The pattern almost every bad job follows

Someone quotes quickly. The price feels reasonable. There is a bit of back and forth over colours. A site goes live. It looks alright. Then nothing much happens, and when you ask why, the answer is that you need to spend more on ads or social media.

The site was never diagnosed. Nobody asked what a good enquiry looks like for you, or which page a Huddersfield customer would land on and why. It was decorated, not built.

What it costs you

The obvious cost is the money. The bigger cost is the two years you spend assuming websites just do not work for your kind of business. In that time you keep paying for a domain, hosting, maybe a plugin licence, and you get very little back. Meanwhile a competitor with a plainer site and clearer wording takes the calls.

There is also the awkward middle ground where the site half works, so you never quite justify replacing it. That is the most expensive outcome of the lot.

Questions that sort the good from the rest

Ask what they would want to know before quoting. A serious answer includes your enquiry sources, your best jobs, and your sales process. A weak answer is a page count and a price.

Ask who owns and can edit the site afterwards. You should be able to change your own opening hours without raising a ticket.

Ask what happens if it does not bring in work. Anyone confident in their process will have an answer that is not just louder marketing.

Local knowledge is a fair thing to ask about

If you serve Huddersfield, Brighouse and Halifax, but not Manchester, your site should say so plainly, and your Google Business Profile should back it up. A designer who shrugs at that is going to leave your best local search traffic on the table.

What to do next

Get two conversations, not five quotes. The conversation tells you more than the document. You are choosing how someone thinks, because that is what you are paying for.