Folks,
Why can’t I get a web page designed and built and just pay?, everyone I talk to wants to start this big, long “relationship”, I understand that there are going to be updates and such but I am trying to be as self sufficient as I can with this deal.
People, this is a new, small business venture, I cannot support both of us!.
This was not originally a Pit thread but I moved it here so I could say:
FUCKIN’ WEB DESIGNING ASSWIPE MOFO’S “I’M AN ARTIST”, FUCKOFF!!!
Unclviny
Interestingly, I do websites on the side, and all my clients seem to want some touchy-feely relationship group hug.
Whereas I just want them to tell me what they want (by email preferably), and then leave me alone to do it. They approve it, I upload it, gimme the money, end of story. If they need an update, get back in touch.
Instead I have to traipse across town to meet their boring asses and listen to them bang on about all the costly features they want that they’re never going to pay for when I tell them the price.
unclviny, maybe we should (not) work together? 
Why won’t you marry me?!! It’s because I’m white isn’t it?! Bigot! Racist!!!11
I’ve only had two touchy feelies.
One just had to rearrange all the words (at my place), even though they gave me all the words to start with.
Most of the time it’s a simple case of what they want, how much they want to pay, do it, load it, finesse a few things here or there, pay up and piss off.
Of course, the ones with a bit of ‘salesmanship’ in them will always try to get you to buy something else. I think they’re getting as bad a used car salesman.
My husband has had the same thing. He does our personal site and my parents’ sites. One client my parents recommended (they don’t seem to understand that just because they want to run their own business, we don’t want the same thing) wanted to enter into a “partnership over the long term.” In other words, if they ever made any money, he would get a percentage of the profits.
Others just don’t want to pay very much. My husband’s skills lie in developing web-based programs (like database apps), not in slapping some graphics and text on a page (not that there’s anything wrong with that). People ask him to make a page for him and then balk when he tells them his fee. Which is fine by him, since he’d rather not do it anyway.
My wife freelanced as a graphic artist in print production. After a time, we discovered that charging book rates was the best way to keep the cheapskates out. Because first they bargain you down on your rates, then they bargain you up on what you do for those rates, and then … they don’t pay you anyway! You’d think the ones who didn’t intend to pay you in the first place would be pretty relaxed about the rates they weren’t going to pay, but it rarely worked out that way.
Since your means are so limited why not just get a cheap page design tool and slap it up yourself. Use music. people love pages with tunes! And don’t forget flashing lights. They’re a sure fire crowd pleaser!
Yeah, well, sometimes starting up a long-term touchy-feely relationship is good, for those of us who make some change doing this kind of thing consistently. Of course, most of the time, they end up being the kind of jerks that you WISH had just paid you a one-time fee and then you’d be done with forever…
If you’re still looking for someone to build your page and not have a child with, I think there are plenty in this thread alone (myself, included) who would find that to be a good business prop.
Two words: Scope creep.
When people get something for a flat fee, they often expect you to make one little change here, another little change there. The work involved in the little things often adds up to more than the original project by orders of magnitude. Before you know it, you’re working for free for an ungrateful idiot.
Advice to both sides: Before any work begins, get a written contract with very specific language. Spec it out. Live up to your end of it.
Exactly!!! That’s the way to go!!!
Ah, yes. I can see this happening very easily.
I have never really done that much web design work for anyone else, but my few experiences were such that—ack—never again. I used to have a semi-professional website created, showing off my web design services, trying to get business, but I’ve revamped that whole site and made it into something else. I am OUT of the web design business (not that I was really ever in it). I don’t want to deal with endless, “But could you change this…and while you’re at it, change that. Oh by the way, the work you just spent 2 hours on isn’t quite what I wanted after all—can you change it again?” NO. No more of that.
Dopers/web folks,
What I need is a large, picture intensive, secure site with shopping cart software and a forum and apparently most of the folks that do this stuff “on the side” can’t (or don’t want to) mess with the various programs to do what I need.
WARNING!!!, I AM A WEB PAGE IDIOT!!!
I do not want to be involved very much in the development of this page, the “look” is actually pretty Spartan (there is pretty much a “formula/aesthetic” that the crowd this is for likes), BUT!
Dopers/web folks,
What I need is a large, picture intensive, secure site with shopping cart software (400 - 500 different items for sale) and a forum and apparently most of the folks that do this stuff “on the side” can’t (or don’t want to) mess with the various programs to do what I need.
WARNING!!!, I AM A WEB PAGE IDIOT!!!
I do not want to be involved very much in the development of this page, the “look” is actually pretty Spartan (there is pretty much a “formula/aesthetic” that the crowd this is for likes) and I have an actual graphic artist working on logo’s now, BUT! this site will be my primary source of income so I am going to be REAL pissy about completeness and deadlines.
I have no problem paying!, I have money. The whole “I’m an Artist” thing pisses me off because I feel like when you “hang out a shingle” you become less Picasso and more Kincaid, web design has gone (in your world) from being “art” to being “a job”.
Unclviny (who still has some Newbie web page questions)
You have money, eh? We at Q5 Media like money. Come visit. We promise to not like you for a very good price.
OMGWTFBBQ!!!111 oneone U d0n’T evNe uSe uN1x!!!111 OMG WTF!11 U r suc tEh l4M3r11!! I uS t3h l33t h4xx0r c0de!11 Suxx0r 4 u!! OMF WTF BBQ!!!111
(This message brought to you by: Script Kiddies! Annoying the fuck out of everyone on the internet since 2000!)
You users all want the same thing: “Wham, bam, html, ma’am.”
Would it hurt you to cuddle a little? No, don’t touch me. I feel so used.
Don’t forget pop-ups. People love pop-ups.
Especially the kind that keep popping up for 10 minutes AFTER you leave the site.
And porn links. No matter who your customers are, they always appreciate a good porn link.
unclviny - because you said in your own words that you are a webpage idiot, and that what you are asking for is a very big task (I don’t know of a contractor or company that would charge anything less than $3000 for a e-commerce site, the hours of data entry to crop images, and load up the store, plus potential and almost inevitable custom items which would require programming to change the store to be the way you want it). I have never heard of or had a client that wants a straight out of the box forum or store - there are issues like hosting (let the web developer you choose pick the hosting - because otherwise there may not be all the tools needed on the host), integrating your payment method for credit cards, applying the templates - and I suppose you want users to have the same login on the store as on the forums, that will require lots of work.
As a webpage idiot, you’ll need help formatting your photos or other images in the store, as well as with data entry, because most store packages which are prebuilt are very complex. You will need to be trained if you are planning on making updates yourself and I can guess that you may need quite a bit of hand holding. If you want a company to make the updates instead - you’ll have to think about how often you will be going back to them, and what sorts of things you want them to handle right away, and what sorts of things you wouldn’t mind were lower priority.
As well, as a webpage idiot, you probably aren’t sure of what you want, and your contractor or company will need to talk to you often in order to be 100% sure that everything is developed the way you want.
Without a full rfp, my guess on a quote would be about $5000.
No offense - If you were my client we’d be going to the altar right now. 
Much like jjimm, I have a problem that is the polar opposite of unclviny, so I feel for both of them. I find an ad for a one-shot web developing for the one site, apply, and when the time comes to meet in the Real World, they want to go for the Long-Time Commitment, like I was applying for a full-time position.
While it is clear that long lived sites require long-term maintenance, and that someone has to to do it, why not specify it clearly in the offer that it has to be me? As far as I know, they might have perfectly good people at their behest that could handle maintenance but not creation, maybe just because of a problem of being overworked.
As for the Being An Artist thing, I have the opposite problem once again. I am NOT an artist, I am a programmer. I really have a piggy hand when it comes to drawing or handling graphics. With this firmly and clearly mentioned in the CV, why bloody ask me to handle untold hours of Photoshopping?
Hijack, but not a very big one: I put my CV on a couple of websites (like Monster and others) for some freelance work. I’m not looking for full-time positions, because I’m in the University doing a PhD. I do get contacted by firms, but they want to hire me and make me move on the other side of this island, usually Manchester or London. Well, that is nice and good, but I did specify that I’m a student on the CV, right? And that I am looking for freelance, right? So why ask? I don’t want to compete with those that really, seriously need a job to support the family.
Maybe the designers you’ve approached are trying to live up to Kant’s categorical imperative: “Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of another, always at the same time as an end and never simply as a means.”
Great , for some reason that sounds like errors and omissions insurance on the contract, or what ever its called now.
At some point your going to have to decide what exactly you are. An artist or a small business person. If you have the money , have someone else do this for you , in terms of the whole package ,and you work on your easel .
If you don’t ,and some one does sell you a cookie cutter website, with some training. then you are at the mercy of the webhost having a redundant power supply , and that you remembered to back up your site , daily , and you have the time to rotate your stock pictures , and so forth.
Fire away
Declan