Do not think that if a web designer is selling you a template that he/she won’t sell it to the next purchaser? Think again. Selling gorgeous templates to small businesses or freelancers is the ultimate cash cow and the only way to ensure that this template doesn’t wind up on numerous domains is to ‘buy out’ the design so that it is all yours. Just how much are you willing to pay for these exclusive rights?

As a web designer, I often visit sites just to see how much imagination is out there on the web. And guess what happened during one of my visits to numerous sites? I came across a professionally designed website that gave me the strange feeling like I had seen it before. Perhaps having a memory like an elephant presented a prompt flashback. De ja vu, well not quite since the site wasn’t exactly the same since some elements and colors had been changed but it was designed in an identical manner to the other site and I had Firefox bookmarks to prove it.

This is not what you want prospective clients to stumble upon as they search the web doing their preliminary research. What do you think potential clients might think of a web design business that uses templates to promote their work? My first thought would be that they don’t have the vision to do the work themselves and for that they would get one out of five stars in my book.

When compiling elements for your website, you always want your designer to craft innovative logos and graphics. A truly professional web designer will always build their designs from scratch by presenting artistic ideas that speak volumes without screaming the word ‘template’. Part three of this series will discuss contracts and reasons why they should never be avoided.

One of the first things that will lead a client to the right designer is experience. Make sure your potential designer has plenty of experience in designing and developing a web site to completion. And you might ask, how do I access this designer’s experience? Always ask to see a portfolio. Make sure he/she can provide evidence of creativity as well as logical thought. What I mean by that is, can he/she think like a web site user and be able to provide solutions to common web design problems?

This issue is common-place with some designers in that their designs are not user-friendly and will subsequently frustrate site users. We have all been to sites that we gawk at in complete bafflement as we have to figure out how to navigate through their design maze. And sometimes, try as we may, we are unable to do this successfully. So what happens to users when they are frustrated and have been made to think just a little bit too long and hard about their next move? You guessed it, they leave and some never return.

A good designer understands and is very much cognizant of the user experience that he/she must provide, therefore, focusing their design decisions on accommodating the user so that they will return again and again. This completes part one of the series on searching for a web designer. Part two of this series will discuss Originality and how templates are not always a good idea.

If you dont have a knack for locating harmonious colors, then I can recommend a great book, called “Color Harmony” By Bride M. Whelan. It provides visual charts for the style of color that you are trying to create, which is actually the foundation for creating a harmonious color palette. It greatly depends on the mood you are trying to set for your website user and how you want to make them feel.

A rich color palette of blues, oranges and whites may signify a professional or corporate tone where as greens, browns and blacks may signify a deeper and mysterious tone.