To choose a web design agency, ask twelve questions: who owns the site when it is finished, what platform it will be built on and why, who actually does the work, what is excluded from the quote, how changes are handled, what happens after launch, how they protect your Google rankings, what the site will score on performance, who owns your domain and hosting, what their last three clients would say, what happens if you want to leave, and what they would push back on in your brief. The answers to those twelve tell you more than any portfolio does.
A website is one of the larger discretionary purchases a small business makes, usually somewhere between $8,000 and $60,000, and most owners only do it every four or five years. That combination makes it hard to judge. This guide is what we would want a client to ask us, including the parts that are uncomfortable.
Before you contact anyone
Get two things straight first, because they change who you should even be talking to.
What is the site actually for? Generating enquiries, selling products, looking credible to investors and being a brochure are different jobs with different builds. An agency that does beautiful brand sites may be the wrong choice for a store that lives or dies on conversion rate.
What is your real budget? Not the number you want to say out loud, the number above which you would say no. Withholding it wastes everyone’s time and usually produces a quote scoped to what the agency guesses you can afford. Any decent agency will tell you straight if your budget does not match your brief.
The twelve questions
1. Who owns the website when it is finished?
You should. All of it: the code, the design files, the content, the domain and the hosting account.
Some agencies build on proprietary platforms you can only use while you keep paying them. That is a legitimate business model but you need to know you are entering it. If the answer is anything other than a clear “you do”, ask what happens if you leave.
2. What platform will you build on, and why that one?
Listen for a reason connected to your situation rather than to their convenience. WordPress, Shopify, Astro, Next.js and Webflow are all good answers for different projects. “It is what we always use” is not a reason.
Fair reasons sound like: you publish three times a week and need a proper editor, so WordPress. You sell fifty products and want the ecosystem, so Shopify. Your site is mostly content and speed is the priority, so Astro. If you want the longer version of that comparison, we wrote about Shopify versus WordPress for ecommerce.
3. Who will actually do the work?
At small studios you usually get the people you meet. At larger agencies, the senior person who wins the project is not always the person who delivers it, and work is sometimes subcontracted offshore without that being mentioned.
Neither is wrong. You just want to know before you sign, and you want to know who you can call when something breaks.
4. What is not included in this quote?
The most useful question on the list. Common exclusions that surprise people:
- Copywriting, which is often assumed to be your job
- Stock photography licences
- Content migration from the old site
- Third-party integrations
- Training on how to update the site
- Hosting, domain and SSL for year one
- Post-launch support beyond a short bug window
None of these are dishonest exclusions. They just need to be visible before you compare two quotes that look $6,000 apart and are not.
5. How are changes and revisions handled?
Ask how many rounds are included, what counts as a round, and what happens beyond it. A quote with unlimited revisions is either priced for it or will become tense around week five.
6. What happens after launch?
Websites are not furniture. Platforms update, plugins break, browsers change, certificates expire. Ask whether support is included, what it costs monthly, response times, and who fixes it at 6pm on a Friday when the contact form stops working.
Also ask what happens if you want to make changes yourself. You should get a walkthrough and ideally a short recorded video of your own site.
7. How will you protect my existing Google rankings?
Critical for a rebuild and frequently missed. If your URLs change without proper redirects, you can lose rankings you spent years earning, and it can take months to recover.
You want to hear: a redirect map from every old URL to its new equivalent, preservation of page titles and meta descriptions where they already perform, a crawl before and after, and monitoring in Search Console for a few weeks post-launch. If they look blank at this question, that is your answer.
8. What will the finished site score on performance?
Ask for a target and ask them to run PageSpeed Insights on their own recent work in front of you. Mobile, not desktop.
Speed is not vanity. Around half of mobile users abandon a page that takes more than three seconds, and Google uses page experience signals in ranking. If an agency cannot point at fast sites they have built, they are not optimising for it. More on this in our guide to improving your PageSpeed score.
9. Who holds my domain and hosting?
Your domain should be registered in your business name, in an account you control. Same for hosting. Agencies holding domains hostage is rare but it happens, and it is miserable when it does.
If they manage hosting on your behalf, that is fine and often sensible. Just confirm the account is yours and you can get the login.
10. Can I speak to your last three clients?
Not the three showcase testimonials on the website. The last three, including any that did not go smoothly. A confident agency will offer this. How they talk about a project that went badly is more informative than the ones that went well.
11. What happens if I want to leave?
Ask it before you sign, when you have the most leverage. Can you take the code? Is there a handover process? Is there an exit fee? Are you on a contract with a minimum term?
12. What would you push back on in my brief?
The best question of the twelve, and the one people never ask.
An agency that agrees with everything in your brief is either flattering you or not thinking. You are hiring expertise, and expertise should produce at least one “we would not do it that way, and here is why”. If they have no opinion before the money changes hands, they will not develop one afterwards.
Red flags worth walking away from
- A quote arrives without a conversation. Nobody can scope a site from a two line email.
- Guaranteed number one on Google. Nobody controls Google’s ranking. This one is a straightforward misrepresentation.
- Dramatically cheaper than everyone else. Usually a template, an offshore team you were not told about, or a scope much smaller than you think.
- No written scope. If what you are buying is not written down, disputes later have no reference point.
- Pressure to sign this week. Discounts that expire are a sales tactic, not a business reality.
- A portfolio of slow sites. Run their own site through PageSpeed Insights. It is a two minute check and it is revealing.
- They will not name their platform. Vagueness here usually means lock-in.
Small studio or large agency?
Both work. They fail differently.
| Small studio | Larger agency | |
|---|---|---|
| Who does the work | Usually the people you met | Often a delivery team you have not met |
| Cost | Lower overhead, usually cheaper | Higher rates |
| Availability | Fewer projects at once, more attention | More capacity, more process |
| Risk | Key person dependency | You may be a small account |
| Best for | Businesses wanting senior attention | Large multi-stakeholder projects |
We are obviously biased, being a small studio in Byron Bay. The honest version: if your project needs six specialists working in parallel to a fixed corporate deadline, a larger agency is the safer choice. If you want senior people actually doing the work and a direct line to them, a small studio wins.
Frequently asked questions
How much should I pay a web design agency in Australia?
A small business website typically costs $8,000 to $25,000, a larger corporate site $25,000 to $60,000, and a simple landing page $2,000 to $6,000. Our own builds start at $12,000 ex GST.
What questions should I ask a web designer before hiring them?
The essentials are who owns the finished site, what is excluded from the quote, who does the actual work, what happens after launch, and how they will protect your existing Google rankings during a rebuild.
Should I hire a freelancer or an agency?
A freelancer is usually cheaper and fine for smaller projects, but carries key person risk if they get sick or move on. An agency or studio gives you continuity and a broader skill set. For anything business-critical, continuity matters.
Is it worth hiring a local web designer?
Location matters less than it used to, and most work happens over video calls regardless. A local agency helps if you want in-person workshops, or if local market knowledge is genuinely relevant to your customers. Otherwise, judge on the work.
How do I know if a web design quote is fair?
Compare inclusions rather than totals. Ask each agency what they assumed about content, revisions, integrations and post-launch support. Quotes that look far apart are usually scoping different projects.
What should be in a web design contract?
A written scope, a payment schedule, the number of revision rounds, an intellectual property clause confirming you own the finished work, a timeline with both parties’ obligations, and what happens if either side wants to exit.
If you are collecting quotes
Ask us the twelve questions above. We will answer all of them, including the uncomfortable ones, and we will tell you if we are not the right fit for what you need.
Book a free 20 minute call or take a look at how we build websites first.
