Hiring a web design agency for your UAE business? What to check

Do you need Arabic and English?

Many UAE businesses serve both Arabic and English speakers. A bilingual site is more than a translation plugin. Arabic reads right to left, so menus, layouts and even some icons need to flip properly. Ask the agency to show you a bilingual site they have built, and check it on your phone.

If you are starting in English only, ask whether Arabic can be added later without a rebuild.

Look at work in your industry

A portfolio tells you more than a sales call. Look for sites similar in size and purpose to yours, whether that's real estate, hospitality, healthcare or retail. Open them on your phone, see how fast they load, and check whether you can find what you'd need as a customer.

Payments, bookings and the tools you already use

If you plan to take bookings or sell online, check that the agency has worked with payment gateways available to UAE businesses, and with the tools you already use, such as a CRM or a booking system. These details are much easier to plan at the start than to add later.

Where is the team, and how will you work together?

Plenty of good agencies work with UAE clients from India, Europe and elsewhere. The time difference between India and the UAE is small, which makes calls easy. What matters more is a clear process, one point of contact, and regular updates you can actually review. We've written about working with an agency in another country if this is new for you.

Who owns the website and the logins?

Make sure the domain, hosting account and website admin are in your company's name, or at least that you hold the main login. If you ever change agencies, you should be able to move without starting again.

What happens after launch

A website needs updates, backups and the odd fix. Ask what support is included, how quickly they respond and what it costs once the build is done. Our guide to what website maintenance includes covers what to expect.

Can people find it on Google and AI tools?

A good-looking site still needs to be found. Ask how the agency handles page titles, speed, business details and structured data, so the site can show up on Google and in answers from AI tools like ChatGPT. Our website design service includes this groundwork from the start, and we've written more on getting recommended by AI tools.