Questions to Ask Before Hiring a Web Designer: 15 Things Small Business Owners Forget

Hiring a web designer is one of those decisions that looks simple until the invoice arrives, the launch date slips, or you discover you don’t actually own your own website. The difference between a smooth project and an expensive mess is almost never talent. It’s clarity, and clarity comes from asking the right questions to ask a web designer before anything is signed.

This guide gives you 15 questions small business owners routinely forget, what a solid answer sounds like, and the warning signs that should make you pause. Print it, bring it to your discovery call, and use it to compare quotes side by side.

Why the vetting conversation matters more than the portfolio

Portfolios are curated. Every studio shows its best five projects. What a portfolio cannot tell you is:

• Whether the project finished on time, or six months late
• Who wrote the content, and whether the client had to scramble for it
• What happened when the client asked for a seventh round of changes
• Who holds the domain, the hosting account and the admin login today
• Whether the site still ranks, loads fast and converts two years later

Those answers come from questions, not screenshots. Treat the first call as an interview in both directions: a professional studio will be interviewing you just as carefully.

The quick checklist: 15 questions at a glance

Part 1: Scope and deliverables

1. What exactly is included in this quote, and what is not?

A number on a page means nothing without a line item list behind it. Ask for the quote to specify: strategy and discovery, wireframes, visual design, development, content integration, forms, integrations (booking, CRM, newsletter, payment), testing, launch, and training.

A good answer sounds like: a written proposal where each deliverable is named, plus an explicit list of exclusions such as copywriting, photography, logo design, translations, third party plugin licences or ongoing hosting. This overview fills in the gaps.

Red flag: a single price with one sentence of description, or a verbal promise that everything is included.

2. How many pages, templates and unique layouts are covered?

Most quotes are built on templates, not pages. A five page site with five completely different layouts costs far more than a fifteen page site using four templates. Clarify:

• The number of unique page designs versus repeated templates
• What happens if you need three more pages mid project
• Whether blog, case study or service page templates are included
• The cost per additional page or template, stated up front

3. Who is responsible for content, images and copy?

This is the single biggest cause of stalled projects. Designers are usually waiting on the client, not the other way around. Ask directly: do you write the copy, do I, or do we work with a copywriter? Who sources photography and who pays for stock licences? Who migrates existing blog posts?

How we answer it at Berardo Modern: we define content ownership in the proposal before kickoff, provide a page by page content template with word counts, and set a content deadline that is treated as a real milestone. If content is not ready, we say so early rather than silently sliding the launch date.

Part 2: Process and timeline

4. What is your design and project management process?

You want to hear named phases, not vibes. A mature process usually looks like this:

1. Discovery: goals, audience, competitors, current analytics
2. Strategy and sitemap: page structure, user journeys, conversion points
3. Wireframes: layout and hierarchy before any colour
4. Visual design: homepage and key templates presented for approval
5. Development: build, responsive testing, integrations
6. Content and QA: population, link checks, forms, speed, browsers
7. Launch and handover: redirects, analytics, training, documentation

Also ask who you talk to. One point of contact, or five people in a shared inbox? Which tool tracks tasks and feedback? How often will you receive updates?

5. How long will the project take from kickoff to launch?

Ask for a phase by phase timeline with dates, not a single duration. Typical ranges for small business projects:

Red flag: anyone promising a full custom site in one week without seeing your content. Speed usually means a recycled template and no strategy.

6. What do you need from me, and what happens if I am late?

Ask for a client responsibilities list: brand assets, logins, content, feedback deadlines, approvals. Then ask the uncomfortable follow up: if I miss a deadline by three weeks, does the project get rescheduled, and is there a fee? Knowing the rule in advance prevents resentment later.

Part 3: Revisions, pricing and contracts

7. How many rounds of revisions are included, and what counts as a round?

Two designers can both say two rounds included and mean completely different things. Define it:

• A round is one consolidated batch of feedback from your side, not three emails on three days
• Revisions apply to the approved direction, not a complete restart
• Changes after sign off on a phase are billed at an agreed hourly rate
• The hourly rate for extra work is written in the contract

Also ask how feedback is collected. Comments on a live staging link or annotated PDF beats scattered emails every time.

8. What is the payment schedule, and what happens if we stop?

Standard practice is a deposit to book the slot, one or more milestone payments, and a final payment before or at launch. Questions worth asking:

• Is the deposit refundable, and until when?
• If I cancel at the design stage, what do I keep?
• Are files released before final payment? (Usually no, and that is normal.)
• Are there late payment or project pause fees?

Part 4: Ownership, hosting and platform

9. Who owns the website, the design files and the content after launch?

This is the question small business owners forget most often, and it is the one that hurts the most. Get in writing that on final payment, full ownership of the design, the code and the content transfers to your business, and that you receive administrator access.

Watch for arrangements where the studio keeps ownership and rents the site to you monthly. That model can be legitimate, but you must know you are renting, not buying, before you sign. If you leave, you may leave with nothing.

10. Where will the site be hosted, and whose name is on the accounts?

Ask for a simple inventory of accounts and who controls each one:

Then ask the practical questions: what is the monthly or annual hosting cost, are backups automatic and how far back do they go, what is the uptime commitment, and how quickly is a broken site restored?

11. What platform will you build on, and why is it right for my business?

There is no universally correct answer, only a correct reasoning. A designer should connect the platform to your needs: how often you update content, whether you sell online, whether you need multiple languages, your internal skills, your growth plans.

• WordPress: flexible, huge ecosystem, strong for content and SEO, needs maintenance
• Shopify: best for product based commerce, less flexible for editorial content
• Webflow or similar: clean output, fast to build, platform dependent
• Custom build: justified when you have unusual functionality or scale

Follow up worth asking: is this a pre-built theme, a customised theme, or a fully custom build? And can I edit text and images myself without breaking the layout?

Part 5: SEO, performance and accessibility

12. What SEO is included in the build, and what is not?

Design and SEO are not separate purchases. A build should include the technical foundation even if ongoing SEO campaigns are a separate service. Ask whether the following are covered:

• Keyword informed sitemap and URL structure
• Unique title tags and meta descriptions for every page
• Clean heading hierarchy and semantic markup
• Image compression and descriptive alt text
• Schema markup for your business type
• XML sitemap, robots file, canonical tags, HTTPS
• 301 redirects from every old URL if this is a redesign
• Analytics and Search Console set up and verified before launch

That redirect point deserves emphasis. Redesigns lose rankings mainly because old URLs were left to return 404 errors. Ask explicitly how the migration will preserve existing traffic.

13. How will you handle speed, mobile and accessibility?

Ask what performance target the studio works to, how the site is tested on real devices, and whether accessibility is considered. Reasonable commitments include Core Web Vitals in the green range, testing on small phones as well as large desktops, keyboard navigation, sufficient colour contrast and properly labelled forms. Accessibility is no longer a nice extra: it widens your audience and reduces legal exposure. Ten questions to ask a website designer is a useful companion to this.

Part 6: Launch, support and results

14. What happens after launch?

Many projects end the day the site goes live, which is exactly when websites start needing attention. Clarify:

• Is there a warranty period for bugs, and how long? (30 to 60 days is common)
• Are core, theme and plugin updates included, or a separate plan?
• What is the response time for urgent issues, and how do I report one?
• Will I get training and documentation to manage the site myself?
• What are the maintenance costs per month, in writing?

A clear handover should include a video walkthrough, a credentials document and a short guide to editing your own pages. If a studio cannot explain how you will update your own opening hours, that is a dependency, not a service.

15. How will we know if the website worked?

The best designers talk about business outcomes, not awards. Ask what metrics will be tracked from day one: form submissions, calls, bookings, quote requests, organic sessions, conversion rate by page. Agree on a review point, for example 60 or 90 days after launch, to look at real data and adjust.

Bonus: the questions a good designer will ask you

Vetting works both ways. If nobody asks you these, you are buying decoration rather than strategy:

• Why are you redesigning now, and what is the current site failing to do?
• Who is your ideal customer, and how do they currently find you?
• What action should a visitor take on the site?
• Who are your competitors, and what do you want to be different?
• Who has final approval on your side?
• What is your budget range and your deadline?

Red flags checklist

• No written contract or proposal
• Refuses to transfer ownership or admin access
• Registers your domain in their own name
• Guarantees a number one Google ranking
• Unlimited revisions promised with no definition
• No staging or preview environment
• Cannot supply two or three references or live client sites
• Vague on timelines and on what happens if they slip
• Price far below every other quote with the same scope

How to compare two or three proposals fairly

Score each quote against the same criteria rather than the headline price. A simple weighted table works well:

Note the last line: compare total cost of year one, including hosting, maintenance, licences and expected extras, not just the build fee.

Ready to put these questions to us?

Everything above is how we run projects at Berardo Modern: written scope, phase based timelines, defined revision rounds, full ownership transfer on final payment, technical SEO built in and a documented handover. Bring this checklist to a discovery call and ask us all 15. If any answer is not clear enough, tell us and we will put it in writing.

Frequently asked questions

What are the 7 C’s of website design?

They are a memory aid for the elements that make a site effective: Content, Context (layout and design), Community, Customisation, Communication, Connection and Commerce. Ask a designer how your project addresses the ones relevant to your business model rather than treating all seven as mandatory.

What are the 7 principles of web design?

Commonly cited principles are visual hierarchy, balance, contrast, consistency, alignment, white space and emphasis on user focus. In practice, judge a design by whether a first time visitor understands what you do, who it is for and what to do next within a few seconds.

What questions should I ask a designer if I have a small budget?

Ask what the smallest useful version of the project looks like, whether it can be built in phases, whether a customised template reduces cost without hurting quality, and what the ongoing costs will be. A good studio will tell you honestly when your budget does not match your scope instead of quietly cutting corners.

Should I ask for references or client contacts?

Yes. Ask for two or three live sites built in the last couple of years and, if possible, a client you can email. Useful questions to the reference: did the project finish on schedule, were there surprise costs, and how responsive was the team after launch?

What are good interview questions for a web designer I want to hire in-house?

Beyond the project questions above, ask them to walk through one case study end to end, explain a design decision they later regretted, describe how they handle conflicting stakeholder feedback, and show how they build responsive layouts and accessible components. Their reasoning matters more than their tool list.

Do I really need to own my hosting account?

You need control or a guaranteed exit. Managed hosting through your designer is convenient and often better maintained, provided the contract states that you can request a full export and migration at any time without penalty, and that your domain stays registered in your business name. Much the same conclusion turns up on circlesstudio.com.