How to Choose a Web Designer in Edmonton: 10 Questions to Ask First

The short answer: pick the Edmonton web designer who can show you fast, real sites they’ve built, tells you the full price up front (including any monthly fees), and puts in writing that you own your domain and your site. Everything else is detail.

The longer answer is below. These are the 10 questions I’d ask anyone, including me, before handing over a deposit.

1. What’s the total price, including monthly fees?

Edmonton website prices are all over the map. Freelancers usually charge $800 to $4,000. Agencies usually charge $3,000 to $15,000 or more. Then there’s the part people forget: many builders and agencies add $20 to $150 a month for hosting and “care”, forever.

Ask for one number for the build and one number per month, in writing. If they can’t give you both, keep looking.

2. Who owns the website and the domain?

You should. Your domain (yourbusiness.ca) should be registered in your name, and you should be able to take your site files with you if you ever leave. Some companies build on their own platform so you can’t move. That’s a trap, not a feature.

3. Can I see sites you’ve actually built?

Look for real, live websites, not just screenshots. Open them on your phone. Do they load fast? Can you find the phone number in two seconds? Would you call that business?

Good designers will also tell you which examples are paid client work and which are concept or sample sites. Both are fine, as long as they’re honest about it.

4. How fast will my site load on a phone?

Most local customers find you on their phone. Ask the designer to run one of their sites through Google’s free PageSpeed Insights test. Mobile scores of 90+ are excellent. Under 50 means visitors are leaving before the page loads.

You can also run our free website health check on any site, including theirs.

5. What is it built with?

There’s no single right answer, but you should know what you’re getting:

• Wix, Squarespace or GoDaddy: easy for you to edit, but you rent the site, pay monthly forever, and they’re often slow on phones.
• WordPress with a page builder like Elementor: flexible, but heavy. Plugins need constant updates or things break.
• Hand-built (HTML, CSS and JavaScript): fastest and cleanest, nothing to break, but you need someone to make bigger changes.

6. Who writes the content?

Many designers expect you to hand over every word and photo. That’s often where projects stall for months. Ask if they write the content for you, and whether that costs extra.

7. How long until I see something?

Some agencies quote 6 to 12 weeks. A focused freelancer can often show you a working first draft within a few days. Ask when you’ll see a first draft and when it’ll be live.

8. What do you do so Google can find me?

At minimum, every new site should have: a clear title and description on each page, a sitemap submitted to Google, business details in Google’s format (called schema), fast loading, and your Google Business Profile set up and linked. If the answer is vague, that’s a red flag.

9. Do you guarantee rankings?

The right answer is no. Nobody outside Google controls rankings, and anyone guaranteeing you “#1 on Google” is either lying or planning to use tricks that can get your site penalized. A good designer will tell you what they’ll do and show you the numbers honestly.

10. What happens after launch?

Ask how changes work after the site is live. Is there a free period for tweaks? What does a small edit cost after that? Who do you call if something breaks, and how fast do they answer?

A quick checklist

Before you sign, you should have in writing:

• The total build price and any monthly fees
• That you own the domain, content and site files
• What’s included and what isn’t
• When you’ll see a first draft and when it goes live
• How changes and support work after launch

Where Griffin fits

I’m a small, independent studio in Edmonton, and I built my offer around exactly these questions: one-time prices from $799 with free hosting and no monthly fees, a first draft in 48 hours, all the content written for you, and you own everything. Every price is on the packages page.

Not ready to talk? Run the free website health check on your current site and see where you stand.