Quality takes time! The video that every client should see.
I often say to potential clients "We're the agency you come speak to for your second website" - the reason being that as a business, by the time you're ready for your second website you're looking for quality web design, you're looking for something bigger and better than the first site, and along with that comes the expectation that it's going to cost more as well. But where does that extra money go?
Well, if you spend 60 seconds watching the following video, you will immediately understand. Quality takes time! There's no shortcut. If you want your website to look good and operate as you expect it to, then that is going to take TIME.
It's important as well to understand the scale of time here; it takes the artist TEN TIMES longer to do the job properly. It's not a case of adding 10% to the budget, that isn't going to make a difference. So how do you manage this balance between delivering quality web design, and what it is you're expecting out of the project? As with most things, less is more!
As I've said before, one of the worst things you can do as a client is to jam too much into the project timeline. You are much better off with a website that's done well, but has fewer features. Take the time to think about what you REALLY need - are you adding that piece of functionality because you saw your competitors do it, and you want to too? Have you taken the time consider whether your end users will actually need or want it? I can't tell you the number of times I've built some specific piece of functionality for a client, only to see it go entirely unused. At the time, it was the most important thing in the world, but unless you actually design from the perspective of your users... all that hard work might end up being a white elephant that chews up your valuable budget, dragging down the quality of the rest of your site, while delivering nothing on its own.
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!