April 28, 2020 | Digital Marketing, Tips, Web Design
Building a website for your business

A DIY website is simple, right? They advertise that they will save more money and giving you the same results a professionally developed website would. Common website builders such as Wix, Weebly and Squarespace state that forming your own website using their platforms is simple. Unfortunately for many business owners, the many reasons why you shouldn’t use a DIY website builder are rarely shared. At Word of Mouth Agency, we handle a lot of enquiries from business owners who have attempted to create their own company website with frustrating and disappointing results. Instead of diving headfirst into the DIY world, we would like to highlight a few of the hidden catches and outline why DIY websites are a big mistake.

Design:

We live in an aesthetic-loving world. Almost every potential customer you get will always choose the professional and unique looking site over a run-of-the-mill website any day…even if you sell the exact same products! To attract customers, it’s important to stand-out and command attention that challenges your competition. First impressions are vital and the most successful way to obtain a beautiful website that suits your business is to have your site professionally developed and designed. There is no opportunity for a unique website with the limited design choices a DIY website builder gives you. Your site will end up looking like thousands of others, all using the same template.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO):

SEO is something you’ve probably heard about, but might not understand. It’s basically the code used to build your website and how it ranks in terms with Google. It doesn’t matter if you have the best looking site in the world. If your site consists of weak codes and a crowded server,, Google will ignore you, resulting in no online traffic.

Site Management:

When choosing a website builder, you are adding to thousands of other websites all using the same server. A web server is a software that runs websites. It’s a computer program that stores, processes and delivers web pages to users and customers. Each website builder has their own server, so when choosing to host your website with Wix, you join over 300 thousand other websites all using the same server. This results in slow load time and weak SEO ranking. A professionally developed website is the exact opposite. At Word of Mouth, we limit numbers per server resulting in fast load times and strong SEO for each of our clients.

Ownership:

If you choose to DIY a website through platforms such as Wix or Squarespace, you are choosing to give them the rights to your own website. If, over time, these platforms lose money or choose to close down, so does your website along with your hard work, investments and/or customers you may have through the site. By choosing a professional developer, these scenarios are non-existent. Even if your chosen developer closes it’s doors, they have the ability to transfer you and your customers to a new developer without losing your rank.

Time Management:

You’ve heard it before, but just leave it to the professionals. There are many talents and trades and being a web developer is one. By choosing a professional developer, you are choosing someone who has been educated on every specific regarding websites and someone with years of experience. Instead of stressing out over designing a website and ending up with a problematic, poorly coded site with no Google ranking, we recommend you choose professional developers.

Cost:

It is a common misconception that you’ll save bucket loads of money by building a website yourself. What most business owners don’t realise is that there is more than just pictures paired with text that goes into a successful website. Professionally developed sites do initially cost more than DIY sites. What business owners need to remember though, is that a professionally developed website will attract more customers and make you more money in the long run than any ‘free’ site ever could.

There is more than what meets the eye in website development. Although DIY websites might sound like the way to go, it’s important to do your research and figure out what best suits you and your business. If you are interested in seeing what a professionally developed website could do for your business, please contact us for a free quote and we would be happy to discuss how we can develop your perfect site.