It is now 6:36pm on the 4th. I didn’t get home until 6am this morning so I couldn’t write my normal 2 am-only a few hours late-its still technically today somewhere-post.
We live in a society where people want everything now, they want it fast, they want it cheap. Hence why we all live off of fast food that is cheap but sure not “good”. We buy songs off of itunes one at a time because we can’t be bothered with having a whole CD of a persons work. Too much money! I only want the songs I LIKE! We go through life being cheap, fast, and lazy.
We don’t know what quality is. We live in the clearance bins.
That seems harsh, doesn’t it? What does it mean?
Don’t mistake what I am saying to mean we all need Prada purses and Jaguars. I’m perfectly fine in my no-name jeans. This isn’t about “living poor” and being wrong. This is about not wanting QUALITY in our lives, and not wanting to have to pay to receive it. We will literally do anything we can to get things as cheap and easy as possible without questioning if it TRULY is “worth” it.
What sent me on this rant?
I am a graphic designer, up and coming. I am by no means some pro who has been at it for ten years. I am simply a girl who has been dabbling for about 15 years in different aspects of the field, then officially went to college for it. I have been dabbling in photography for most of my life, and concentrated on it for seven years.
So when I come across a website from a “graphic designer” so bad, so just disgustingly amateur, I get just a little upset. Same with faux-togs.
If you do not know the simple rules of a field, do not claim to be a “professional”.
I am a hobbyist photographer. I know that with accurate training, I could meet professional standards. I have taken some schooling in it. Why do I not continue the schooling? Simple. Every person with instagram thinks they are a photographer. They don’t realize that the automatic editing once took someonen a very long time to create that effect. They take their picture, and post it on Facebook in a matter of minutes, never thinking about the process that should have occured. So what is honestly the point? I will continue with my hobby, and I like my hobby. But I will never claim to be a “Photographer” in the ranks of the big boys. I’ll help out friends, I’ll enjoy the hobby. I am smart enough to know, leave professional jobs to the professionals. Because otherwise it is just a huge insult.
When someone makes a website and claims to be a professional, it better stand up. No spelling errors. No typos. No punctuation errors. And that’s just in the copy! If you want to design web, and you’re good at it, but suck at copy? Don’t write the copy! Let the customer hire a copywriter! It only makes you and the customer look stupid.
If you are going to make a website, and things don’t link back, things are not sized properly, and all in all the site is a mess, you are not a “webdesigner”. You have NO RIGHT to call yourself one. You have NO RIGHT to CHARGE people for your pathetic services. Why?
You probably got paid 200 bucks to make that site. And boy, can you tell.
Now, that person is going to come to me. And want it done for 200 bucks. Thats approximately 6 hours of my time. Sure, I can make you say, a very watered down, click here click there, no words, no pictures, no-pretty-much-anything site. And that person is going to whine, “but they did it!”
And now you’re here, asking me to do it. What does that tell you?
You get what you pay for. You wanted it fast, cheap and easy. And now it LOOKS fast, cheap, and easy. If you do not want to spend the money on a good quality site, maybe you shouldn’t be getting a site. When YOUR customers come to YOUR site and see this mess? They are going to immediately judge you as unprofessional. They’re not going to come back. And if they’re like me, the next thing they are going to think is, “who made this site, and associates their name with this garbage?” If you wouldn’t go to a website, because it is junk, why would you put your name on it, or your customers name on it? It’s insulting to everyone involved. Including your base you are trying to reach. Are they not worth the time and investment of a nice, professional site? Are they really mindless zombies that are too stupid they won’t notice? They notice. Trust me.
So was being cheap, fast, and easy “worth” it in the end? You paid guy number one two hundred bucks for your mess. Now you’re going to pay me my fee on TOP of that fee. If you had simply done it correctly the FIRST time, you wouldn’t be wasting that original two hundred bucks. Sometimes “pinching pennies” wastes dollars.
Don’t live in a clearance bin.
108fate 