Web Design Business with Josh Hall

If you’re on the shallow or deep end of the “introvert spectrum” spectrum, I’m guessing the sales part of web design is your least favorite part of the job, right? For some, going to in person networking, business meetups, chamber of commerce events or even calls can be energizing but for others, it’s draining. It is, however, part of being a web biz owner if you’re the one doing the selling… Ther...

Ah…the tug and pull between wanting to avoid being a burned out agency owner but also not being a stressed out, overwhelmed freelancer… Surely there’s a happy medium between the two? Good news, there is. My whole web business education model is focused around this hybrid approach to having a business that runs like a true business/agency but having the freedom and flexibility of a freelancer. Thou...

Copy, written by a human, with its flaws, oddities, and personally lived experience beats out corporate, stale, or AI-generated content every time. From home pages to service pages, to lead generators, blog posts, email sequences, and sales posts…the more personal and genuine you come across, the more it’ll stand out in today’s AI slop world. To help us get practical and tactical with writing pers...

Josh here with big news! Web Designer Pro™ 2.0 (tiered model) is live now!! 🎉 Up to this point, Pro has been one membership tier which gave full access to all of my web design courses, the amazing community and coaching with me directly with a member cap of 250 active members. We're closing in on capacity but the exciting news is...we now have two lower tiers available! Available in Web Desi...

The Web Design Business Podcast turns 5 today!!! 🎉 What a ride it’s been so far (and I have no plans on slowing down.) For this special milestone, I polled my community Web Designer Pro™ for questions and they delivered, asking some GREAT conversation starters. So in this special, 5 year anniversary podcast episode, I’m dishing out the longest AMA session I’ve done to date at 2 hours! The questio...

I don’t know about you…but I didn’t officially “launch” my web design business when I got started. I just kind of fumbled through starting my freelance journey. But if I were starting today, I would put much more effort and emphasis on creating an official “business launch.” Now to the big question…how do you launch a web business successfully? i.e. Get clients fast? Well, my guest in this podcast...

Let’s get real and share exactly how it is…WordPress is not the tool of choice for most web designers getting into the game today. It may be where most end up, because WordPress is the most popular, customizable, and only open-source platform online but as a starting point, it’s not where most new web designers are starting. Drag and drop platforms like Framer, SquareSpace, and ShowIt and even mor...

Clients don’t really want a pretty website…they want a 24/7 sales machine. You work hard creating beautiful designs that are built solid and have intentional messaging and copy…but how do you know all that work is paying off for your client? How do you measure results? How do you keep your clients coming back for ongoing work over and over again? Well, at the end of the day…one of the best ways is...

I recently published a newsletter sharing 5 ways I would get clients if I were starting out in web design today in 2024. It got a lot of great feedback from both early-stage web designers and established web designers looking for a revenue boost alike - so I decided to expand on these 5 strategies as a full podcast! We’ll dive into each of these strategies, how I would go about them and how I woul...

If you’re an established web designer, think back to your first year in business. What was your highest paid project? Aside from some exceptions, I’m guessing it was in the low-thousands…or hundreds. Well, Ben Forred, a web designer who’s still in his first year of business, building it as a side hustle alongside full-time corporate employment recently landed a $7,500 website package and in this p...

It’s been a little while since we’ve talked about accessibility on the podcast and one area we haven’t covered at all to this point is specifically how to make accessible eCommerce websites. Everything is more complex with eCommerce sites and accessibility, while complex even at the basic level, gets even trickier.  So, to help understand all of this, accessibility expert Bet Hannon (CEO of access...

You’ve heard of work/life balance…but what about life/work balance? What if, instead of prioritizing our work and living life around that, we set our calendars, schedules, and weekly routines to have our work revolve around our ideal week? As freedom based lifestyle web designers, that’s exactly the option we have available to us But it takes a proactive approach to make this happen, otherwise cal...

I’ve noticed a common thread among web designers who always seem to have no trouble getting clients - they’re easily ‘referable’ 🤝 It might be a niche, it might be a skillset, it might be something they're known for but in all cases, they’re easily referred to.  For example, here are some Web Designer Pro members who fit the “easily referred” bill: Want a web designer who also helps you with...

Web designers often ask me “how long will it take to get to 6-figures in my web design business?” And it's a tough question to answer. There are a lot of variables to how fast you can build your web design business. Your background, your time availability, your area of focus or expertise, your aversion to risk, work ethic, etc are all factors. But I can tell you, there are folks who go from z...

What’s the most terrifying phrase that hovers in the back of all our minds as a web designer and web business owner? Well, aside from “email down” it’s likely “burnout.” You may have seen a fellow web designer go through this or experienced it yourself. And the harsh reality is, burnout is where all roads can lead if we’re not careful. The onslaught of clients, fulfillment, design, development, tr...

We’re doing a first for the podcast on this episode…I’m featuring a recent Web Designer Pro coaching call! If you didn’t know, in my web design community Web Designer Pro, I host a live coaching call every week. These coaching calls typically include: Member website reviews Member hot seats 10-15 min coaching sessions) And AMA (ask me anything) time Today, I’m sharing a recent call that had some g...

I was recently interviewed on the EverBros Agency Growth Podcast about my journey in fumbling through starting and scaling a web design agency. It was a really good, casual chat with tons of important topics for web designers (early stage and established alike) so THE BROS were kind enough to let me repurpose our chat here for you! Don’t let the name fool you, these are not your typical marketing...

In person networking and referral groups remain to this day the best way to start getting clients, get more clients by expanding your network and get better clients by way of referrals. There are a lot of different ways to get clients in person and virtually, and I’ve done many but if I were starting as a web designer today, my FIRST priority would be to join a networking group. More specifically,...

Ever had a client ask “How long would it take to get to the top of Google?” Ah, I can see your head nodding along now. As web designers, we can’t expect clients to understand how long SEO results can take. We know nothing will lead to instant results and due to all the variables, competition and goal of the client, it may take months to see results…but there are some quick wins that you can implem...

Recurring revenue…the two most lovely words in web design (or any business for that matter.) Having enough recurring income to cover my family's bills is what changed the game for me, it’s what helped get us through a 56 day NICU journey and it’s what ultimately led to me creating my first course on how to launch and sell website maintenance plans. One of my students Marc Hyde went through th...

In the early days as a web designer, it’s common to say “yes” to any project that comes your way just to make some money and build a portfolio. But it doesn’t take many “bad client experiences” before you’re ready to weed out those bad-fit clients. But what makes a client bad-fit? Are they cheap? Do they not understand your value? Are they a bad personality fit? Are they super-intensive with commu...

Ah privacy policies…your favorite aspect of web design, right? Yeah me neither but day by day, it’s an aspect of websites that becomes more and more important with new privacy laws being passed in the states along with other countries, even outside the EU with regards to GDPR compliance.  So, to help us make sense of where things are at with website privacy policies, I’m excited to bring back on t...

This is probably ignorance on my part but my eyebrow always went crooked when I heard digital agencies, hosting companies, saas products, or any online entrepreneur talking about how they’re a “green” company. It’s not like we’re a manufacturing company or chemical plant with waste and pollutants. We work on a computer at home…so how can we “go green?” Use less paper? Recycle old equipment?  What...

I recently did a live training on how to Scale Your Web Design Business for Brad Hussey’s web design community CreativeCrew. We did a live Q&A session afterward and had some amazing questions come in. Brad and I got to riff on scaling a web agency, the lessons learned from our experience, what we both may have done differently and what we felt worked really well. I’m pleased to share the entir...

One of the benefits of being a web designer is your option to build recurring revenue. As a WordPress web designer, I learned that one of the best ways to do this was to offer a hosting and maintenance plan. Or “care plan” as it’s more commonly referred to these days. For years, it was my assumption that if you use self-hosted platforms like SquareSpace, WixStudio, Webflow, Showit, etc then you ca...