There Are 100 Million Web Designers
I’m a veteran in the web design industry, which is ridiculous to say at my ripe old age of 25 (just turned 2 weeks ago) except that it’s true.
I started blogging in July 2003, back when only a few companies used CSS and people like Jeffrey Zeldman were on the frontlines of the standards brigade. I remember the days when putting together a navigation element on a page didn’t automatically mean use an unordered list, which people didn’t really use until Fall/Winter of 2002 which was when the previously-linked A List Apart article was penned. I remember when CSS Zen Garden went live in May 2003 and how excited everyone was to put together a theme (I never did, but I sure did start-and-stop a half dozen). I remember the days when Doug Bowman was the design blog king, before he took his hiatus and returned only to go to Google. I was around when Dan Cederholm redesigned FastCompany’s website (their current design looks like ass, Dan’s was far superior and also 5 years older…) which put him on the path to design stardom. I distinctly remember how popular Movable Type was and how it dominated the blog world before WordPress made a run on them.
Do you remember any of these events?
The reason I’m taking a trip down memory lane is because I’ve been thinking recently just how many web designers there are now and how much the industry has grown in the past 3-5 years. When we launched Business Logs in early Summer 2004 the concept of a design firm that focused on blogs was unheard of. There were some other blog consulting sites out there, but none that really provided high-fidelity visual design. We were the first. Now I probably have 2 dozen blog design firms in my bookmarks folder alone, and could easily name another dozen individual designers who have put together some amazing blog-based website designs. In 2004, the playing field was so small that everything was new….
….but now in 2008, you hardly see anything completely brand new in the web design industry. My partner Paul Scrivens started the very first web design gallery at CSS Vault and now there are probably over 100. Every month I probably come across a half-dozen portfolio sites that I’d consider some of the best design sites I’ve ever seen, and this happens every month! The abundance of design talent in the world right now is unbelievable, but I see the following as some consequences of this abundance:
- It’s unbelievably hard to go from 0-60mph as a new designer just starting out. When I started I put together a blog and some great articles and I was well on my way. Now if you don’t have a blog and you don’t have a couple unbelievable articles (with equally unbelievable pageviews and linkbacks) then you’re already behind everyone else.
- Your portfolio has to be unreal to even get noticed. I can name a half-dozen designers right now that launched their careers with a homely portfolio but still took-off in the industry. Over time they honed their skills and are now putting out fantastic work, but when they started they were still in the learning stages so to speak. If you’re a new designer about to embark in the web design industry and you launch with a decent-but-not-amazing portfolio or blog, you’re already 5 steps behind.
- Competition for client work drives pricing down across the industry. When I designed blogs for medium-to-large sized clients in my past life, prices started at a couple thousand dollars and worked their way up. Now that there are thousands (tens of thousands?) of free WordPress themes available — and everybody uses WP now instead of Movable Type, sorry Anil — clients see that as the bargain basement and when looking for a “custom theme” (I fucking hate that term, it should die) designers have to prove their worth beyond a shadow of a doubt because at all stages of the process a client could pick a freebie design and tweak it up. I’ve been part of many threads in Notes where people ask for bids on a nice blog design and people start throwing out 3-digit quotes. Well, shit, good luck with that.
So what do you do?
You separate yourself from the pack.
Put together a nice portfolio and blog, but don’t get caught up with the one-upsmanship that all the CSS galleries perpetuate. Read more than you write (I suggest this entry to start) and absorb more than you spew out. Twitter and all the microblogging platforms give you the means to produce verbal meta-diarrhea at all times of the day but resist the urge. Pick a niche and put together a small web-based “product” that targets that niche… it doesn’t have to be anything fancy. It could be as simple as a small utility that does to-do tracking in a new way, or a nice iPhone Summerboard theme, but design the hell out of it and then blog about it. Put it in your portfolio, and then tuck it away and put together the next little product site. The successful designers I see out there now are the ones that experiment with these little types of sites, and building a site like this teaches you a lot more than you think it will.
There aren’t really 100 million web designers out there right now, but there are enough so that you’ll get drowned out unless you pick reachable goals and then execute the hell out of ‘em. Don’t try to be the next Smashing Magazine or Freelance Switch, carve out your own area and own it.
Eli James # —
Strange, I was reading Aribag the other day and he was complaining that the design industry lacked solid talent (and that there was more and more work to be done).
What do you think about that post?
Chris # —
You’re absolutely right Mike. There will always be designers that have such incredibly deep talent that they won’t have to work about the influx, but average joes such as myself do have that issue.
All this being said, I see the market changing as you do, and it has come time to adopt or be left behind. By that I mean leaving the technical area and into the business side. So long CSS, maybe another day jQuery, and now business development, taxonomies, and processes reign my vocab.
Scrivs # —
This is a great thing because as Chris mentioned you need to start evolving. Web design is one of those fields where anyone can get involved and that is why you see an influx of portfolios and people offering their design services. The ones that will rise to the top are the ones that step their game up.
There are a million CSS galleries because it isn’t that hard to put one together in a couple of hours. What I am surprised to see is that no one has even bothered differentiating themselves because maybe it is too easy to get that traffic.
Industries evolve, but can only do so when a group decide to take the next leap. I have no problem in believing that one of the sites that we are working on will help do that for design overall.
Designers’ Egos » Emersian # —
[…] is more important than ever now because as Rundle points out there are 100 million web designers out there and the field is getting crowded. The usual designers who just happened to pick up the profession […]
Mike Rundle # —
Eli I think that Greg isn’t as in tune with current web trends and all the new sites that are out like he used to be. There are a ton of talented designers out there if you know where to look.
nemetral # —
Talking about web design, I do like the design of this blog :).
However, I don’t fully agree with the point of this post. Here are my 2 cents: most webdesigners won’t find their clients online; to my view, traditionnal “real-world” networking is still the best way to get new clients and believe me, to non-techie eyes, little difference is made out of a portfolio and HUMAN attitude is much more important; so unless you’re absolutely willing to grab the job of redesigning the website of a high-tech web 2.0 superstar startup, there is less need to separate ourselves from the pack. The separation is already a fact due to our respective (and unique) HUMAN networks. I’m often surprised by the number of people I know who design websites and get paid for that without even having an online portfolio.
Who has 100 million competitors? | nemetral # —
[…] recently stumbled upon an entry from respectable blog 3by9 which dealt with the overcrowded webdesign market and the necessity for webdesigners to make a […]
Jg # —
I disagree with the whole one-step-behind, five-steps-behind concept. You’re speaking to a narrow segment of the design population here — there are many of us who never write a tutorial, never publish a rant about design trends, who don’t use our blogs to discuss our work, and who keep a low profile.
I’ve been a working web designer for ten years now, and I’d hardly consider myself a veteran of the industry. In fact, I feel as if I’m just now really maturing my skills and reaching my natural peak. For eight years I designed for small business clients. For the past two I’ve designed for HP, Apple, BlackBerry, ESPN and other high-profile accounts.
But nobody on the web knows my name or what I do, and I’m okay with that. The people who pay me know my name, as do the clients who trust me, and that’s all the street cred I need.
RS # —
My take is that the world has become increasingly smaller.
Talent really is abundant not just in the USA but everywhere from India, Russia, China to Singapore.
You can be the absolute best at what you do but if you don’t know how to communicate, market and sell your products competitively then you need to get out of the kitchen and go get a job.
I’m an American who competes often in those damn 3 figures and quite honestly, by the time our phone conversation is over with a potential client, that 3 figures steps into the 4 figure arena. It doesn’t happen all the time but it does happen.
We’ve been in the industry since 2002… Today we are positioned on the #1 page of Google in the #1 spot for the keyword search term “Cheap Professional Web Site Design”, and we don’t worry about keeping up with the jones. We focus on our little world around us and nobody elses.
Before we learned the real value of page rankings, we still did fine with our web business. I against every grain in my body forced myself to become my own telemarketer. It was a soul searching traumatic experience. But there is nothing like making a sale on your own.
The niche thing is correct, but don’t you all get tired of hearing “Find your Niche”. Easier said than done. Many designers / developers simply don’t have the intestinal fortitude to be creative and/or an effective salesperson, even if it’s for their own company.
Without the sale there is no business. So it simply doesn’t matter how good you are. I know of an ex-employee who was a fabulous designer. Really awesome in code as well and he left thinking he could start up his business and make a great living. He’s been back to us twice now begging for overflow work. Too bad he was sneaky and dishonest or we’d give him a ton of extra work.
So guys/gals… Don’t burn your bridges either. Best of luck in your web design business. Focus on your little world and don’t worry how many designers there are out there. There is simply too much business to be had.
Thanks,
Rich
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