Some of the quotes here are priceless:
I am going to make it a company policy that all websites are done when we say they are. Even if it means I have work 24 hours a day it it will be delivered on time, if not 10% would be deducted per day its late or somthing.
Joy, you've only just graduated. It's all good talking about providing fantastic customer service about a company in it's formative stages, but there is a point you have to get real.
1) Never plan to work 24 hours a day - you start to produce shoddy work after about 8 hours. And then everything slips.
2) Late from when? There are truly terrible designers / developers that let deadlines slide, but often it takes two to tango when projects slip and items are not signed off in agreed timescales (sometimes bad workmanship / sometimes just lack of communication), or more likely promised content doesn't arrive.
3) Hard work and good brains often get beaten by good organisation and efficient working practises.
Finding a good web development company is like finding a good builder (any one know a good reliable builder in Berkshire?).
Agreed. From the outside web development and building is somewhat of a black box. I guess the same as building one of the best methods of finding one is through referal, or to look at existing work. Or the old faithful, your website/building project looks fantastic, would you let me know who did it?
The trouble at the moment is there are far too many cowboys and the market is becoming saturated.
Tell me about it - see the websites for £350 thread.
We have a 100% customer satisfaction record for the sites we have produced and aim to keep it.
Hmmm, so is that 1 happy client, or 100, or 1000? And would your clients concur?
You know, I don't think I have worked at a company where we could say that every single client was constantly 100% happy. What I would say on the flip side is that when they were not we'd work hard to bring things around.
Come on you Web Developers, get your customer care skills in order!, unless you want to be painted with the same brush! By the way, if you are a web developer or some kind of technician looking to take up work from us please do not bother unless you can turnaround the work within a reasonable timeframe.
Hands On - you're a professional. Think seriously about what you paid and how much time that buys of your time? You also (as I know from accessify), know a fair bit about the web (you offer accessibility audits through your group) - so why did you let yourself get caught out this way?
I might sound rather flippant, but then I feel I have a right to be. It's the same old story time and again. I heard it when I first started doing web development professionally back in '96 and I hear it time and again now. If you choose to get some spotty oik to do your work for you then don't expect the same results as if you'd employeed a professional.
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Now the productive bit...
Some things to look for in a prospective agency:
Strength of company financially
Are they growing?
Are they constantly being topped up by mum's and daddies money?
How solid are they?
Are they used to dealing with your size of project? - guessable from staff numbers (mainly wages in a dev company) : turnover
Levels of communication
Are you likely to be ignored or passed around the houses?
Will you have a dedicated point of contact in the company to handle any issues for you?
Do they sub-contract?
What level of communication are you getting whilst the project is proceeding?
Can you get on with the people in the company?
Portfolio
Do you like the work they have done?
Do they have experience in your field?
How does your project fit in with the experience they have?
Will they provide references, wil they arrange for you to get references from their portfolio of your choosing?
Professionalism
Do they operate under a solid set of T&C's?
What procedures do they work to?
What quality assurance mechanisms are in place?
What are the likely timeframes and how do they match up to project value ? - A good rule of thumb here, divide the project cost against day rate and you should have perhaps only half the time to live taken into account. A good company will counter for slippage from day one and hope to exceed the stated expectations rather than hope everything will go without a hitch. An agency that is very good will not mind telling you no on silly timescales - and if you accept that you'll get the better job for it.
Skills
What are the skill sets of the key personel that will be managing your project
How long have they been doing this?
How often do they stretch themselves?
Is this the key function of the business, or something they dabble in?
To be honest it wouldn't take long to get a rough idea on most of these with any company, and might just help you get what you want.
