Q: What's your name and position in the company?
A: Cathy McCarthy - Freelance creative web design and development
Q: Describe your company in 5 words.
A: Freelance web and graphics services
Q: Describe your office environment.
A: Home office
Q: Describe how your team interact and work together.
A: I work as a freelancer and have a selection of other specialised freelancers I collaborate with on copywriting, photography, SEO and back-end development.
Q: What makes you different from other web design companies?
A: Working with a freelancer you won’t pay agency fees but you’ll have access to an experienced designer with agency and in-house commercial experience – including working as a Senior Designer for Tesco. I will help you define your design brief and turn around changes faster than an agency – offering responsiveness and value for money.
Q: How do you get the majority of your business?
A: Word of mouth
Q: Describe how you manage projects from the initial client contact to completion and handover.
A: After a client initially requires I will work through their requirements over phone/email and come up with a plan for the project and a quote setting out everything included. I work either to hourly rate or to a fixed charge whichever works best for the client & the project. I always mockup designs in Photoshop as well as a test site within my test environment before passing to the client for sign off. This ensures that when the website goes live there are no surprises and the client is happy. CMS training is provided on handover to the client.
Q: What do you think is the most crucial element of creating a good client relationship?
A: Communication & honesty.
Q: How do you manage demanding clients?
A: By communicating well and breaking down the price to explain the costs, clients can then prioritise their wish-list and tasks which they would like me to work on. This helps build an understanding of how long things take, which things are easy and which require for example complex custom development.
I also try and explain things in a non-technical way when required.
Q: If a client was trying to decide between a shortlist of web design companies, how would you recommend they go about selecting the right one for them?
A: - Style of work
- Type of clients they work with
- Who will be working on your project directly
- Can you talk to the Designer/Developer directly?
Q: Where do you see your company in 10 years time?
A: I hope I am still freelancing :)
Q: What computers do you have use in your offices, PCs or Macs?
A: Mac
Q: How was your company name chosen?
A: Why the name Raingoose Design? Raingoose is an informal name for a Red Throated Diver – a summer visitor to Shetland. I have Shetland heritage and as a child I loved holidaying there, also as a summer visitor – you don’t want to spend much time there in winter!
Q: If you were to give your clients one tip on how to get the most from their website what would it be?
A: Regular updates of high quality content.
Latest Work
