The online image can be considered the most critical part of any business organisation. Your website’s representation is essential to a customer’s first impression of your organisation. Hence, designing a well-optimised and high-quality website can be crucial. This is precisely where the Web Design Agencies vs. DIY Website Builders debate comes into the picture.
In an era when the average internet user spends six and a half hours online daily, your online presence is a key to business success.Choosing a web design agency London can make all the difference in building a professional, high-performing website.
Almost everyone starts with the wrong question when building their website. Instead of asking, “Should I opt for a DIY option or hire professional web design services?” the real question is: “What is the cost of getting this choice wrong?”
This is because whether you choose DIY or hire an agency, making the wrong choice doesn’t just cost you money and time. It means watching your prospects choose your competitors instead of you!
In this blog, we will explain the differences between DIY and web design agencies, their benefits, and the ways to choose them. We will also explain why DIY web design is a bad idea. So, let’s explore.
Web Design Agencies vs. DIY Website Builders: Key Differences!
First, let’s examine website builders and the challenges of using them for your business.
What DIY Website Builders Are?
DIY website builders are various tools that enable the construction of a website without the requirement of manual coding, and they come in two forms:
- Offline builders: This is where you download the software to create a website on your laptop or PC.
- Online builders: These are web-based builders that allow the creation of the website directly on the company’s server.
With DIY website builders, you typically choose from pre-designed templates and input the content to create your business website.
DIY Website Builder Limitations
There are a lot of disadvantages to choosing a DIY website builder. Some of them include:
- Basic, Generic, and Samey designs: DIY website builders are pretty popular, so there is a chance that the template you opted for has already been used. What is the result? A generic and unoriginal website cannot make your business website stand out from the competitors. What’s more? The templates on these builders are not based on website design fundamentals like UX and visitor conversions. In simple terms, this means your website isn’t optimised to direct your visitors to particular areas of the website, which results in a potential loss in leads and conversions.
- Poor SEO: They lack search engine optimisation (SEO) features. This means your business website will be seen in fewer Google searches. Your prospects will find it extremely difficult to find you, which can be detrimental to your online presence.
- Time-Taking: While DIY website builders are easy to use, they are time-consuming. In addition, employees working on the website will not be working on other crucial tasks for the business.
Now, let’s understand what web design agencies are and what the benefits of choosing them are.
What Web Design Agencies Are?
Unlike DIY website builders, a web design agency is a dedicated team of professionals from different fields. Typically, an agency comprises web developers, SEO and UX experts, and web designers. They leverage their knowledge, experience, and collaboration skills to create compelling, unique websites that perfectly align with your business needs.
What Are the Benefits?
There are many benefits of agency-designed websites by hiring professional web design services for your business. Some of them are:
- Professional designs that are personalised for your business requirements: An experienced web designer comprehends your business’s goal and the website’s aim. They will then incorporate their skills to build a website that has the potential to draw your prospects with an intuitive UX design.
- Designs That Perform: Web designers can create genuinely compelling web designs. This will help your website stand out in this highly competitive business landscape and make a great first impression on the customers.
- Search Engine Optimisation Aspect: A web design agency will use its SEO team to incorporate keywords associated with your business. This will ensure SEO success from the very launch of your business website.
- Time-Saving: Time is money; investing in a well-designed and professional website will free up time and resources that could be used elsewhere.
Through these, we can comprehend the key differences between web Design Agencies vs. DIY website builders, which is crucial for you as a business owner.
Why DIY Web Design is a Bad Idea
What These DIY Builders Don’t Tell You!
DIY website builders like Squarespace, Wix, and Weebly make the promise that you can build a professional website for your business from scratch in minutes. They ensure this with drag-and-drop simplicity.
What they do not tell you?
- You will have to spend considerable time (sometimes hours) to make your business website look as good as the ones in their commercials.
- You will struggle with incorporating advanced web design features that will take hours to figure out.
- Your simple website project suddenly consumes days.
The worst part is that these technical mistakes waste your time and send your prospects right to your competitors. If a user lands on your site and has to zoom in just to see your phone number while they can quickly contact your competitor with just a click on the mobile-friendly website design, who do you think they will prefer?
Moreover, every hour spent Googling how to fix a menu on the DIY website is wasted, which could have been spent productively closing in on business deals, growing your business, or serving clients.
The Hidden Costs
1. Most business owners assume that building a DIY website is free or less expensive. But here is what happens:
- The basics include web hosting services, a domain name, and a subscription to the website builder, and they cost money.
2. Then the “premium” game kicks in:
- Want to remove advertisements? Upgrade!
- Want a simple contact form? Upgrade!
- Custom fonts, booking features, email integration? More and more upgrades!
Suddenly, that 5 USD plan turns into a 65 USD monthly plan. Still, you won’t have everything you need! However, the actual cost of a DIY website is not money; it is the endless hours that are spent to figure out these basic questions:
- Where should you put the most important information about your business?
- How do you perfectly structure the navigation?
- How do you optimise content for each page?
If you get any of this wrong, you will lose visitors and prospects!
Why do Businesses Choose Agencies Over DIY?
As your business scales, you want to scale your website, too. So, long-term website scalability is required. A web design company can be a valuable partner in helping you achieve your business goals. It offers the following benefits:
Better Understanding of the Industry
A robust digital presence is crucial for your business in today’s landscape. Hence, your website can be rendered pivotal in enhancing your brand equity. It is also essential to have an in-depth comprehension of your industry. This way, you can formulate improved strategies for your business website.
Therefore, you can tap into the industry expertise of a reputed web design agency to have a high-quality website. It can provide immersive experiences to the users while catering to your business goals.
Premium and Balanced Business Website
Hiring a web design agency can efficiently handle the process from conceptualisation to deployment. Through their comprehensive expertise and dedicated teams, they can seamlessly fulfil business website requirements in various verticals.
A balanced web design ensures that every element on the website emerges as you envisioned it. No dimension dominates the other, making the website more engaging, informative, and navigation-friendly.
Search Engine Optimisation in Web Design
There is no denying that achieving your business’s marketing and branding goals relies on SEO friendliness. This is because your target audience resides on page one of the SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages).
An optimised website code, along with a well-developed navigation, can work wonders for your business. In addition, carefully selected font and typography, captivating and relevant content on web pages, and strategic placement of CTA buttons can be quite useful. This will guarantee better website visibility in search engines, which will drive more conversions.
Terms like off-page and on-page optimisation may seem perplexing to a business owner. Collaborating with an SEO agency in London can save you all the troubles when it comes to SEO.
Hiring the right web design company can make all the difference in differentiating your business from your competitors. A well-optimised web design can boost traffic and increase conversions while generating leads that solidify your brand.
A Reliable Website Design
In the contemporary world, where mobile devices generate around 54% of the global website traffic, owning a mobile-friendly website is a must. This is because most audiences search for your business on mobile devices.
Plus, your website needs to have a responsive website design. It must render appropriately without hampering the user experience on any device. Your business website can have a one-click checkout, just like Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, enabling users to make purchases without leaving the platform. A reputed web design firm can implement this technicality, among others.
Website Just Like Industry Leaders
An experienced web design agency in London observes the upgrades and accomplishments of others at your domain’s forefront. They will find ways to leverage this to make your business website more compelling to your target audience.
A web design agency guarantees the integration of payment modes like Amazon Pay and Google Pay into your website, making business transactions on your website more feasible for users.
How to Choose the Right Web Design Agency?
Now that we know the benefits of hiring a web design agency when it comes to Web Design Agencies vs. DIY Website Builders, let’s look at the steps of choosing the best web design agency for your business:
Step 1: Check if they work in your domain
Understanding your competitors’ local and international websites can help you understand the norm in your domain. This can help you zoom in on current trends, elements, and standards your potential clients want to see on your website.
There can be a plethora of things that your potential clients want to see the first time they visit your website:
- Easy way to schedule appointments
- Intuitive and smooth navigation
- Skimmable texts
- Live support
- Legible typography
- Store locators
- Sharing options
- Social media buttons
Understanding this can also help implement a gap analysis to check if any of these elements are missing from your competitor’s website. You can provide this, which can make you stand out.
Another crucial element to consider is whether the web design agency you choose has industry experience. This will ensure familiarity with audience habits, industry trends, and environmental changes, allowing them to do the right job for your business.
Step 2: Finalise business requirements
Although factors like SEO, usability, and loading speed are vital, its design is the primary factor for any business website. You have to zero in on your requirements, which can help you determine which agency is best for those tasks.
You must seek firms that can add value by providing advice and feedback without agreeing to everything you say. They can help you determine your design needs and put you ahead of the competition.
Step 3: Establishing Budget
Designing a website can be costly for your business. You have to decide on the scope of work, which will also help finalise the budget while keeping you informed about other services that need to be included in the project. This will guarantee that you won’t end up working on the other parts of your business website alone.
Step 4: Portfolio Check
This is important when choosing the right agency for your business website design. You have to check the work of the design firm through their website. This way, you can comprehensively check out their portfolio and case studies. It also shows how they have optimised their website, which offers a picture of their expertise.
You can also check their reviews and ratings from third-party websites where past clients give their impressions and ratings of their experience with the agency.
Step 5: Getting in Touch
Contacting the shortlisted agencies can give you an idea about their communication capabilities. It will also allow you to judge their promptness and responsiveness to inquiries.
It can also include a detailed Q&A session, allowing for setting expectations while determining whether the firm can deliver them. This comprehensive discussion can help you figure out how to choose the agency from the pool of shortlisted agencies.
Communicating the business’s mission and vision is crucial. The web design agency is an expert at designing websites. However, you are the one who knows what and to whom you are selling your products.
Step 6: Determination of Tools
With an ever-evolving digital landscape, an ideal web design agency should be at the top regarding tools and techniques. To make your business website look fresh and interactive, it should not look like it was created ages ago.
The agency’s tools, like the CRM tool, can say a lot about the web design agency. You have to check out how well-equipped they are with contemporary digital trends. This will portray their flexibility when tweaking your website according to your business needs.
Keeping up with these steps is essential when you go downhunting for your ideal web design agency in London. This ensures that your business looks aesthetically pleasing and guarantees the overall function of your business website.
Wrapping Up
Your business website is often the first point of contact between your prospects and your business. In the Web Design Agencies vs. DIY Website Builders debate, whether you opt for a DIY website builder or hire a professional, the key is ensuring your business gets represented correctly.
A Website builder can save you money initially. However, the hidden costs, frustration, lost time, and prospects slipping away can add up fast. On the contrary, hiring a web design agency requires investment, but it gives you a highly favourable website for your business.
By the end of this discussion, you will probably know which path suits you. Want to hire a professional web design agency in London? Hear us out.
At Webskitters Ltd., we specialise in creating result-driven and aesthetically pleasing website designs. Our dedicated designers assist you in thriving in this competitive landscape. We focus on creating easy-to-navigate and impressive websites with strong CTA options. Our sole objective is to design your website strategically to boost sales and overall user satisfaction.
Want to stand out? Partner with us today and get a business website that boosts sales and makes a lasting impression on your target segment. Book a call with us, and let’s create something extraordinary together!
