A third-party web design service provider can help you achieve business goals. Discover if you need to outsource.
Designing a web page isn’t just about creating a few visually appealing pages. From speed and search performance to accessibility and user experience, a well-designed website has to tick many boxes. Most small-business leaders are often confused if they should keep web design in-house or outsource it.
Outsourced web design can save you time and secure better results while reducing the workload on your internal teams. According to a recent Capterra survey*, 44% of small and midsize businesses (SMBs) say they utilize service providers because they don't have the capacity to complete the work in-house. If you’re curious about web design outsourcing, here's some advice to help you decide if it's right for your business.
What is web design?
Web design is the process of determining a website's visual layout and its overall functioning. Brands may hire web designers to revamp their existing websites or create new ones. These professionals can work in-house, but since their services may not be needed on a long-term daily basis, they can be hired as contractors or freelancers.
What is web design outsourcing?
Web design outsourcing is when a business hires a third-party—either a web design agency or a freelance designer—to create their website. While "web design" primarily refers to planning the visual structure and storyboard of a website, many web design agencies tap into development resources to execute the right design for your business. This means you can get turnkey services when outsourcing your website project.
Why outsource web design?
Web design outsourcing can save time, money, and other resources for small businesses, allowing them access to experienced professionals across diverse industries.
Cost efficiency
Hiring a full-time or part-time employee to manage your in-house web design includes spending time, resources, and money on interviews, onboarding, and training. These processes aggravate business expenses, and can be easily avoided by working with third-party service providers.
An experienced freelancer or an agency will provide turnkey services at a flat hourly or package price. While you may have to retain employees with additional perks (such as health insurance and food coupons), third-party service providers can be hired as per your project’s needs. Hence, outsourcing web design can prove effective for small business owners aiming to save money without compromising on their web design’s quality.
Time efficiency
Another key benefit of outsourcing web design is the amount of time it can save. Hiring an employee can take weeks—if not months—to search, reach, interview, onboard, and train the selected candidate. It is important to adhere to fair hiring practices and consider diverse candidates who are qualified enough to meet your business needs.
Freelancers and agencies can provide you with references to check their work’s success rate. Most freelancers maintain portfolios, including details of their past work and references. Agencies can also present case studies and testimonials of their previous clients.
Both agencies and freelancers can provide you with a project completion date and timeline, so you don’t need to intervene to keep things up and running. This will allow you to invest your time to finish other important tasks.
Diverse talent
If you’re a small-business leader aiming to achieve great results for your business, you should give a fair chance to diverse talent. Hiring in-house web designers may restrict your options to locals with limited experience. If you choose to hire remote workers in-house, you’ll have to focus on reaching the right people, so you can have diverse brains working to make your project successful.
Web design outsourcing simplifies your search for diversely talented individuals. This is because you can easily find qualified agencies or freelancers from their own websites or their listings on third-party platforms.
Fresh ideas
When hiring in-house, there's a tendency to search for people who may be a good cultural fit. Such biased hiring criteria can create a hive-mind environment, leading to a lack of fresh ideas. Even a candidate deemed perfectly fit for a role may require some time to comfortably present dissenting opinions ahead of a team. Agencies and freelancers don't have such restraints.
Having an outside perspective on your projects may help you understand things differently. Moreover, when you outsource web design services, you can take advantage of all the latest tools to improve your internal operations and the brand’s public reputation.
Web design outsourcing vs. in-house
In a 2022 survey, Capterra* asked over 1,000 SMB decision-makers in the U.S. about what triggered their decision to search for a service provider. Here's what respondents answered:
19% required a new strategic direction
19% needed a way to increase productivity
18% had entered a new phase of growth
16% needed a problem solver faster than them
11% had a change in management
Outsourcing your web design project may be the right choice if you fit into any of these categories. It's also a better option if tackling the project in-house will strain your existing resources, come with a major learning curve, and/or require you to hire specialized talent that you may not be able to utilize on a long-term basis.
If you need help finding the right company, check out our hiring guide for web design services. The guide contains useful information about web design companies, their services, and differences between developers and designers.
Searching for a website design company to hire for your business? We’ve got you covered. Check out our list of companies in the following areas:
How much does web design outsourcing cost?
There are various web designers in the market. Hence, it is important to research how to choose the right web designer for your business. The cost of outsourcing your web design project will depend on multiple factors, including your website’s complexity and the type of person or business you outsource to. From the most affordable to the most expensive, your options may include an offshore freelancer, offshore agency, onshore freelancer, and onshore agency.
While most freelancers charge per hour, some may offer a flat project rate for the entire website. Agencies, on the other hand, typically charge per project. Consider discussing project details, such as the number of pages required for your design, and specific features you may want to be added (cost calculators, contact forms, etc.) so you can get a quote from the service providers. Optional services, such as web copywriting and web development, may imply additional charges.
Prepare your business for web design outsourcing
If you're looking for web design tips or more information on outsourcing web design work, you must circle back to why web design is important for your business. You should prioritize the skills required, deliverables, and targets your project has to understand your business’s outsourcing needs better.
Here’s how you can prepare to outsource web design for your business:
Establish well-defined criteria. While a web design agency can help you develop a design from scratch, it's ideal to sit down with your team and discuss some key elements and features you want to incorporate into the final design. Having a list of "must haves" and "nice to haves" will allow you to find the right talent and get a more accurate quote upfront.
Check portfolios and testimonials before hiring. There is no shortage of qualified freelancers and agencies ready to help with your project, but the perfect fit for one business may not fit another. Spare some time to go through portfolios, testimonials, and case studies to look for designs similar to your needs.
Avoid cookie-cutter designs. When web designers work with multiple clients, they often find a groove that can speed up the process but also lead to a cookie-cutter website. Make sure to ask the right questions about how the web designers will be working. Consider asking if they will start with an existing template or if they will customize it for your needs.
Find better ways to collaborate. Just because you outsourced your web design project doesn't mean you should be out of the loop. Find ways to collaborate with web designers that work for everyone involved. When vetting agencies, consider time zones and business hours to ensure they coincide with your team’s availability.
Final steps
Now that you know how to outsource web design projects, it’s time to dig deep into the prep work. Consider choosing a collaboration tool to get your team brainstorming on what could go into your website project. You might also need to look into content management and accessibility solutions to start figuring out the details you want to incorporate into your website.
Once you have laid out a strong foundation and have a clear direction for your project, you can pick an agency and start moving forward with the web design best suited to your business' needs.