9 questions to ask before you hire a web designer

Hiring a web designer is uncomfortable if you're not technical. You can't judge the code, you often can't judge the design, and the vocabulary is designed to make you nod along.

You don't need to become technical. You need nine questions and the patience to listen to how they're answered. A vague answer is itself an answer.

01Whose name will the domain be in?

The correct answer is yours. Your domain is your property, the way your shop signboard is. If it's registered in the designer's account, you cannot move it, sell it, or work with anyone else without their cooperation.

Worry if: "Don't worry, we handle all that." That is not an answer to the question that was asked.

02Who has the hosting login?

Same principle. You should have the account, or at minimum your own credentials to it. It's fine for the designer to manage it day to day — it's not fine for you to be locked out of it.

If the designer hosts the site on their own server, that can work well, but then ask the next thing directly: if we part ways, do I get a copy of my site and my domain, and how long does that take?

Worry if: there's no clear exit. Ask before you're in, not when you want out.

03What exactly is in the price, and what isn't?

Get it in writing. Number of pages. Logo, or not. Does it include the domain and hosting for the first year, or is that extra? Is the Google Business Profile setup included? How many rounds of revisions?

The point isn't to catch anyone out. It's that "website — ₹X" is not a scope, and every gap in the scope turns into an argument later.

Worry if: a verbal quote with no written breakdown, or a number that keeps moving.

04What do changes cost after launch?

Your prices change. Your menu changes. A festival offer needs to go up. Ask what happens then: is there a free window, is it per change, is it a monthly plan?

Also ask how long a change takes. A designer who takes three weeks to update a phone number is a problem you'll feel every month.

Worry if: "Small changes are free" with no definition of small.

05Can I see something you built that's live right now?

Not a screenshot, not a design mockup — a working URL you can open on your own phone. Then actually open it: does it load quickly, does it work at your thumb's width, does the call button work?

One real live site tells you more than a folder of portfolio images, because images can come from anywhere.

Worry if: only mockups, or links that are down.

06How will you make the site load fast on mobile?

You're not testing for a technical lecture. You're testing whether they've thought about it at all. A reasonable answer mentions compressing images and keeping the page light.

An answer that treats speed as an afterthought usually produces a site where a single uncompressed photo is heavier than the rest of the page put together.

Worry if: "It'll be fine, everyone has 4G now."

07What will you do about Google?

Good answers are specific and modest: submit the site to Search Console, add a sitemap, write proper page titles and descriptions, add structured business details, set up or fix the Google Business Profile.

Then listen for what they don't promise. Nobody can guarantee a ranking. Competition, category and location decide that, and none of those are under a designer's control.

Worry if: a guaranteed first-page result, especially with a deadline attached.

08What do you need from me, and by when?

This one flips the table, and it's revealing. A designer who has done this before will immediately list what they need: photos, your service or menu list, logo files if you have them, business hours, address, phone number.

It also tells you where the delays will come from. Most projects that run late run late because the content never arrived, not because the design was hard.

Worry if: "Just leave it to us." Then the content gets invented, and it won't sound like your business.

09How do I reach you after the site is live?

Ask for the actual channel and the actual expectation. Phone, WhatsApp, email? Within a day? Within a week?

A website is a thing that keeps needing small attention. The difference between a good experience and a bad one, a year in, is almost entirely about whether someone picks up.

Worry if: you've only ever dealt with a salesperson and never met whoever builds it.

Before you pay anything

Get four things in writing, even if it's just a WhatsApp message you both agree to:

1. The total price, and what's included and excluded.
2. The timeline, and what you owe them to keep it.
3. Who owns the domain and hosting.
4. What post-launch changes cost.

A designer worth hiring will be relieved you asked. Clear expectations make their job easier too.

Judge a designer the way you'd judge a supplier

I spent five years in the hotel line in Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar before I built websites, and every kitchen I worked in judged its suppliers by the same three things. They transfer to this almost exactly.

Does the rate hold?

A vendor who quotes low on the first order and revises it on the third isn't cheap, he's expensive with a delay. Same with a build price that gets topped up mid-project — "the gallery is extra", "the form is extra". Nail the scope down in writing at the start and the top-ups have nowhere to come from.

Does he pick up in the rush?

Anyone is responsive when they want the order. The real test is the Saturday night when something has gone wrong. With a website, the equivalent is the day your site is down or your prices are wrong on a festival weekend. Ask how you reach them then, and what "soon" means in hours.

Does he tell you when something is a bad idea?

A supplier who agrees to everything is usually agreeing to things he can't do. A designer who says yes to a homepage video, a booking engine, an app and a first-page guarantee in the same conversation is telling you he hasn't thought about any of it.

If you already have a website and you're replacing it

Two extra questions, and people skip both.

Who is holding what right now? Before you talk to anyone new, find out whose account your current domain sits in and when it renews. This is where the unpleasant surprises live. Renewals lapse quietly, and a domain that has expired is far more painful to recover than one you simply move. If the split between domain, hosting and the site itself is fuzzy, this explains the three separately.

What happens to the old addresses? If your old site had pages that Google already knows about, they should point to the matching new ones rather than dying into an error page. Ask whether redirects are included. It's a small piece of work and it protects whatever search visibility you'd already earned.

Common questions

How do I check a web designer is genuine?

Open a live site they built, on your own phone, on mobile data. Not a screenshot and not a mockup. Check that it loads quickly, that nothing spills off the edge of the screen, and that the call and WhatsApp buttons actually work. Then ask who owns the domain on that project. Two minutes of that tells you more than an hour of portfolio slides.

Should I pay the full amount upfront?

No. Split it. I work half before starting and half before the site goes live, with the finished site visible on a preview link before that second payment. Any structure where you can see the work before the last instalment is reasonable; paying everything upfront removes your only leverage if things stall.

What if the designer disappears after launch?

This is why questions 01, 02 and 09 exist. If the domain is in your name and you hold the hosting login, a disappearance is an inconvenience — another person can take over. If both sit in someone else's account, it becomes a negotiation over something you already paid for. Sort this out before you pay, not after.

Is a freelancer or an agency better for a small business?

For a single-location shop or restaurant, what matters isn't the label, it's who actually does the work and whether you can reach that person. An agency gives you continuity if someone leaves; a freelancer usually gives you a faster reply and no account manager in between. Ask to speak to whoever will build it either way.

Is a cheap quote always a bad sign?

Not by itself. A low price is fine when the scope is genuinely small — one page, your content ready, no logo needed. It's a warning when the price is low and the promises are large. The suspicious combination is a small number next to eight pages, SEO, a logo and a ranking guarantee. Pricing in more detail is in what a website actually costs in India, and if you'd rather have this conversation in Hinglish with someone local, my Chhatrapati Sambhajinagar page covers the same ground.