If you have a website design but don’t have the time, resources or inclination to turn it into CSS or XHTML, check out three month old startup XHTMLized.
They outsource your design to coders around the world and return it to you within five days. They do more than quick converstion to code: XHMTLized claims that they’ve come up with a “recipe which provides search engine love, accessibility know-how and utilizes smart practices such microformats and ALA techniques”. Projects start at a very reasonable $150, and you don’t pay if you don’t like the product.
XHTMLized is the creation of Dave Rosen, Stan Dzavoronok, Ilya Sabanin, Dmitry Sabanin from Futuretrack5.
From their submission:
Launched nearly 3 months ago, XHTMLized is growing strong, giving lots of satisfied customers a < break / >. Each project is quoted for based on the design, but the average price is USD$149. Most projects are completed within a couple of days but XHTMLized can meet any deadline. A collective of 12 XHTML/CSS gurus spread over 7 countries do the XHTMLizations, collaborating via advanced use of the Basecamp API. Jointly they have formed a XHTML/CSS recipe which provides search engine love, accessibility know-how and utilizes smart practices such microformats and ALA techniques. XHTMLized can also transforms designs into blog or CMS themes as well as pimping up old table-based sites.
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The black picture links to http://www.htmlized.com, which just contains sponsored links.
Fixed it, thank you for pointing it out.
Sounds fun. What’s stopping someone from saying “I don’t like the design” and walking away with the new design for free?
Bookmarked on Digg
who is the target for this?
is this for the remaining 5 print designers who don’t know html?
an average consumer wouldn’t have a photoshop mockup for a site ready to go.
@simran:
you submit the design to them, and they code it.
@Brian:
this is for cheap companies that can’t pay a real firm to create a proper web presence (branding, marketing, etc).
I’m Dave, XHTMLized founder. Thanks for putting us on Techcrunch!
@siram:
Customers pay afterwards so if they aren’t happy with the code quality, then no food on our table! Hasn’t happened yet.
@Brian
Many designers out there would prefer to spend time determining colors, not classes. Especially with an ever changing browser landscape. It’s not only for those who are still stuck on table based designs, but also for those who just don’t want to.
@Jason
I wouldn’t say it’s for cheap companies. Sure the service is affordable but I don’t see how this makes the companies cheep. We work with a lot of design firms - our specialization in is code.
Cheap? How about affordable?
I tried employing a code monkey, he broke the lamp and left peanut shells on the floor when he wasn’t busy. Same as I don’t employ an electrician all year just get one in when the lights break. We’re a multi-function design agency, we’ll make things look great, we just don’t have an in-house chef to bake the web pies some clients want. It makes sense we oversee the entire look and feel across many disciplines - so that’s why we’ve gone to these guys.
@ Jason: I get that already. But to quote Michael:
What’s stopping someone from taking and implementing the product and saying, that they don’t like it and thereby walking away pockets full of un-spent cash?
It’s Simran. Interesting idea for a company, Dave. What I still don’t understand is how this is going to be profitable on a mass scale when you have a large percentage of people claiming they don’t like the final product, just to avoid paying.
@simram
If they don’t pay, then we’d expect they don’t use the code. May be we are just lucky, but so far we’ve been working with amazing customers, most sending repeat work and always prompt payments.
In reality not many people do that. Don’t you see ads for products which tell you if you are not satisfied by our washing powder- you get your full money back- no questions asked. It’s a strategy to get user confidence in making a purchase. They must be for sure backing it up with good quality to keep the refunds low.
For that matter most american retailers accept returns for no questions asked. It just works.
Five days? Wow. I can get a design sliced within a few hours, XHTML, CSS and all.
@siram
I see what you’re saying - there are people who could abuse the system. We toyed around with the idea of asking for a starting deposit but we’d rather keep things simple. If we were finding we started to get a lot of cases where people were not paying we’d evaluate it then.
@Don
In reality most projects take a day, but then you get ones with 50+ pages which require the buffer. People like having a timeframe, but we can work to whatever milestone you have.
that’s a great service at very good price, but once you get the XHTML, then what? You need a hosting and you need someone who can update your content without screwing up the layout. And you may need someone to code one contact form or a voting poll. I think the small-budget folks will be much better if use services like moonfruit, SiteKreator or even Godaddy…..
WHat about databases…..is that extra?
@danny
XHTMLized isn’t focused on databases. We specialize in markup. However we’ll help you out with your site in anyway we can, be it pointing you to some top-notch programmers or helping iron out what you really need.
Great idea.
Best of luck!
Hey Dave
Good luck with this. I’m sure you’ll see loads of new customers roll in off the back of this coverage, some good, some maybe not so good. I guess that’s going to be one of your big challenges as you grow way beyond word of mouth.
All the best though and hope it goes well.
Oh, boy. After checking out similar services, i.e., meretricious domain companies that claim they can do this, e.g., will not name - I am going to use this service for my web design. I understand that for those who are fortunate enough and have the CSS/HTML skills to do this in 24 hours - seriously, great for you. For those like myself that need to launch a bunch of domains with quality web pages that index well, while I work daytime as *not* a web developer, this is a dream come true. I maybe proven wrong, but am currently very excited. I would love to hear of a better alternative if there is one.
Seems to me that, if the templates provided as as well-produced and as full of the rich semantic goodness as is being claimed, then this company is radically devaluing the skills of professional web designers. I mean, quality modern web design is a complex, synthetic craft, requiring an unusually broad skill-set. An individual designer, who might be expected to have skills in information design, graphic arts, markup, and writing, would surely find it very hard to make a living on US $150 a week. But I’d say that it’s that sector of the market that would be hit hardest by this kind of service. I mean, it’s bad enough that we have the concept of “nephew art”.
@ Nick, this doesn’t answer the question for ok well-produced sites that i have, i mean, I really am not happy with Moonfruit, SiteKreator or even Godaddy. That’s why I had some hope with this service.
Kind of sounds like a web design sweat-shop. Whats the designers cut?
I always cringe when I hear people start talking about “sweat shops”. Because where I live that isn’t bad money for coders. And there are other places in the world where that is very good money, assuming they got around 50% of that fee.
It seems arrogant for people in developed countries to look down on us just because the currency exchange rates mean what they spend on lunch is a full day’s pay for us. And when some western politician or celebrity shuts down our little “sweat shop” and we lose a good paying job that is a crime, or should be.
@Nick
Look it’s simple mathematic…if i can get the same quality coding done oversea; why would I reduce my profit by contracting it to someone here in the States!!! Business wise and financially it doesn’t make sense!
Why do u think us consumers flock to Costco / Sam’s Club…because as consumers we like/appreciate a good bargain!
Still not as fun as making your own
@ asiansweetheart
I’m not talking about the pay; That doesn’t really matter to me. Its the working conditions that some people have to work in that appall me.
Believe it or not, America does have a little experience with poor working conditions and sweatshops. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.....sweatshops
@ Asainsweetheart (and partly agreeing with Deff), i’m not talking about the pay either, and there are better websites for you to offer sweat shop advice too (which have none to do with this post). Try myspace which you are probably on, or tagworld. In your words, “It seems arrogant for people in developed countries to look down on us just because the currency exchange rates mean what they spend on lunch is a full day’s pay for usit’s a place for non arrogent countries to offer “advice” and “sell” their products.”
Stop selling yourself, and start selling the post, as you sound so niave and impertinent to this discussion. If you disagree, I would love to be proven wrong.
Bottom line: Techcrunch is such a quality site and it’s sad that answers from the public come from “pros” like yourself. If you need to date a quality guy in the Valley, there are other ways to do that than participating here.
I really don’t see how this is a web 2.0 company, or service.
There are tons of people that code vaild XHTML 1.1 for the same price or cheaper.
Were they profiled because they use the Basecamp API?
What I still don’t understand is how this is going to be profitable on a mass scale when you have a large percentage of people claiming they don’t like the final product, just to avoid paying.
All the people saying this clearly have no idea what 98% of clients are like. People are not, generally, out to rip you off. Most pay their bills, most are honest, and the world isn’t entirely populated by sharks.
@ deff, westerners have similar views of working conditions and pay. The working conditions in those “sweat shops” are better than the alternatives, just like the pay is better.
@ that other guy, you can insult me, that says more about you than me. I have opinions on technology as well as offshoring. And they are probably more valid than yours since I have some experience living and working in a couple of countries. And I have been to the Valley when I worked in California. I’m sure there are some quality guys there, but I’m not interested thank you anyway.
And back on topic. My point was that the concern by deff about the work being done in sweat shops shouldn’t really be part of whether you would want to use the service or not, for the reasons I mentioned above.
dave
ignore the haters. This sounds like an excellent service and I’ve bookmarked your site. I hope to put some work your way soon.
@ asainsweetheart:
From your site: http://www.asiansweetheart.net/ - you say
“Please view the photos of our beautiful and exotic Thai ladies, select from our services and place an order. Be sure to check out our special offers and our many free services.” and it gets worse…
I’m going to Thailand with my boyfriend in two weeks and unfortunately, he’s in technology and can block this site right now. Sorry. This is a reminder to only give positive feedback (or negative that is relevant) on the post. People turn in here for relevancy, not whores. You are the first I’ve seen in months.
Besides the point, I really like this service XHTMLized - that’s why I’m confirming your “pros” to go elsewhere. Could this be a spam filter not working correctly?
Dave,
Alex is right! Ignore the haters…your service seems like a good idea. Bookmarking it and will be using the service for my projects!
Ibid to Evision. Plus, so far there are no true haters on this post, Dave, which is something I don’t need to explain as you know it already. All I can say is keep up the good work - you have an extremely valuable product which I will use.
whoa. seems to be a lot goin on here. personally, i think the whole idea is pretty cool, and some people could really use such service. nevermind such hate comments and the whole “sweat shop” idea.
Very good idea, and very good and respectable person Dave seems to be.
Also if you go Sitepoint or any webmaster forums, this is the going rate to have your PSD/design made into webpages… good stuff
Regarding talk of sweat shops - I know that XHTMLized opperates differently.
Dave looks after his team because each member is an asset and part of a functional unit. I have even thought of working with him (I have known him for over 8 years and respect him personally and professionally).
I think that XHTMLized is a great idea - and there does seem to be a need for such a service. Simple, clean, fast and affordable. It’s not for everyone, but neither is Microsoft Windows, Coke (or Pepsi), etc.
Thanks to those who have offered the XHTMLized.com team encouragement, I’m sure they appreciate it.
- Mike -
wow, calling names “whores” and all. what happened here? i don’t see anyone pimping their stuff or off topic. maybe afraid boyfriend will run off? (oops, probably get banned for that).
btw, xhtmlized look cool. hope we see user reviews in the future. back to lurking…
Mike:
“Regarding talk of sweat shops - I know that XHTMLized opperates differently.
Dave looks after his team because each member is an asset and part of a functional unit. I have even thought of working with him (I have known him for over 8 years and respect him personally and professionally).”
I doubt this work is done in a sweatshop, ala Apple and iPod. But the price does reflect that the work is most likely done offshore, in countries where the US dollar has more buying power than here in the US.
If we continue to offshore any and every last bit of whatever labor we can to other countries, especially our technology work, eventually they’ll have problems with finding the labor to do the work and then the offshoring will begin to other countries. The same will happen in these second-tier offshored companies until it comes full circle one day and ends up being accomplished by some designer in Kentucky just trying to make payment on their trailer–the American worker finally reduced to a point of desperation that yes, even 150.00 a week at least keeps one off the street.
Chances are, there are independents in this country who can do much of the work for a good and fair value, and these people will also be around to help with database work and other programming and a relationship is established between the business and developer. A relationship that, for a small business owner, will eventually prove essential.
Any company looking to the long view is not going to be enticed by cheap costs up front. Eventually this service will exhaust the quick buck folks, and life will go on.
And is it my imagination, or are many of the posts here being written by anonymous people who all seem to have the same written ‘dialect’?
@Shelley: work is also completed in Australia and the US. XHTMLized.com does not discriminate based upon nationality/religion/age/sex/etc. - and nor should they. Quality skills is what is sought - which is essential to having satisfied customers.
Dave has told me that XHTMLized has completed projects for clients in Australia, Russia, Italy, and others. One member of the XHTMLized team lives in Russia - so that project was a match made in heaven.
I have developed web sites commercially since 1997 (I currently develop a web based financial application for Amex EMEA and banks in Europe) - and I too am partially concerned about offshoring. The origins of the projects and the team members are widely dispersed enough for this to not concern me. (I am not employed by XHTMLized.com - I just went to university with the creator.)
Regarding companies and the long view, in my experience, many companies only look at the bottom line for the current fiscal year. What is delivered to them by XHTMLized.com is a flexible template that can be extended later to have database/Ajax/etc functionality whenever new features are sought.
As for the ‘dialects’ - I am not a linguist; nor can I pick the origin of posts. But I can say that I have never heard a fellow Aussie say “throw another shrimp on the barbie”.
It’s past 2am so it’s time for me to punch out. Night all.
- Mike -
This sounds like a great idea to me, and thanks to Mike for blogging about the service. I’m surprised at some of the anti-offshoring rhetoric that’s surfaced in these comments. In the technology sector, we’ve lived with a global economy for a long time. The acid test has always been the quality of work delivered for the money paid. If XHTMLized delivers on their promise, more power to them.
It’s funny … 60% of my time is spent making a design look good (colors, nudging, shapes, etc) in Fireworks/Photoshop. I absolutely dread the other 40%, which is kicking it into (X)HTML & CSS.
My question is … can designers justify the increase in their prices to accomodate an outsourced service like this?
I’ll give it a try on a couple projects … the end-product is excellent.
@Bas
Perhaps they were profiled because like many 2.0 companies they simplify the experience for the user, especially the beginning user.
Could you please name those other companies?
As it is with all things: you get what you pay for.
Any designer worth his salt can crank out a mockup to some functional CSS/XHTML in a few hours. This service only appears to be inexpensive because they do not perform any of the other steps a customer would have received from a more thorough web design process. So instead of receiving a bill for a few thousand dollars for research, design, backend coding and interface coding, they receive a bill for interface coding. Smaller chunk of work, smaller bill.
Sure there’s a demand for this service, but nobody is doing themselves any huge favors by going with it.
@Dana
Precisely right. And for those fixating on the $150/under 5 days thing and inferring that you get 5 days of coding for $150… I’d bet not. Remember, they say “starting at $150″ not that $150 is a flat rate. And of course, if you need some kind of a CMS or other db interaction and AJAXy goodness, that’s likely more… Plus, of course, you need the design in the first place. But for people whose sites can be done with a handful of templates and who have a decent visual design but not the time or skill to code it up… this is a nice service. If the coders really can turn out 2-3 templates in a few hours for $150, they’re grossing an effective $30-$40 per hour… not bad.
This isn’t to say that outsourciing isn’t a worry… but this doesn;t compete with a full on, do the IA, design, db and coding solution. Now, getting clients to understand that…..
@ Don Wilson
“Five days? Wow. I can get a design sliced within a few hours, XHTML, CSS and all.”
WOW eggface, so at their rate you’d be pulling around $30/hour! Start your own company, it’ll be hyooge!
I’m sure it takes them 5 days…shut your cakehole.
Jeez…. 150 bucks? I’ve been charging 20 for years now.
/me hikes price…
Thanks luvsDon, I loved the childish comment.
@ Dave Rosen, 50+ pages of design to chop up for $150 doesn’t sound right, unless you’re boosting the number of pages out of proportion when there is only text to insert on most of the pages.
@ Dave Rosen
Dave- this may sound like a dumb question, but what prevents someone from stealing the code? I’m assuming we get to view and test the site before buying so can’t someone just “view source” and steal the code???
Well, this post and this company certainly pissed off the designer crowd. It was up on the digg home page for a few minutes and then pulled down as multiple people reported it as “lame” and “spam”. I’ve also deleted a bunch of flame comments on this post. Congrats, HTMLized, when designers get that pissed off about something it almost certainly means you are onto a good idea.