Should you use a professional to build your website or is a free website builder worth it?
Free website builders are appealing for many reasons. Without a doubt, one of the most important aspects of starting a business is having a sleek and professional-looking website for people to reference. Even without knowing your business personally, consumers go straight to Google when searching for a product or service. You want your website to stand out in the crowd and draw in the most clients possible. But building a website can be time-consuming if you try the DIY route, and expensive if you employ someone else to build it for you.
Are free website builders worth it?
"Higher price = better quality" whilst this may be true to some extent, there are some gems to be found for a minimum price tag, or even free! Often the best website builder will be an expert agency that does this all the time and can charge a high fee. However, we are offering a few clients each month the chance of having a new website built for them for £0! Find out more
here.
But for peace of mind, there is a list of pros and cons to consider when looking for a free website builder
Pros:
● It is completely free. Starting a business can be incredibly expensive, especially if you have no current income. A website is one of the key aspects of a business, so if you can save yourself a few £00 or £000, who would not want that.
● You don't have to bother learning about coding, domain names, keywords or any other element of website building and can put your time and focus somewhere else.
● Easy to export. If down the road you decide to change your business direction, name or brand, you don't have to start from scratch all over again
● No creative skills are required. Successful websites are coherent, stylish looking and easy to navigate. This can be hard to replicate if you are making a website yourself. Luckily, free website builders offer simple templates that require minimal editing. Saving you time and creative brainpower.
Cons:
● Professional businesses need to have a quality design, SEO coding, and professional features. First impressions last. More often than not consumers will never visit your website twice if you have a cheap-looking design.
48% of people believe that site design is the number one factor in deciding credibility.
● It is not unique. Free website builders offer a small number of free templates to use. The likelihood of you picking a design style many other people have also chosen is high.
● Studies show that 2 seconds is the maximum time people will wait for a website to load before exiting a page. Not long is it? Free website builders can take a lot longer for their pages to load, so if you're hoping to draw in more clients and the page takes a while to load, let's hope they are patient!
● Poor SEO. Unless you choose to go through an
SEO specialist agency, then it is unlikely that free website builders will offer you a high-quality SEO, if any. Search Engine Optimisation is the only thing that will give your website good visibility and allow people to find your website, and consequently business, easily.
When it comes to business, there is a higher level of quality that you will receive when you choose to employ and pay a website builder vs free website building sites. Above all, you can ask for each element to be personalised to match your business to a T. Alongside that, professional, paid website builders will employ a higher calibre of skills and SEO than any generic free website builder can offer. You are dealing with a real person rather than a series of templates and self-help guides.
Free website builders are simple and easy to use. Often using a simple drag and drop feature, it is very much "what you see is what you get". If you are not wanting the price tag then often good agencies will point you in the direction of these free website builders. Especially for small, local and independent businesses, or businesses starting out with a limited budget, this is a great starting point. There is nothing stopping you from employing a website builder once your business starts making a profit. Getting your foot in the door with a simple website is better than not having one.
What are the best free website builders for small businesses?
If you decide to go the free route then there are ample websites out there to use. Here are our top 5 recommendations.
- Agencies that offer free website building. This is the absolute best of both worlds. You have the personal aspect as well as the SEO skills that are required to make a successful website, along with the £0 price tag.
- Squarespace has over 70 templates to choose from to offer a coherent, easy to use website. Bold, unique and modern designs optimised for all devices. Easily customizable, down to the nitty-gritty of CSS editing
- Network solutions have over 200 templates to choose from with a wide media gallery of pictures and images to include on your site.
- Wix has over 800 customisable templates with included SEO features and marketing tools. It has reliable web hosting and security and is trusted by over 215 million users.
- Wordpress is probably the most well know free website builder. It has a great forum and lots of add ons that enable you to achieve the design and function of your site with no coding skills needed.
Conclusion
Still undecided on what is best for your business? In today's digital world, if you do not have any sort of online presence you will miss out on a large number of potential customers. Having a great looking website is as important as curbside appeal. Your website wants to explain your business clearly, what you offer, your prices or an option for people to receive quotes. It needs to reflect your business with its colour choices and style.
For a target audience of a younger generation, it is common to include brighter colour palettes. This is not the same style you would use for services such as funeral directors or lawyers. It is choices like these that can make creating a website seem like a daunting task. Thankfully with free website builders, they have pre-designed templates to take out all the creative decision making for you.
But as we explored, there are also a number of cons that come with using free website builders. That is why we recommend researching and looking for reputable agencies, that are digitally trained in SEO, and offer free website creation. This will permit you the best of both worlds and give you a great looking, SEO optimised website to boost your business.
For questions and queries about how to start building a website, there are plenty of beginner tutorials for free on YouTube. We would be happy to point you in the right direction.
If you are interested in having a website built for free by us, just
give us a call today or find out more
here.
