What should I ask a webdesigner before I hire him/her?

Picking a webdesigner can be a tricky business. There are lots of people looking for that businesses, some are good, some are not, some are downright cowboys. How do you tell the competent ones from the chancers? Here are a few brief pointers.

1. Show me some of your previous work (and some proof that he/she actually did the sites)
2. How much will the website cost, how long will it take?
3. Is this site from a template, or are you making it from scratch?
   
4. How much will the annual hosting and domain cost (some of these chancers ask for over 150 per year, which is about twice what it should cost just to keep the site up)

What Pages should I have on my website?

The first thing is to remember, the number of pages your website has is not as important as making sure you have included all the information you need to give your customers, and that this information is easy for them to find. Also bear in mind, that a website is not a book. You can add more pages later if you need to.

Most people will wait until they have about 3-5 pages ready before they put anything up on their website, others might launch their website with only have one page, containing a summary of what you do, where you can be found, and how to contact you.
And later, as they expand on that, those things can get separate pages to include more detail.

Generally speaking, you should at least have HOME, SERVICES/ PRODUCTS and CONTACT pages, and depending on your business, an ABOUT page and an FAQ page.

We have moved!

I know nothing really looks any different, but if you look at the address bar you'll see that you haven't been visiting www.thourigan.com but now the website is located at www.houriganwebworks.com, which matches the business name.

Just a small admin detail. I was never really comfortable with the domain thourigan.com so when it came time to renew, I went for something that matched the business name.
The site is now houriganwebworks.com, but people trying to open thourigan.com will be automatically redirected to the new site.

Instead of e-mailing webworks@thourigan.com, e-mails should now go to tim@houriganwebworks.com

If you've ever thought of changing your website name, here's a short article on it recently posted.

What if I want to change the name of my website?

Well first off, it can be done, and there's plenty of reasons for it.
Take the example of a site set up without thinking much about the name, to list the therapists in part of the US, www.findtherapist.com . Some might read as Find The Rapist, rather than Find Therapist.

Other businesses have had website names that are far too long to remember, too long to type without making a mistake, and maybe a bit long to fit on leaflets, side of the van etc.

www.johnmurphysroofcleaningandwindowwashingservice.ie is a bit of a monster (but not too far off of some site names I've seen!).
Say later, Mr Murphy wishes he had picked www.roofandwindows.ie. Well it's not too late to change! There is a bit of work involved in it, but it can be done fairly quickly if you have a small website and not a lot of links to worry about.