I'm sometimes amazed by how much money some people are paying for their website design.
I recently spent some time updating someones website for them and found out that they had spent over £3000 on the original design in 2010! With only 3 and a half hours work I completely redesigned the site and brought it up to date. I only wish I'd been able to charge them £3000 for my work - I'd make a fortune in a short time 
I'm not saying that you should find the lowest priced web designer available - doing this could cause you major headaches! The best approach to getting the right designer for your website is to do the following:
- follow our guide to planning your website design - this will allow you to provide potential web designers with a detailed brief to work with
- ask for samples of previous work form any potential designers (also check out their own site - if they are good their site should be too)
- get the web designers to provide you with a detailed fixed quote, with this you'll know exactly what you are getting and how much you are paying for it
- try to avoid a designer who wants to charge hourly for their work. If they do how do you know how much time they are really spending on your site?
- if your website is going to be updated on a frequent basis then find a designer who will set up a Content Management System such as Joomla
- ask any potential web designers whether they'l design yor site from scratch or if they use templates. Using pre-built templates is always a bit of a cheat in my eyes!
Hopefully you'll find this advice useful to finding the right website designer and you won't end up spending £3000 on a website that can be done in 3 hours - if you want any further help or advice then please feel free to contact us by email or phone on 0800 95 00 163
