retard"?
A lot can be said of that.
Great website copy, great website designers... they mean jack if your website doesn't handle the traffic it receives. http://cl.ly/3t2D1E2c3H3A2d1I433W