The number one piece of advice I give my clients.

I develop custom websites for a living. I charge my clients for the time it takes to produce the work. That is the absolute sum total of my business model. The more work I do, the more I charge. The less work I do, the less I charge. 

This is why the biggest single piece of advice I can give a business owner is this: don't screw down your vendors on the price! You're not getting one over them and tricking them into making the same product for a lower cost, YOU'RE GETTING A WORSE PRODUCT. 

Do you really want the public face of your company to be the absolute cheapest thing that could possibly be sticky-taped together? Or do you want it to shine with a vivid image of quality and professionalism? 

Choosing a vendor is always a tough gig, everyone's advertising fluff says they're the biggest and best in the industry, and that their solution is the greatest. Picking the right company to work with isn't a simple task, but going for the cheapest solution, particularly if everyone is responding to the exact same brief, is going to get you a poor result. 

I've worked on projects in the past where we've taken to the scope with a chainsaw to get it down to a set budget, packing in every last possible piece of functionality for the dollar. Guess what? It doesn't work. You're much better off with less functionality and a healthier budget to get it done with quality and attention to detail. Have you ever done your best work while you were desperately rushing to get it done? No, and neither has anyone else. 

Assembler is a web design agency based in Perth, Western Australia. This blog is intended to be an informal, behind the scenes look into the web design and development industry. If you like our content, please follow us on LinkedIn or Facebook!