About web site designers... there's a low bar for admittance into the profession... all someone needs is a computer & ISP. I've seen a lot of people who don't even know how to spell "website" or don't even know basic HTML coding actually get work designing sites for mom & pop operations. My guess is that they're cheap. Ultimately though, the sites they design are coded very inefficiently, though they may look OK on the surface. Down the road when you know better, that means redoing the whole site from practically scratch to get it up to speed.
A criteria for choosing a web site designer would be to find someone who has built sites exactly like the one you have in mind, that is, with the specific function of the site in mind. For example, is it to be a blog? Is it to host a shopping cart? Will you have hundreds of products and want to therefore have a database driven site? Does the designer know how to write javascript to make your site interactive? Do they understand how to use style sheets? Do they know what a "script call" is? Do they know how to use SSI? Do they know how to script PHP and other CGI scripts? Or are they instead so heavily dependent on FrontPage and Dreamweaver that they don't really know HTML (newbies!)? Surf around and find similar sites that not only look good and clean and professional to you, they also are functioning along the same lines as what you want your site to do, and the navigation throughout the site is easy to understand and impliment. Then get in touch with that designer (they may have a link at the bottom of the home page) or contact the webmaster for the recco.
A criteria for choosing a web site designer would be to find someone who has built sites exactly like the one you have in mind, that is, with the specific function of the site in mind. For example, is it to be a blog? Is it to host a shopping cart? Will you have hundreds of products and want to therefore have a database driven site? Does the designer know how to write javascript to make your site interactive? Do they understand how to use style sheets? Do they know what a "script call" is? Do they know how to use SSI? Do they know how to script PHP and other CGI scripts? Or are they instead so heavily dependent on FrontPage and Dreamweaver that they don't really know HTML (newbies!)? Surf around and find similar sites that not only look good and clean and professional to you, they also are functioning along the same lines as what you want your site to do, and the navigation throughout the site is easy to understand and impliment. Then get in touch with that designer (they may have a link at the bottom of the home page) or contact the webmaster for the recco.
