How to find a good web designer for your small business
If you’ve searched “best web designer near me” or “who can build a website for my business,” you’ve probably found a page of agencies that all say they’re the best. The honest answer is that the best web designer for a roofer in Surprise isn’t the best one for a dentist in Glendale or a boutique in Old Town Peoria. It depends on what your website needs to do.
This guide walks through how to work that out, the four kinds of people who build small business websites, the pros and cons of each, the questions to ask, and the warning signs. We’re a small web design studio in Peoria, Arizona, so the examples come from Phoenix and the West Valley, but the advice works anywhere.
What should a small business website do?
Before you compare web designers, write down the one or two jobs your site has. Most small business websites have one of these:
- Make the phone ring. Plumbers, HVAC, roofers, landscapers, pool service. The site has to load fast on a phone, show up on Google Maps, and put your number where a thumb can reach it.
- Get appointments booked. Salons, dentists, physical therapy, dog groomers. The site has to connect to your booking system and answer the questions people ask before they book.
- Win quotes. Contractors, remodelers, event services. The site has to show your past work and make it easy to ask for a quote.
- Sell online. Shops and makers. This is a different kind of project, and it’s worth hiring someone who builds online stores specifically.
A web designer who’s great at one of these jobs isn’t automatically good at the others. That’s why “the best web designer in Phoenix” isn’t a useful question on its own, and “who’s best at websites that make the phone ring for contractors” is.
Freelancer, agency or Wix: which is best for a small business?
It depends on your budget, your time and what the site has to do. Here are the four options, with the pros and cons of each.
| Option | Good for | Watch out for |
|---|---|---|
| Build it yourself with Wix, Squarespace or GoDaddy | A new business on a tight budget, a simple site you’re happy to update, people who enjoy doing it | Your evenings. Sites that look fine on a laptop but are slow or hard to use on a phone, and nobody setting up your Google Business Profile or email |
| A freelance web designer | A straightforward site at a lower price, working with one person directly | What happens if they get busy, change careers or stop answering. Check who owns the domain and hosting |
| A local web design studio or agency | Businesses that want a site built and then looked after, meetings in person, help with local search | Higher prices, long contracts, and agencies that build on their own system so you can’t leave |
| Marketplaces like Fiverr and Upwork | A small, clearly defined job, like a logo or one page | Uneven quality, time zones, and no one to call when something breaks a year later |
Should I build my own website or pay someone?
Build it yourself if you’re just starting out, you have more time than money, and you need a simple page with your services, hours and phone number. A website builder is fine for that, and it’s the right call more often than agencies admit. Pay someone when the site needs to do more.
It’s usually time to hire a web designer when:
- people find you on Google but don’t call, book or ask for a quote
- you can’t remember the last time you updated the site
- your emails land in customers’ spam folders (here’s why that happens)
- you don’t show up on Google Maps for your own town (what to check first)
- the time you spend on the website is time you’d bill customers for
Do I need a local web designer near me?
No, but it helps. Most of the work happens over email and video calls, so a good designer in another state can build you a good site. A local web designer has two real advantages:
- They know how your customers search. Someone in the Phoenix area knows that people in Sun City, Surprise and El Mirage often search by the town, that Peoria, Arizona gets mixed up with Peoria, Illinois, and that a pool company in Goodyear competes with businesses in Avondale, Buckeye and Litchfield Park.
- You can sit across a table from them. For some owners that matters a lot, and it’s a fair reason to choose.
If you’re anywhere in Greater Phoenix, from Glendale and Peoria out to Buckeye, or across town in Scottsdale, Tempe, Mesa or Chandler, a local web designer can usually meet you in person. Just don’t pick someone only because they’re close.
How to tell if a web designer is good
Look at their real work, not their sales pitch. Five checks:
- Open their past websites on your phone. Not the screenshots in their portfolio, the live sites. Do they load quickly? Can you find the phone number in a few seconds?
- Search for their clients the way a customer would. Type “plumber Glendale AZ” or whatever fits. If their clients don’t show up, a pretty site isn’t helping them.
- Call one or two of their clients. Ask whether the site brought in work, and what happens when they need a change.
- Ask who will own the domain, the hosting and the site. The answer should be “you.”
- Ask what happens after launch. Who updates it, who notices when it breaks, and what that costs.
Questions to ask any web designer
- What should my website do for my business, in your words? A good designer asks about your customers before talking about colors.
- Will the domain, hosting and website be in my name? If you leave, you should be able to take everything with you.
- Which sites have you built for businesses like mine, and can I call the owners?
- How will people find the site? Ask about Google Business Profile, local search and page speed, not only design.
- What’s included in the price, and what costs extra? Photos, copywriting, changes after launch, hosting.
- What does it cost each month after launch, and what do I get for it?
- Will you tell me if I don’t need a new website? Sometimes fixing the current one is the better deal.
Red flags when hiring a web designer
- Guaranteed first place on Google. Nobody can promise that, and anyone who does is guessing or bending the rules.
- The domain is registered in their name. That makes it hard to ever leave.
- A long contract before you’ve seen any work.
- A price before they’ve asked what your business does.
- Their portfolio sites are slow or broken on a phone.
How much does a web designer cost?
Prices vary so much that a single number isn’t useful. What moves the price: how many pages, whether you supply the words and photos, booking or payments, an online store, and whether looking after the site afterwards is included. Get two or three quotes for the same list of pages and features, so you’re comparing like with like. For the monthly side, see what website maintenance costs.
Where we fit, honestly
Birch Bloom Co. is a small web design studio in Peoria, Arizona. We build and look after websites for local service businesses across the West Valley and Greater Phoenix: the ones whose site needs to make the phone ring or get appointments booked. We set everything up in your name, and before we recommend anything we run your current site through our free audit, which sometimes says to leave it alone.
We’re probably not the right fit if you need a large online store, or if you want a site you build and update entirely yourself. In that case, a website builder or an e-commerce specialist is the better choice, and we’ll say so.
Questions people ask us
Do I need a web designer or a web developer?
For most small business websites, you want one person or team that does both. A web designer decides how the site looks and works for visitors; a web developer writes the code that makes it run. Hiring one who does both means you don’t have to manage the handoff.
How do I find a good web designer near Peoria or Phoenix?
Ask other local business owners whose websites you like, search Google Maps for web design in your town, and check each designer’s past sites on your phone. Then ask the questions above.
Is Wix or Squarespace good enough for a small business?
For a simple site, often yes. They become limiting when you need the site to rank in local search, connect to other tools, or when nobody has time to keep it current.
Do I need a new website, or can my current one be fixed?
Often it can be fixed. Slow pages, a missing phone number, broken forms and email in spam can all be repaired without a rebuild. Our free audit tells you which.
Not sure whether you need a web designer at all?
Our free audit checks your current site, domain, certificate and email setup from the outside, with no login. It tells you plainly what’s working and what isn’t, including when the answer is “leave it alone.”
Get your free audit