Dear John,
When you bring in a new media company you're effectively buying the time of
creative people with the right skills. I would argue that the only
significant benefit offered by such a company is that they assemble the
team for you. In some cases, the team will be assembled by bringing
freelancers in (particularly when it comes to designers). They'll talk
about other things such as 'brand management', 'knowledge of marketing
on-line', 'value add', etc. but if you're simply looking for a re-design
then a lot of this isn't critical (your ERD will know the College's market
after all).
The hub of the new media company's process is the Account Manager (your
main contact as a client) and the Project Manager (the team leader). Now,
it could be argued that *you* (the client) could occupy these two roles. If
you think you can then you might tend toward freelancers. If not, then you
might tend toward a company. But how do you know?
I think the list should answer this question but I'd say that if you're
confident you could assemble the team yourself then your decision is made.
Finally, I would argue that you don't want to put yourself in a position
where you're dependent upon one company. This happens when your site is
stored with them or when they've created a system for maintaining your site
that means you need to go through them (either through people or some
bespoke system they've created).
Stephen...
one hand for the ship and one for yourself
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Stephen Emmott, KIS Editor,
Information Systems and Services,
King's College London http://www.kcl.ac.uk/
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