Are you a WordPress designer? Good, then this post is for you. If you’re going to design for someone, design. Don’t just install and activate a theme, or framework and child theme, installing necessary plugins, and THEN just add their content, and tweak a couple CSS elements for $500… spending not even 2 to 3 hours of time (really it was more like a little over an hour) on the project and no consultation or training to the client.
This is a ripoff and an insult to what a designer or web designer is. Anyone can do that. And it has happened. Its not exactly illegal, but it can be considered unethical. And others may think its opportunistic… which indeed it is.
I recently acquired some clients that had worked with a respectable colleague in the WordPress community that is screwing people over. (One who speaks at WordCamps too. I will not name them. I already chewed them out. I went as far as apologizing to their former client for having to experience such a bad designer.) The person doesn’t even offer design services anymore and only teaches people these days. Its fine that they teach as obviously they can’t design worth crap, but they have designed in the past, and those people landed in my lap.
It pisses me off to know. Yep, I’m angry! I take this seriously. I’m sure some of you reading this also take this seriously. This is not a lecture to you, but to those taking advantage of people and calling themselves a designer.
I understand when a client is bootstrapping, but if they’ve gathered enough money to start up a site, then they are going to come to you again to take their brand to the next level if it works for them from the starting gate.
Side Tip For the Client Looking for a WordPress Designer
Here’s a big word of advice to anyone shopping around for a true WordPress web designer. If the designer works with a framework and child themes of that framework, and can’t make that site at least 50% different compared to the child theme (if they have examples in their portfolio), you might want to seek another designer if you want to start on the right foot to helping them have a brand. No business owner really wants their website to look like thousands of other ones.
Here are some tips for clients that are shopping for a designer:
- Don’t accept a ‘no’ from a designer unless it doesn’t fit your budget. WordPress can do just about anything.
- Be prepared to have a set budget and be up front with it. If you like the designer… ask them what could be done with your budget.
- Go around and window shop around at different websites. See what is going on in your niche and brainstorm a general idea of what you might like. You need to be somewhat active in the development of your website and overall brand.
- Always ask questions.
How to Become a Better WordPress Designer
I consult both business owners and WordPress designers and developers constantly. I’ve been doing this almost as long as I’ve been using, designing, and developing with WordPress alone (12 years combining WordPress and b2.) I am challenging you (those who call themselves WordPress designers) to do better.
Seriously… as Deepak Chopra says (paraphrasing)… instead of thinking outside of the box, get rid of the box. Your imagination in design can be a what breaks a business or allows it to start on the right path.
If you’re a designer that has few graphic design skills, find someone who does it well to pair up with. Having a theme available should be considered as a base to improving and making that site into something else, especially since a lot of themes, both free and paid are used by hundreds, and sometimes thousands, or even tens of thousands of people.
Challenge yourself and your client by not just choosing a theme, but also:
- Color palette
- General mood or vibe your client wishes the site to exude
- Consider what the client truly needs on their site
- Break out of the typical habit of going back to the same exact style by experimenting and studying new styles of design that are acceptable web practices.
- Be prepared to think in terms of helping to deliver a product that may help your client start converting visitors into subscribers, loyal readers, and even buyers.
Its okay to have some set design packaging, but you should also explain your individual flat rate per hour, which has helped determine those other rates. Its a whole different game if you have a whole team of designers working on a project, but the hourly rate, any overhead costs, labor, and consultation time in the end quote has to be justified some where.
Yes, there will be design jobs that might be tens of thousands of dollars depending if you are charging at least $100 per hour of your time, but that better produce some damn good work!
Charging like the one person I mentioned earlier is not acceptable. It shows a lack of care and that they aren’t a designer by profession.
What are your thoughts on this? Do you agree with me that it is unethical? If not, why? Do you have any other pieces of advice to share on this?
Nile your tips for wordpress designers were worth reading.
I must say it has enhanced my knowledge to a great extent in becoming a better wordpress designer. Thanx for providing such a wonderful piece of information.
Oooo Nile,
That would annoy me too. Years ago I asked someone to help with my blog and it turned out Sh—-
that’s when I learned to do as much as possible on my own. There’s much I don’t know, but I know what I want and like. If you’re a designer, design! Don’t task the easy way out .. offer quality. People remember that …
Nile,
I love how you always end your posts with a question. I need to do that more. Yes, charging $500 just to throw up Genesis and a Child Theme and NO TUTORING on how to use the site is a rip off!!! I totally agree with you there. What I do for $500 or $600 is amazing in terms of customizations and tutoring and adding plugins and all that. On the other hand there are some people who can barely afford to get started. So just offering those people a Genesis Theme and a child theme with 90 minutes of tutoring might be a deal if you charge WELL BELOW $500!!! For $500 or $600 people can always customize their child themes and skins when working with me. I’m happy to do it. If they need graphics , they do have to pay extra since I need to pay my graphic designer, though.
I constantly hear horror stories whenever I hear about people who have had bad experiences with their designer. Not finshing projects and not returning emails seems to be typical.
Thanks for sharing!
~ Jupiter Jim
The usual with me is that I get too picky and need to push the proofing back a few days as I want the client to be extremely happy. The other, while I do return emails, I get people who are wanting their replies within the hour… kind of ticks me off and I have to say simmer down…lol.
Definitely if you are working and it shows, its worth it. I know Syed has a different experience on this and I’m not saying people who just do customizations off a child theme aren’t designers. If they can add more flavor and make it different from the other people using that… I’m happy. In the case of the scenario I shared in this post, I was highly disappointed. However, I really am standing on a soap box here with this post…. nothing unusual.
Great suggestions! As a new SEO for a creative agency in Chicago, we’re seeing an increasing number of clients request more WordPress sites for basic business profiles! Great suggestions!
I see this a lot, especially with law firm pages because we use blogs a lot to distribute content and market. It makes us easy targets for bad WP designers to promise a “great” website for way too much money. Then it ends up looking like an out of the box WP theme. I don’t understand how people don’t recognize the low quality of work they received. All you have to do is compare your website to other sites on the internet.
I don’t have any illusions about my own website. It’s a WP site and I put it together myself based strongly on the prototype page for the theme I purchased. I don’t feel bad about it. It looks decent enough–great among its competitors–but most importantly I know the content is legitimate and if I need to change something I feel confident in my ability to tweak the site.
And that is quite fine. If what you have is what you want, great. And its great that you did your website yourself. 🙂
Hi Nile,
That’s exactly what i had in my mind. People tag themselves as exceptional designers, only with the skills and knowledge, most of them fail to give a thought on how to design, sketch the layout, use creative or lateral thinking for a entirely different approach, instead of linear , design based on instructions way.
Since I have been working on my WordPress blogs, this was very valuable information on how to design my sites better. Thanks!
Hi Nile,
Nice post and I can hear your voice louder here.
Happy customers are the best assets and I do agree the approach you adopt. As a customer I can understand how important it is to get some training for a new product you’ve got from your developer and designer. Guesswork is never possible to proceed with.
This is really nice. Very informative indeed. Thank you for sharing this very useful post.
Hi,
I used to work as a Freelancer in my starting stage of my career. I noticed many of my colleagues or rivals accept projects without even having the proper designing skills.
Hi Nile, what you described in your first para, is what I call ‘installation and set up”, definitely not design. I agree with you and understand your frustration with people charging that much for a set up. “Design” really takes creativity, as well as the coding, and is certainly worth paying extra for, especially when you’re working on branding yourself with your blog. For people who can’t pay $100 an hour though, I believe it’s possible to create a more unique blog with different colors and most importantly, a different banner, and different graphics for optin boxes.
Great suggestions for WordPress. My firm is starting to use an increased number of WordPress templates when designing pro-bono work. What are your thoughts on this?
Hi Nile, your tips for becoming a good word press designer is good.
Hi Nile,
Your tips for wordpress designing are really awesome.! I loved to read your posts here at blodish! Great post!!
Thanks Jafar! I always hope that my articles help. 🙂
Nice post Nile, it’s inspiring me now to create something helpful. Thanks for post
Great tips And I am surely gonna Follow them.I don’t want to be a designer but i will surely see the Tips on choosing a designer.
thank you for such a great article this will help me to do better….
Dear Nile: WordPress improved a lot and with that customization is becoming more difficult, specially when was done on a PREVIOUS version. good post.
hi nile thanks for this respective tip to the wordpress designers
Thanks for your advice Nile, i am learning everyday
Hey Nile,
You are saying right. I agree to most of words you have mentioned here. There are many WordPress users and designers who believe that if they can code or use Photoshop they are real designers. Coding, and Photoshoping is not designers do.
They add a new life to business, and let their customers love them.
I’d have to say I don’t totally agree with your statement, but it may not be what you had intended it to say, Hamza. Coding is definitely a part of designing and using Photoshop too. It is how creative you are that makes the difference of how good you are.
I think we all need some extra direction in becoming better designers on WordPress. This is great information!
Nile, I agree with you 100%. Anything less IS unethical! If people are paying that kind of money, the web designer should give them their money’s worth and then some. I appreciate your honesty and forthrightness, and the time you’ve taken to break it down into measurable bites.
Willena
Charging such a huge amount of money for just activating a theme in WordPress is totally wrong. For $500 the client should get a properly designed website with all the functionality options available that are offered by WordPress.
These days designers are really charging much and your tips can help us design ourselves or hire a professional.
I really like Butter it’s the same this i’ll decide on once. Btw Thank you due to this One of a kind Post. Great post. 😀 Thanks for sharing informative post with us.
Nice post Nile, it’s inspiring me now to create something helpful.
Hey Nile, great tips.
For WP design tips, I generally hit either tutsplus or WpBegginer. But after 2 years of blogging, I think I should stick to the marketing side of things. Hehe.
Tutplus or WPBeginner only go so far. WPBeginner doesn’t educate you on how to design your website. Tutplus, does… only in specific tutorials for other designs, so neither help if you’re trying to do your own thing. They both have a lot of great resources (some that can even be found here.)
So, what do you suggest? Lynda?
I could use a something like 30 days to php/html/css like tutsplus offers.
I have been working on my WordPress blogs, this was very valuable information on how to design my sites better. Thanks!
This showed up in my Twitter feed and I find this article intriguing. There are many designers/developers who can create scratch themes, or even take a child theme and make it vastly different from the standard, out-of-the-box theme.
Obviously this article was a bout someone in the Genesis community, though truthfully, it could just as easily be about 80% of the web agencies or solo designers out there. Buying a ThemeForest theme that is close to what the designer created in a PSD is design to a lot of folks, too.
But it doesn’t have to be that way. Especially now, with so many exciting things going on: Flexbox, CSS Grid, CSS Regions – these are all things that people have dreamed about since the early days of the web. Even look at the old-school CSS Zen Garden – the same HTML, but strikingly different layouts with just a different stylesheet. That’s the web design that seems to have vanished with the rise of Bootstrap-style sites that all look the same.
I get what you’re saying about charging for implementation and calling it original design. It’s not really design, it’s just being a theme implementor. Tom McFarlin talked about this a year or so ago.
This wouldn’t be so bad if designers dug into business goals. That’s really what design has become. A mix of marketing, business goals, and creativity – well, sometimes.
Things in life aren’t always hat they seem to be. And things in the WP corner of the web aren’t always what they seem either.
I have no problem with folks getting paid, so long as they build up the client’s business. That’s the bottom line.
Keep standing on the soapbox, Niles.