Let’s begin with the biggest fallacy of a DIY website. You’ll save money by building it yourself.
Simply put, a DIY website will not compete with your competitors and will likely not be found online (See point 2 – SEO). If you consider the cost of missed opportunities, having an unprofessional website will cost your business long term. This refers back to the previous post in regard to user interface vs user experience.
Let’s assume your website has high traffic but the contact page isn’t laid out for the best user experience. As a result, you only make 1 sale in a period of a month. However, if your contact page was professionally built you would have potential to convert enquiries into sales by capturing customer details and building a reliable leads list.
Here are some other reasons why you shouldn’t use a DIY website builder.
Professionalism
It looks easy to build your own DIY website, but will it look professional and, most importantly, will it perform and promote your business? Impressions are everything and having a professional looking website is crucial if you’re going to win customers and beat your competitors.
While DIY website builders follow industry trends, inevitably your site will look homemade and unless that’s something you’re into, it won’t be something you will proudly show to your clients.
Search Engine Optimisation or SEO
Simple code used to build your website confuses the hell out of Google. Why does this matter? In short, Google loves websites that are well coded and structured clearly. It’s how it makes sense of the information on your site. If your website is the best-looking site in the world but if the coding behind it is poor, then it may as well not exist in Google eyes. You need to be ranking in search keywords to be seen on Google.
Stoke Design Co. follows the Google Friendly guidelines for all our websites. Our goal is to use honest, attractive strategies to become a leading provider of SEO.
Site management
If you use a website builder, you are then forced to only host it through their servers. This could result in slow load time and poor SEO ranking. You’re trapped there. If you use the free option, it will include their name in the domain address. If you attach it to your own domain, you have to pay a hosting fee. Whichever way you look at it, you’re locked into a system that you have no control over. In time this will cost you as much to manage as it would to have a professional website built.
Ownership
If your website is built through Wix, Squarespace etc they still own the rights to YOUR website. If one of these companies go under, so does your site along with your hard work, investment, and customers. If your website is built through Stoke design co. YOU own the rights to your website. We offer care plans to help manage and care for your website after its completion.
Efficiency
If you’re a builder you should be focusing on your trade and building amazing homes not stressing about if your website is working properly. Having your website built by a professional ensures you will get the best results allowing you the time to focus on growing your business in other ways.
How much is your time worth?
