Any one of us can create a business online at any time. People talk about this so much that when you contact a professional designer and then see the price tag, you might find yourself wondering why does a web design cost so much?
There is a simple answer to this question–that we often pay more for quality–but there’s a lot more to it than that if you really want to understand the value of web design and how it impacts a business. Do you need a quality web design for your business to succeed? Let’s dive more into this.
The Purpose: What A Website Is For
A website represents your business the same way a brick-and-mortar store front would, in some ways, but it’s actually a lot more than that.
When professionally designed, a site tells the story of your business. It communicates what your brand is and sets the tone for the customer experience right from the beginning. It connects with your customers for you and hopefully leads them to convert, whether that means making a sale in your online store or contacting you.
A great website will sell your company, and your products, for you.
Options For Your WordPress Web Design
You have a lot of options for how to run your business website.
Will you try to build and design your website all by yourself? Could you use templates? Will you hire a web designer to create a few graphics for you, or build your entire website? If you hire a professional, how do you choose the right web designer to hire?
While you have the option to design your own website, you’ll be giving up a lot of one big resource your business is: time. You’ll need time to learn the technical knowledge of building a website and the graphic design skills they’ve spent years acquiring. Once you spend some time on this, it is unlikely to match the years of everyday experience a professional would have on their site.
If hiring a designer isn’t an option for you right now, there are templates you can work with to build your website. These templates may load slower, have less branding, and have some functionality problems, so this will still cost you a lot in terms of your time and the quality of the finished product. If you feel confident and have the time, this is an option for you to get started on a low budget.
A Web Builder Will Benefit Your Business Long Term
Whether you decide to do it yourself now or hire a web designer from the beginning, you’ll need to consider what kind of web builder/content management system you want to use. While you can still design and code a website from scratch, today more than thirty percent of the internet uses WordPress.
There are good reasons for this. WordPress is an easy to use service, it’s fully customizable, there are plugins that make for easy adjustments, and web designers in the top of their field choose it time and again. While the most advanced designers and developers choose WordPress, it’s also easy for novice users to understand, which means that if you want to get into the backend of your website for maintenance or small adjustments on your own, you can.
Conveniently, WordPress is both a high quality and low cost solution for setting up your website.
WordPress is a free software that can be installed on any hosting package. Part of the costs of building your website will include purchasing a domain name, which are typically about $15, and a web-hosting package, which vary in cost depending on the demands of your business. On your hosting, you’ll be able to install WordPress and build your website from there.
What You’re Paying For When Hiring a Professional Web Designer
When you hire a web designer, you’re paying for:
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- An upgraded user experience
- Site functionality
- Unique branding for your business
- Your time–the time you would spend learning, and the time you would spend building a site
Consider this: How much does a bad web design cost?
Many small business owners will say they tried to save startup expenses by beginning with a cheap website.
Unfortunately, this often leads to low/no sales and having to begin again–, or worse, giving up on their business altogether, because they don’t realize the problem is not necessarily their entire business, but the low-quality web site turning people away.
Cheap websites:
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- Don’t consider your business goals
- May be difficult to navigate
- Are often slow to load
- Have poor branding
- Are difficult to read
- Have vague language
- Aren’t user focused
- Don’t consider the customer journey
- Aren’t developed with mobile in mind
- Have poor SEO so search engines can’t find them
- The most important information is hidden from the customer
Quality Work Costs More
You’ve probably heard the expression, “You have to spend money to make money.” While this isn’t always true, it is often the case can explain why it is that web design costs so much, and moreover, why it is that so many experienced business owners are willing to pay.
