Web Design Question

Delaney

I want to set up a site that is similar to one or two existing sites which are not basic sites.

From a design & cost perspective would I be better going to either of the web designers from those sites because they know the technology and therefore it would be quicker and cheaper than giving the brief to someone who may or may not know the technology required.

eg if I wanted to set up a site like daft.ie or myhome.ie, should I only be dealing with a design company that has those type of sites in their portfolio ?

What does a Non disclosure agreement cover ? That the design company wont disclose ANY details of the arrangement with client including replicating design work or technologies used or is it that they wont add their site to their portfolio >?

smcelhinney

Any graphic designer/web developer worth their weight in gold (or paint) would be able to "emulate" any website out there.

Key is to introduce a certain amount of originality into it. Fair enough, the brief will be "i want it looking and acting like website-x.ie", but a graphic designer will be able to augment that.

Just get any graphic designer to do a design based on your brief, at the end of the day, if you're not happy, dont contract him/her!

Delaney

Yeah but would it be cheaper to deal with a web designer who has already designed a similar site ?

kjt

I personally don't think it would be cheaper

heggie

also, if someone came to me and asked me to do pretty much an exact replcia of a previous job, I would'nt touch it, don't think many would

janmc

What you need is to hire someone who gives you an overall price instead of someone who charges an hourly rate. A lot of web developers are interested in expanding their skill set and would offer you the same price even though it might take them longer if they don't have experience in that 'exact' area. Obviously you need someone who is fluent in PHP (or whatever language your site will require), but you will end up with a more original site in the end than if you go somewhere where they churn out sites that look the same all the time.

DJB

Personally, I've done about 20+ property websites and it is this experience and knowledge that my clients are paying for. I think to get the same type of website from a different web designer that doesn't have the same experience, would cost more. You would be paying them to learn the curve! And I'm not just talking about how to install google maps or something like that. I mean why do something a certain way. What makes that way better?

A non disclosure agreement can cover any information shared, is treated as strictly confidential and you can put it in your contracts that this would be a breach of contract if disclosed. In terms of website designs and features, you would need it put into your contract that items are "exclusive" and that the Intellectual Property is transferred to you, especially in the case of website features. Asking a design company not to add it to their portfolio is understandable and it wouldn't be too difficult to hide all details about them from source code, etc.

You've got me really intrigued about what you are doing after reading this post and the other about .ie's. Maybe you'll PM me and share... but I doubt it!

Best of luck anyway and just shout if I can be of further assistance!

Eoin

Are you going to be giving a very detailed brief on the administration end?

For example, what people should see when they're adding a new property, how the search engine will prioritise results, the structure of the database (will you provide a definitive list of areas, or can people add new ones)?

There's a LOT to think about when designing something like this, and if you want to be able to leave a lot of it up to the designer to do, then I'd want to see examples of previous work.

This sounds like a project where you want a developer and designer working together. The presentation, business logic and data tiers all have to be up to scratch, and I've met very few people who excel at both the graphic design and programming end for a project of this (potential) scale.

Delaney

eoin_s wrote:

Are you going to be giving a very detailed brief on the administration end?

For example, what people should see when they're adding a new property, how the search engine will prioritise results, the structure of the database (will you provide a definitive list of areas, or can people add new ones)?

There's a LOT to think about when designing something like this, and if you want to be able to leave a lot of it up to the designer to do, then I'd want to see examples of previous work.

This sounds like a project where you want a developer and designer working together. The presentation, business logic and data tiers all have to be up to scratch, and I've met very few people who excel at both the graphic design and programming end for a project of this (potential) scale.

I never said it was a property website !:o

The web business that I want to setup is not a new idea.I want to develop one that takes the good parts of successful sites and leaves out the ones I don't like.I have my own ideas that I would want to include so Im not looking to cog anyones site ! I will also require flexibilty to add shopping cart, online payments etc in the future which some of the others already use. I would like it to be a significant reference site that will encourage traffic looking for this info. Therefore I would like to include a lot of text, preferably pdfs of documents that I will be generating myself. Does this cause any problems over text on individual pages ?

There is considerable work required by myself before I can get to the stage of bringing the work to a webdesigner in relation to content. I would want CMS as the site will require regular updating. I dont want to waste a designers time until Im ready!

How much would an auctioneers site cost to design and host starting from scratch as a matter of interest ?

By the way when I get up and running, I will be shouting from the roof tops !:rolleyes:

Eoin

Delaney wrote:

I never said it was a property website !:o

The web business that I want to setup is not a new idea.I want to develop one that takes the good parts of successful sites and leaves out the ones I don't like.I have my own ideas that I would want to include so Im not looking to cog anyones site ! I will also require flexibilty to add shopping cart, online payments etc in the future which some of the others already use. I would like it to be a significant reference site that will encourage traffic looking for this info. Therefore I would like to include a lot of text, preferably pdfs of documents that I will be generating myself. Does this cause any problems over text on individual pages ?

There is considerable work required by myself before I can get to the stage of bringing the work to a webdesigner in relation to content. I would want CMS as the site will require regular updating. I dont want to waste a designers time until Im ready!

How much would an auctioneers site cost to design and host starting from scratch as a matter of interest ?

By the way when I get up and running, I will be shouting from the roof tops !:rolleyes:

Sorry, I took the myhome.ie and daft references too literally, so that's the functionality I thought of when I posted originally. A CMS and online store is a lot more generic functionality, but it's hard to tell without knowing more about the nature of the site, which I appreciate you're not ready to do yet. While the concept or idea of the site may be very new or unique, the structure of the content may not be, so the same CMS from a very different site may work as the types of content and structure of the site may be quite similar.

I know that google can search PDFs quite well, but I don't know if they rank as highly as well-marked up content will. Personally I don't like PDFs online - it takes too long to open them. They're great for printing and so on, but they're not a particularly friendly for online use. This is more personal preference, but I'd get pretty annoyed if I had to open 10 pdfs on one site, rather than just 10 pages.

How much would an auctioneers site cost to design and host starting from scratch as a matter of interest ?

An auctioneer's site is usually a lot less complex than something like myhome.ie and daft. You're not likely to have personalised searches and user profiles and all that stuff, so it would cost a lot less to develop. I'm afraid I geniunely don't like putting a price on something so vague, but I'm sure someone else here can give you a rough figure.

Also, an auctioneers site is going to be updated by someone who works for them, and therefore can be trained in how to use it. The admin interface doesn't have to be as intuitive as one that is used by a wide range of other companies or individuals like daft or myhome. I'm not suggesting that corners should be cut in this case, but it does move down the list of priorities slightly.

DJB

For an auctioneers website you're talking anywhere between 5k and 20k and more depending on the features you want. The average one I do is between 5k and 10k but I have seen companies charge 25k for the same work. For a daft/myhome type site, you are talking about 50k-100k with an ongoing support contract to match. But that price is from a web company and not an individual or small group of individuals but I would say it's not far off.

Delaney

Thanks for the reply. That is why I was wondering if it was less expensive to get design work done by someone doing similar sites. Surely the job would take fewer hours if one is familiar with the templates, setup, codes, languages etc than someone who hasn't done one before. How many hours work would be in a basic auctioneer site ?

Ps your portfolio is very good.;)

DJB

It really depends on the website and how complex it is. A lot of designers/developers have a code library that they build up over the years and they use that stuff to speed up development. Chances are, if you use a developer with a few years experience, they'll have done something along the lines of what you want or know how to go about doing it at least.

In terms of hours for a basic auctioneers website... it really depends! For one I did recently... this includes meetings, design concepts, xhtml/css, cms setup, frontend website setup with functionality, testing, seo, etc.... it came in around 40-50 hours.

p.s. glad you like my portfolio, just added a couple of new ones in today.