Is Web Development as Bad in Your City as it is Here?
I’ve been pondering the idea of starting my own company offering web design and development solutions (more on this in a later article). With this in mind, I got curious about the quality of work companies are doing here in Lexington, KY. I decided to Google “Web design in Lexington, KY” to see what I could find. Although Lexington is the second largest city in Kentucky, it’s still very small with close to 300,000 people. There are actually more companies offering web design/development services than I expected.
To my surprise, after looking at quite a few company websites and their portfolios, an astonishing number of them (all that I looked at) should not be referring to themselves as professionals.
Some Things That I Found
I’m not going to name any names, but you can do a search for yourself and see what I’m referring too. The state of web design in Lexington is pretty poor to say the least. Below is just a short list of some things that I discovered from various company sites and the sites in their portfolios.
- Majority of the sites I viewed had no DOCTYPE. The few that did have a valid DOCTYPE declared might as well have not had it. One company had a strict xhtml DOCTYPE declared which would lead me to believe that they have higher standards for writing code? I validated the HTML and found 158 errors. The CSS got a little better with only 28 errors.
- Nearly all used a loaded mess of tables for layout. Unless you’ve only been learning about developing websites for a week or so, you should know tables for layout is stupid. One company claims that their staff has five plus years of experience… and still using ancient techniques?
- Overuse of Flash. I have nothing against using flash, but use it to add some flare to the site, not the whole site design (I hate watching a bar move across the screen with the word “loading” beneath it). Although screen reader support is improving for Flash, it’s still much easier to use HTML so your site is more accessible to the visually impaired. Flash sites are not search engine friendly and are a pain to maintain. There are other reasons, but you get the point.
- Using JavaScript for hover effects on menu items to change a background color or image. Aside from the user potentially having JavaScript disabled and not seeing the effect anyway, CSS could be utilized to produce the exact same results with probably much less effort.
- Tables inside of Divisions (div) for the layout. Please don’t start coding a tableless layout and then throw a mess of tables inside of the divisions. Not only does it look terrible, I’m sure it makes future revisions a pain in the neck which in turn costs the client more money since it will take you longer to make those revisions.
Now, I’m not an HTML/CSS guru, but I do know a little. I still need assistance myself from time to time with different techniques and I still refer to my trusty CSS books (see the books in my footer), but the point I’m trying to make is that people who are actually doing this for a living should take a little more pride in their work. They are the self proclaimed professionals, so why do they look like amateurs? The only reason I can come up with is because the client simply doesn’t know any better. I don’t even do this for a living but I do my best to ensure the stuff I put out there is done the right way.
The Designs Were Not Much Better
Website design is very subjective. What I think looks good, someone else might not. Sometimes, even though the code is a mess, the design can still look aesthetically appealing and visitors may never know the difference (except for some slowness here or there from the terrible code). Majority of the companies I looked at had some very dated designs. I must say though, a couple companies do some good work design wise, but still not exactly what I would expect from a group of individuals who supposedly do this for a living. But that’s just my opinion, someone else may think the designs are wonderful.
What is the State of Web Design in Your City?
Tell me a little about the city or area that you live in. Is it similar to my own experience?
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I still see alot of sites in Cambodia still using Table to layout their page. The designing style seems to be the one 5 or 6 years to the past. The font size is too small to read. More, they like to use flash. Actually, Flash site is still absolutely popular in Cambodia. You know, they use flash even in many programs used for the supermarkets. The price is very high. The internet in Cambodia has just been mushrooming these few years so even the ones who needs to use software or website for their company have no enough ideas yet to tell the programmers or the developers what they wanna do..That’s the unfortunate thing for this poor country.
Posted on Fri Dec 21, 2007
Brian: Where are you going to college Brian? Outside of San Antonio? Either way, I wouldn’t let it stop you from offering design services. Believe me, you might think you’ve got not time while you’re in school, but there is no better time to start a business than while you’re in college. You’ve essentially got no worries, so it’s in my opinion the best time. Test the waters and see how you do. It’s much harder ones you get out of college and you’ve got your own house, cars, bills and such to pay for. If you try something in college and it doesn’t work out, oh well, you tried and you can move on. If you try it out of college and fail, you could lose everything. Just my opinion though. I sure wish I had got more serious about publishing sites and possibly starting my own business while I was in college.
Why trust someone with designing your web site when they can’t do a good job with their own?
I think there in lies the big problem. Most clients are corporate business type people, not web designers/developers themselves. There is nothing wrong with that and I’m sure they are good at what they do, but they are not designers/developers and probably wouldn’t know a good design if it slapped them in the face. These are the people that are viewing the portfolios of these companies and seeing great work, simply because they know no better.
Daravuth KEU: Yes, I agree. It’s unfortunate. The most unfortunate thing is the people who are being ripped off by these bad designer/developers who are telling the clients that their work is top of the line and the client, not knowing any better is agreeing.
Posted on Wed Dec 26, 2007
When I looked around at the websites of web design companies in New Hampshire, I was pretty appalled at the number of bad ones. Fortunately (or unfortunately for me, being a web designer) there were a few good ones as well.
Posted on Fri Dec 28, 2007
Joshua: That seems to be the general conscious thus far from the comments I’ve received. I realize that it can’t be that bad in every city because there are some amazing designer/developers out there, but it’s amazing nonetheless that a lot of the bad designers are even in business. There again though, the average consumer looking for a website, doesn’t know a 1995 looking design from a 2007 looking design. As a matter of fact, in my experience, novice users who are looking for a website, would much rather have a bunch of blinking .gifs, loud colors, and huge images on the site rather than have everything evenly spaces, minimal and clean. Go figure.
Posted on Fri Dec 28, 2007
The web design scene here is dire because
1) The agencies have good salespeople who provide warm fuzzies.
2) The agencies are headed by affluent rich with horrible taste.
3) Lexington’s upper-crusty culture is like teflon to those of us with ideals.
If I sound bitter it’s because I’ve had the most frustrating experiences with even pretty talented local agencies. What was the root of these experiences? The root was a lack of Web Project Management and a failure to understand even the basic differences between Web Project Management and, for example, Print Project Management. It’s maddening and will eventually and fortunately change with people like us 
</rant>
Posted on Tue Jan 1, 2008
Sam: It’s easy to go off an a rant about this. I definitely know how you feel.
I think you’ve hit the nail on the head with your three points. Having good sales people is big. A lot of times all clients need to hear is that they need something. When I was a cell phone sales rep with T-Mobile, it was easy. Tell someone that they NEED this phone and even if they only wanted to spend 50 bucks when they came it, they would easily walk out the door with a 200 dollar phone, car charger, case, and bluetooth headset. 
People just like to hear they need something and it’s usually as easy as that.
Yeah, I’m with you. I think it will change for the better at some point. I just hope that it’s sooner rather than later. I see a big market for design services in Lexington, but it will take a lot to get the business from the already established companies no matter how bad they are.
Posted on Wed Jan 2, 2008
I loved this post! It’s what I grumble about constantly and I live in Brooklyn,NY.
You’d think that the state of Web design would be better here than in Lexington (which I have visited once do you know a band called King Kong? sorry for the random Lexington reference).
Anyways-I see the same stuff in NY webpages;tables for layout,no doctype,all flash for no reason,etc.My clients are all local and all my site overhauls have taken care of this exact kind of nonsense.
Posted on Mon Jan 7, 2008
McCormicky: Yes, you definitely would think that a larger city like Brooklyn, NY would have a better web design scene. Just for shear volume, I’m guessing there are quite a bit more companies offering web design services as their main service or in addition to their main server in Brooklyn than there are here in Lexington. So, based on that alone, one would gather that someone in the bunch would have to know their “stuff.”
It really boggles me why a lot of the designers/developers do what they do. Like you said, no doctype, tables for layout, etc., A lot of those issues are beginner type issues that a “professional” should be aware of. So, they are either aware of the issues and choosing to ignore them or they are choosing to be lazy. Unfortunately the only one hurt in the matter is the client, who unknowingly is hurt.
Who knows? Maybe it’s just me and others like me who are all over the place online. I visit forums, read design/development blogs, etc., so I like to think I’m up to date on all the latest trends. Maybe the developers for these places simply don’t go online to read up on what’s happening today in the development world?
That’s pretty cool that you’ve visited Lexington before. How’d you like it? It’s probably grown a ton since you were here (unless it was recently). Nope, never heard of the group King Kong… just the movie. What kind of music do they play?
Posted on Mon Jan 7, 2008
A hundred miles away from you in Portsmouth, Ohio isn’t any better. Understandably, it’s a much smaller town but there’s really only 1 game in town and his designs are, well, crap. Even the professor who teaches web design at the college doesn’t seem to be knowledgeable about semantics, accessibility, and so forth. I’ve contemplated attending many times, but I don’t believe spending 4 years going to a college just for a degree that won’t even challenge me will/would be beneficial. Saddening to say the least.
Posted on Sun Jan 20, 2008
Shawn: I grew up in West Union, OH before going to school are Morehead State!
Yeah, I know what you mean about the professors. When I was in college from 99 - 2003, semantics and accessibility were not huge issues, but they were around and the professors just didn’t even attempt to teach them or anything that had to do with tableless design. I remember my final project in that class, it was a joke. I wish I would have saved it as something to look back on and remember how far I’ve come.
BTW: Singing in the shower is hilarious!
Good to hear from you.
Posted on Sun Jan 20, 2008
You’d be surprised the people who call themselves professionals and sell their web design. And then you’d be surprised the number of people buy web design packages from these companies. I found several sites from companies that look like eBay listings.. no buttons to click one, everything on one page. Then you have the old “words in flames” design and misspelled words. If I were to buy a package and got something like that, I would be really upset. I would like to get into this, but I am a major stickler and I know that no matter what I do, I’d never be happy with it. I couldn’t ever sell anything to someone unless it was perfect.
Posted on Sun Jan 27, 2008
Melanie: I hear ya. I’m the same way. I’m a real perfectionist, but I’m improving. I’ve just about come to terms that not every single thing (with a design) can be perfect at all times and in every browser. I used to kill myself trying to make my designs look identical in the popular browsers, but that’s just not feasible. Sometimes you just have to go with functional rather than perfect and realize that you are the only one that will see these little imperfections. Everyone visiting your site will not be analyzing the design like you’re analyzing it.
Heck, I could point out all kinds of imperfections on this site, but I’m betting that most everyone that visits couldn’t point them out.
Posted on Sun Jan 27, 2008
It’s very sad that this city which is ranked like 9th in creativity (reference Commerce Lexington) has such a terrible web design scene. I am not even a web designer, I am a print designer and I can vouch that it is not just web, it is all design here unfortunately. Clients work with these firms and freelancers railroaded us with quality work and design competency out of the equation. The clients sacrifice good design for a better price. Terrible.
I like Lexington, it is a nice little city with a lot to do.
Posted on Fri Feb 8, 2008
I used to teach graphic arts, including the web and print design classes in our two year associates degree program students. They were a little more fortunate. If you were NOT in the two-year associates degree program, you couldn’t take my classes… instead you had to settle for the ones offered by the Computer Sciences dept., and they constantly amazed me with how they pushed all the oldest techniques. That seems to be often found in colleges - a “play-it-safe” “cover-your-ass” “teach the basics” mentality. You have to really pre-interview your professors to make sure they will teach you the current information (or whether you will have to ‘qualify’ for an ‘advanced’ course to even begin to scratch the surface there!)
That may be part of why the designs are antiquated - the college graduates are not being taught current methods in many instances, and they get jobs at these agencies based upon their acquiring degrees. Then they do what their professors showed them how to do… pitiful!
The ones bemoaning the current state of affairs are the lifetime learners here, and I commend each one of you for sticking to your guns and holding out for your ideals. If you need to, partner with somebody who is excellent at the sales end and give clients a taste of what they COULD get for their money!
Terry
Posted on Wed Feb 13, 2008
Adam: Yeah, I like Lexington too. I only wish it were a little warmer here year around!
I agree about your thoughts on the state of design here. It’s just overall bad! Maybe a few of us should combine forces and change that?
I never realized that Lexington ranks 9th in creativity. That’s pretty cool I guess, but it doesn’t really say a lot about the others in the list. They are either really really good and blow the competition away or they are just average enough to beat Lexington out.
Terry: Thanks for stopping by Terry. I definitely know what you mean about the college classes. I had a couple web design classes in college and it’s really a wonder that I didn’t decide to pack it in then and just pursue something else. I really didn’t know for sure at the time, but looking back knowing what I know now, the professors didn’t know anything. They would give you the Macromedia MX suite and then let you slice and dice some layouts with a little flash built in and it was just horrendous.
Posted on Wed Feb 13, 2008
I’m going to guess that my site was one of those breaking the rules above! I have stopped pitching Lex clients because so many business models here are the “good enough” kind. Nice people, but not many people going to the edges where the action is.
I spend most of my time on client strategy and less on development than ever before. Still, I just launched a couple of ecommerce sites for niches in the past month, and you’ll be proud to know they were 95% pure CSS and validated! LOL.
Posted on Mon Mar 3, 2008
Scott: hehe, actually no, your site wasn’t one of the ones I checked before writing the article. Yeah, I’ve noticed the “good enough” model. It seems like as long as it works (or seems to work) no one has a second thought.
Did you develop the ecommerce solutions yourself or use an already made application like Magento?
Posted on Mon Mar 3, 2008
I develop everything from scratch in dreamweaver but often use hosted carts on the back-end (liability, security, cost) - most of the time I want to concentrate on the landing page optimization and not the commerce side. If clients outgrow that (e.g. J Peterman) then they will need to adjust the tech.
The most recent one is to support a product that’s going to be on MSNBC this week on “The Big Idea” so it was developed at a full sprint!
Posted on Mon Mar 3, 2008
Scott: I used to use Dreamweaver myself but opted for something a little more light weight. I moved to Edit+ from Dreamweaver and have now moved to NotePad++ for coding.
I like The Big Idea when I remember to watch it. what day is the new product going to be on?
Posted on Mon Mar 3, 2008
Currently i am using latest version of Dreamweaver,
Adobe Dreamweaver CS3. as it’s very much friendly for the both users design and coding part.
I am integrating web services which i made in dot.net with the dreamweaver.
Posted on Thu Mar 13, 2008
James: I used to use Dreamweaver, but moved to something a little more lightweight. I use Notepad++ now.
Posted on Thu Mar 13, 2008
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My name is Deron Sizemore and I am a web designer, web publisher, blogger and serial internet entrepreneur living in Lexington, Kentucky.
Wow…
I just searched San Antonio - and couldn’t find anything good.
I didn’t even bother diving into the code - their sites were terrible.
Why trust someone with designing your web site when they can’t do a good job with their own?
hm…
That could easily be a great way to advertise your web design business.
Nothing in your area?
Throw your home town into your site and try and gain good search engine listings by that.
could do good.
I’m wanting to re-design my personal web site, and if I wasn’t running off to college next year, I’d probably try and advertise myself as a local guy here in SA…
*shrugs*
Oh well.
someone else try it then!
Posted on Fri Dec 21, 2007