We're looking to do a little re-branding of services which would involve some new site designs on our side. Now, we have resources to spend, and I am wanting someone who is very good at what they do, but am also not looking to overspend. Here are the requirements, and I was wondering if anyone had any suggestions.

1) Must have a full understanding of the marketing aspects, how to present things in order to sell things. The purpose of a site is to sell product, not just to look pretty.

2) Must have an understanding of usability, organizing the site in a manner that is easy to find the information needed and well setup for all targeted users.

3) We are fine with cutting the site and writing the html/css, etc. ourselves, but if the designer is doing it, the sites must be fully standards compliant. We are not looking for someone to sell us on a CMS or any other backend, we are fully capable, and prefer to, edit things manually.

4) We're looking for someone that has significant experience, a nice portfolio to look through, and hopefully some experience in this or a related industry.

5) Looking for pricing under $15k for a full site design, 25-50 pages, with basically a template for most common pages, but still looking to have the images, text, and other graphics for the content throughout the site well displayed/organized.

6) We would be looking to use the person continuously for updates to the site, to assure they still stay well organized, for creating additional graphics for specials, etc.

Hi,

I'm having my design work done by CoreyMade. (http://coreymade.com)
You can view his work here (http://coreymade.com/my-work)

You would probably have to check all these points with him directly, but I can tell you that he is helping me on 1,2 and 3

He has also been more than willing to do little tweaks on demand even after you've paid and considered a project "done"

Say hi to him for me. (PS my blog was not designed by him)

Regards,

Barry

@Barry - Thank you for the recommendation. Always a blast working with you on your projects.

@Karl - Seems like you need a CMS, and I would recommend WordPress because of it's ease of use when it comes to creating and maintaining content. Also it will cut down on expense, because you will not need 20-50 pages coded out, as it uses a header / footer template system. So no matter who you get the design from, tell you need it implemented into Wordpress as a CMS - you will be happy you did.

@Barry - Thank you for the recommendation. Always a blast working with you on your projects.

@Karl - Seems like you need a CMS, and I would recommend WordPress because of it's ease of use when it comes to creating and maintaining content. Also it will cut down on expense, because you will not need 20-50 pages coded out, as it uses a header / footer template system. So no matter who you get the design from, tell you need it implemented into Wordpress as a CMS - you will be happy you did.

No, we do NOT want a CMS, especially one as bloated and with continuous security vulnerabilities such as WordPress.

We already use headers and footers with simple PHP includes. There is absolutely no reason to further complicate things. The need for the 20-50 pages is not a separate site design for each page, but to assure proper layout of the text and images specific to the body of each page. Once the base work is done, it is not hard to edit HTML and I see no use in a CMS.

We purchased a company awhile ago that used a CMS to manage their site. It just over-complicated the whole thing, and within a month or so we decided to rip it apart from the CMS and manage it separately.

Well I have used wordpress for a number of years now, and if taken the proper measurements to secure it, it can be a very valuable tool in terms of managing pages...again if implemented the correct way. At any rate, good luck with that!

Forgot to mention; here are some high end companies that may be able to help you out.

http://www.nclud.com

http://www.hicksdesign.co.uk

http://www.mediocore.cz

http://neography.com/

Just to name a few!

Yes a CMS would be overkill for 25 - 50 pages, no reason not to stick with PHP includes for the header/footer. I also prefer a more "hands-on" approach, glad to see others out there do as well.

I had some success finding a designer through craigslist. My budget was substantially less than yours (about $3k), but one of my requirements was to be able to meet face to face with the developer. I believe that being able to meet in person really helps with communication.

On craigslist though you're going to have to be willing to wade through a lot of garbage responses. One thing I did was include a note at the bottom indicating a special code that I asked people replying to put in their subject, so I will know that they at least skimmed my posting.

Even with that, I received close to 50 responses, of which only two or three were seriously worth consideration.

Best of luck with your search! With your budget you should get a very nice site.

a CMS would be overkill for 25 - 50 pages?? You have no idea what you're talking about Mike (with all due respect)

A CMS would be overkill for 1 to 2 pages....MAYBE.

I must probabbly agree with Karl & Mike, There is complete no need for an CMS, specially for wordpress or any other widely-known opensource software, since as Karl mentioned it Isn't really secure - specially to run on an datacenter's website where their security is one of the important things in their business.

As for things making easier, looks like you have quite a budget. For an 1k or 2k you might even could get your own simple CMS custom made just for editing pages if needed.


As the recommendetion one of the High-end companys whom do constantrate on the web hosting designs would be - http://www.4design.tv
I haven't really worked with them personally, but i did came across couple of their designs.
I would say they're one of the best in industry, so you might want to consider them.

a CMS would be overkill for 25 - 50 pages?? You have no idea what you're talking about Mike (with all due respect)

A CMS would be overkill for 1 to 2 pages....MAYBE.

For someone who is comfortable with HTML/CSS, and would prefer to take the extra time to ensure that their site is using semantic and valid markup, yes a CMS would be overkill for such a small number of pages.

If your editors are not technically inclined, well then that's a different story. But that does not seem to be the case with the OP...

Karl,

You might want to try contacting Sarah at pulppixel.com. The quote I received from her for my own design request was decently priced and she would be within your budget.

I haven't personally used her services yet, so I can't offer a recommendation. I can, however, say I intend to soon.

Regards,

Jay

Take a look to bassobrovelli.com they are making our new design (PM me for the demo), and they did some works for big companies here in Argentina.

I,d say payton designs, they seem to undertake quite alot of work for hosting companys here on WHT, They got a nice portfolio aswell, I havent personally used their design service, But i am getting my whmcs integrated by them at present.

http://www.paytondesigns.com/portfolio.html

Regards