After you have hired a good web developer to oversee the creation of your custom site, your next step is to draw on his or her connections to help you find a designer who can bring your project to life online, says Cara Crosetti, Los Angeles-based account director and web specialist with Wickware Communications Inc. of Toronto.
“When it comes to design, things are very subjective,” Crosetti says. “But finding a designer is based on style, target market and pricing. Making conscientious decisions [on who to hire] is important.”
Crosetti offers the following suggestions to help you chose a website designer who best suits your needs:
> Custom or template?
Professional and experienced designers will have a portfolio of work that you can examine before signing on the dotted line. After carefully looking over a designer’s work, ask whether they design their sites custom or from a template.
“Lots of designers say they developed the site,” Crosetti says. “But they just used a template and made some different graphics and plugged them in.”
A custom design will help ensure your site stands out from the rest. But there are ways to make a template design your own.
> Use colour
One of the easiest ways to create a custom look is with a dynamic colour palette. People are naturally drawn to colour, Crosetti says, and you should use this to your advantage.
With only about four seconds to grab a surfer’s attention, you need to quickly captivate visitors in order to keep them on your website.
Crosetti recommends using contrasting colours. Traditionally, there is plenty of blue on financial services websites. So, finding a good contrasting colour, such as a red or yellow, might work well.
> Check ownership
Before signing a contract with a designer, make sure you know who is the proper owner of any digital artwork that is created. Ensure that your designer will provide you with layered graphic files that you can legally use later, in items such as email signatures. Also, ensure that you can edit these elements yourself.
Identifying copyright issues in advance, Crosetti says, can prevent legal problems later on.
> Check out the competition
Find out what other advisors, especially those who share your target market, are doing with their websites and encourage your prospective designer to do the same.
If the designer is not abundantly familiar with financial advisory services, gauge his or her willingness to research the industry before designing anything for you. You can help facilitate this process by giving the designer a list of some of the advisor websites you think really work well.
> Make it dynamic
A dynamic website is one that is equipped to automatically display properly on mobile devices. If you are unable to acquire a dynamic website, then at least make sure you have a mobile plugin — otherwise your site is likely to look like an HTML page from 1992 on a client’s mobile device.
This is the third installment in a four-part series on designing your own website. Next: creating and maintaining a blog.