Every business needs a website
Research has found that the top reasons people search the internet are to find information, a business, and/or services. If your business does not have a website, how will potential customers find you? Consumers are evaluating products and companies long before they decide to make a purchase, and if your website does not seem professional or secure, they will simply move on to the next vendor.
“I don’t need a designer, I’m going to build it myself”
With all the DYI site-building tools out there today, you may feel that you (or ChatGGP!) can slap something together and call it a day. If your site is a small personal site or for a business that does not plan to grow, this may be all you need. Great!
But, for anything more than that, you need a professional designer to build a website that does everything you need it to do today, while also ensuring it’s expandable for future needs. To be able to scale your site to grow with you, you need an expert-level knowledge of the web design landscape. Successful web design is more than just creating beautiful images and layouts.
Be aware, on most web-builder sites your website is not really yours. You are basically renting templates and the hosting from the DIY web builder. It is their proprietary system and your level of control over your website is limited. If you decide that this website isn’t getting the results you hoped for and you want to migrate to a different platform, the website is not portable to another system. You will have to start all over from scratch. Any SEO authority you may have built from the cookie-cutter website will be lost it in the starting-over process. In such a competitive online marketing atmosphere, this could be costly for your company.
“Hiring a web designer will cost a lot of money”
What is your time worth?
How much time will it take you to learn how to design a website? Probably, more time than you think. How good are your web designing skills? Surely, not as good as those of a professional. Hiring a web designer saves you time and allows you to focus on what you know and do best — your business.
Making your site unique
Do you want a cookie-cutter site? DYI options often rely on templates with little flexibility, so you cannnot truly make the finished site your own. A professional designer is able to create a web site that is unique to your business, pleasant to look at, have clear and easy navigation, load efficiently, and work properly in all the major browsers.
Finding a good web designer
Finding a good web designer is challenging. It can be tempting to try to hire a web designer purely based on price: lowest bid gets the job. This can only end in heartache. Do some research. A web designer is not always a competent web designer.
Summary
Cookie-cutter-canned-template websites can be a bad investment for your company. They are not unique, they are not yours, and they are not as flexible and code-solid as they need to be to meet the constantly shifting demands of Internet marketing. Designing websites is a very complicated and involved endeavor. It is better to hire a web professional because he or she knows how to tackle just about every problem and how to deliver the right product for your business growth.
Your company website is an investment in the future, and when you think of it as your first sales employee (one who never asks for vacations or sick days), you’ll realize just how affordable it is to do it right the first time by getting a professionally-designed website that is uniquely tailored to your business objectives.