Looking to hire someone for a website redesign. How would you recommend that I go about it?

As I complained to you a few weeks ago, I’m having problems with the plugin I use to post to this blog and, though I had posts scheduled for these last few weeks, they didn’t post. I hired someone to write me a new plugin that actually works consistently and it’s not going well. So I’m cranky because I wrote all these posts and scheduled them for you guys to read and here you are with nothing to read because they didn’t post.

I work too hard for there to ever be a week on this blog without a blog post, is all I’m sayin’.

Which brings me to the topic of today’s post which is related. I need to redesign my personal website. It’s not so much how it looks, I’m actually fine with that, but how it works on the back end because it’s been hacked together a billion different times by an idiot (read that as: me). It’s one of these things where I could do it all myself but I never have the time to do it right since I’m always in a huge rush so I’ve finally convinced myself it’s worth it to hire someone to get everything on my website To Do list done and done right once and for all. And, heck, why not give it a new design too, while we’re at it.

Except I’m not sure how to go about it. Do I go with a company that has a specific webdesign package and see if they can tailor it to my needs or do I seek out an individual freelancer on something like Elance? I have such specific needs and wants on my list that I’m afraid I’ll overpay by going directly to a company that’s tailored more towards the sort of people without web skills but I’m also not sure if a freelancer can do everything I need (especially since the freelancer mentioned above is pissing me off).

I’ve actually never hired someone to do a website before in my life as I’ve always just done it myself. This is a whole new world for me.

And I think we’ve all seen the case where a pretty website isn’t necessarily a website that works well. I assume (and maybe I’m wrong) that’s because people who are good at the pretty aren’t so good with the code. Is there really a way to get both? Because, if I have to pick, I’d rather a site that works well over looking nice.

Let me turn this over to you because I value your advice on this.

What route would you recommend that I go to find someone to take care of all the little code issues on my To Do list but still give me a pretty website?

If you’ve worked with a web designer you’re happy with, please pass their name along so that I can check them out. If you’re a web designer yourself and you think you can fulfill my WordPress needs, let me know!