Why It’s Difficult to Compare Agencies?

As a business, choosing the right digital or web design agency is understandably a difficult and daunting decision, because in the overall scheme of things, their ideas and concepts will come to form the future image of your organisation. As with all important business investments, it’s natural to test the water, and shop around for different web design companies before committing to just one. Often these decisions will be based on a number of factors, including the agency’s portfolio, any industry recommendations, and perhaps most importantly the price of their services.

Speaking as the director of a web design agency, however, I would suggest that, owing to the following factors, it’s difficult to try and compare multiple creative organisations using these over-arching, umbrella categories. Remember that what you’re paying for is not so much a product, but rather a service, which makes it harder to make logical decisions based simply on factors like previous experience and cost.

A sizable issue
When it comes to print and digital design, the size of your agency can drastically affect the services your company benefits from, but it pays to remember that bigger is not always necessarily better. Opting for a larger web design agency can dramatically increase turnaround time, but this will of course be reflected in the invoice you receive once the build is finished. It’s also often difficult to tell whether your site has simply been assigned to one developer, or has benefitted from the creative input of multiple team members. You might find that a lot of online agencies take steps to masque their appearance on their websites, making it difficult for you to ascertain whether or not they justify that hefty price tag. Here at SO, we’re inherently proud of all our team members, and have plastered them all over our About Us page for prospective clients to see, so feel free to take a look.
Smaller web development agencies are naturally cheaper and often work on a project-by-project basis; this means the whole team gets involved in one build at a time, and thus make creating your new site a priority. This often leads to better, more rounded designs that have benefitted from a range of skills, inspiration and creative input.

Apples with… apples?
Part of the issue with comparing web design agencies is that in the large part, however much they might argue to the contrary, their services probably look quite similar to those who aren’t well versed in the area of web development. As a business owner, you’re probably more interested in the finished product, rather than the complicated processes and impenetrable industry jargon that go behind it, so naturally you will begin to base your decision on the agency’s portfolio.
Whilst this is a great place to start, it’s important not to get too drawn in by individual designs and builds. It’s better to try and pin down particular design choices, such as a professional-looking font or a remarkably striking visual effect, and earmark them as things you’d like to incorporate into your website. This way, your website will take inspiration from previous builds whilst still looking both unique and distinctive.

Reaching a decision
When push comes to shove, the relationship you have with your web design agency is arguably the deciding factor in the quality and impression of the final product, so it’s imperative that you pick a team that you gel with. The best web design agencies will strive to understand your company and mission, and build compelling designs around this; therefore the better they understand you, the better the design and build. To this end, personally consult with as many agencies as possible before taking that final step. The majority of reputable web design agencies on the market should be happy to throw a few concepts into the mixing pot based on your customer brief, which will give you a better idea of their skill set and creative direction.

We understand that choosing a web design agency can be hard, but as long as you remember not to base your decision solely on arbitrary factors like costs and team size, you shouldn’t go too far wrong.