Regardless of the fact that we’re living through a pandemic, our reliance on the internet for pretty much everything is now so deeply entrenched that the expectation to find every business online cannot be avoided.
For small businesses, DIY web builders offer a direct route to create an online presence from the comfort of your home office. They are cheap to run and easy to manage and your resulting website will enrapture your audience, right?
Well, let’s take a moment.
In this article we'll review the advantages and disadvantages of building your own website, and when to seek professional help.
First thing’s first, websites do not come first when launching a business. It can be exciting to bring your ideas to life and make your business a public reality, but a website is just one weapon in the marketing mix. First comes business planning and a marketing strategy, working out who your audience is, and how to please them better than your competitors. This work will dictate the look, feel, functionality and content requirements of your website, before you get caught up in attractive ‘themes’ designed to fit photography portfolios.
By all means, get your presence online at the earliest opportunity. But it may be wise to begin with a domain and a landing page with a brief business summary and contact information to whet the appetite. Because of course, the last thing you need is for a potential client to seek you out only to be directed to a competitor website instead.
To DIY or bring in the experts?
This is a conundrum not isolated (urgh) to the world of websites, and the answer is pretty much the same whether we’re talking home improvements or website development. Do you have the skills, the resources and the time?
Yes - I know - you can presume bias here as building websites is our profession, but just as a painter and decorator may advise a trip to B&Q, we happily admit that for some small projects, a DIY approach can achieve the same, or at least comparably similar results.
Follow this link to read the full article on when to DIY and when to bring in the professionals.
