Web development companies. Sheesh!!

Have you ever had this? Did you ever feel like you were alone in the world, you and your so-called "high" standards? Have you ever had a contractor deliver some seriously suboptimal deliverables? (let me see those hands...) Have you ever had an argument with your contractor, where he just couldn't see what was so embarrassing in what they did, and you thought you were going out of your freakin' mind?

I was recently involved in a project that required building a branding website. We hired Israel's top leading company in Drupal to do the development (no names mentioned), despite the relatively high price-tag, because we wanted the best, and we didn't have any room for mistakes, and had a short deadline, yada yada yada.

We set the timeline. Everyone was happy. We were looking over the developer shoulders constantly, and we saw they were not working fast enough to reach the milestones. We started whipping them, and in parallel started dropping features from the deadline, so we can make it there on time. We finally made the deadline (WE ALWAYS DO! It's a principal to work by) with less than half of the applicative content we had planned for, but with sort-of enough content.

All this we've seen before, and I refuse to get excited about it anymore. It's a general form of practice with web companies in Israel. Sometimes in the states too. You promise one thing, and deliver something else. You promise top quality product, on time. You end up delivering low quality on time, or top quality two months late, or low quality not on time. We've actually gone to the point where if you received one of the two - either quality or timely deliverable - you are a happy camper.

But the thing that drove me mad is the fact that the web company felt it was adequate to release the site with things like the above image (and this is merely an example. There was plenty more). To me this just reads "unprofessional" all over the canvas. Meeting the deadline with everything that was agreed upon is one thing. But releasing something to a production system that embarrasses your customer in front of their customers is a whole different ball-game.

Think about it - the whole idea of the website is creating new contact. You spend money on online advertising, leading your new potential customers through funnels, and when they finally push the button you wanted them to push most, splaaaaaaaat.

I sent the above image to the web company so that they know what my problem is.
Needless to say they had no idea why I am so upset. The feedback text is there, ain't it...