How to choose a web design agency in Dubai

Searching for a web design agency in Dubai returns hundreds of results, and almost all of them say the same things. Award winning. Results driven. Bespoke. None of that helps you choose, because none of it can be checked before you have already paid.

We are one of those studios, so read this knowing we have an interest in your answer. What follows is still the honest version: these are the questions we would ask if we were hiring us, and a few of them are ones we would rather not be asked.

1. Ask who actually does the work

In a lot of agencies the person who wins the project is not the person who builds it. You meet a senior name at the pitch, sign, and then deal with an account manager relaying your words to a team you never meet. Nothing is malicious about it. It is just how a business built on headcount has to run.

Ask directly: who designs this, who builds it, and will I speak to them? A studio that cannot answer plainly is telling you something.

2. Ask to see a site on your own phone

Portfolios are shown on large screens, in mockups, at angles. Your customers will see your site on a phone, in daylight, on a mobile connection. Those are very different tests.

So open three of their live client sites on your own phone while you are sitting with them. Does the text fit the screen? Does anything jump as it loads? Can you find the phone number in under three seconds? A studio proud of its mobile work will hand you their phone before you ask.

3. Ask what happens if you want to leave

This is the uncomfortable one, and it is the most revealing. Some agencies build on platforms you cannot take with you, or hold the domain, the hosting and the code in their own accounts. Leaving means starting again, which is precisely the point.

Ask who owns the domain, who owns the code, and what you would walk away with if you stopped working together tomorrow. The answer should be: all of it, and you.

4. Be careful what a fixed price is fixed to

A number on a page is reassuring, and it can also be meaningless. A fixed price for an unfixed scope becomes a change request the moment the project starts moving, which is when the real cost appears.

What matters is not whether the price is published, but whether the scope behind it is written down. Ask for the scope in writing before you ask for the discount.

A cheap website that nobody enquires through is not cheap. It is the most expensive thing on the list, because you pay for it twice.

5. Ask what they would tell you not to build

Anyone will agree to build what you ask for. Far fewer will tell you which part of it is a bad idea. A studio worth hiring has opinions about what will not work, and will say so before it is built rather than after.

If every idea you float is met with enthusiasm, you are talking to a supplier, not an adviser. That is fine if you know exactly what you want. It is expensive if you do not.

6. Ask who maintains it, and what that costs

A website is not a delivery, it is a thing that has to keep working. Platforms update, plugins break, content goes stale, and search engines change what they reward. A site nobody has touched in three years looks like a business nobody has touched in three years.

Agree before launch who is responsible for keeping it current, and what that costs monthly. The honest answer might be that you will do it yourself. That is fine, as long as somebody has said it out loud.

The Dubai part, specifically

Two things are genuinely different here. The market is unusually international, so a site that only speaks to one audience leaves money on the table. And mobile share is very high, which makes the phone experience the main experience rather than the secondary one.

Neither requires a local agency. It requires an agency that understands who your customers actually are. Ours is based in Dubai and works with clients wherever they are, which is a preference rather than a qualification.

What to do next

Pick three studios. Ask all six questions. Compare the answers rather than the pitch decks, because the pitch decks will be indistinguishable and the answers will not be.

If you want ours, our process is written out step by step, our indicative ranges are published rather than hidden behind a call, and the founder replies to every enquiry personally. Start with a couple of sentences about what you are trying to achieve and we will tell you honestly whether we are the right fit.