Home
>
Web Development
>
Should You Design Your Own Website?

Should You Design Your Own Website?

If you're anything like most small business owners, you probably think that web site design is expensive - possibly too expensive for you to justify the expense. If that's the case, then it can be tempting to just design your small business web site yourself. You have a computer, complete with Microsoft Frontpage, you have a copy of Photoshop - why pay a web designer when you could just do it yourself?

Well, here are a few reasons why a DIY website may not be the best possible solution for your small business:

1. An amateur web design = an amateur small business

You may think you're pretty handy with the old Frontpage, but the truth is that an amateur web design is pretty easy to spot - although sometimes that's not clear to the person who designed it! Think about it, though: you've invested in stock, equipment, advertising, marketing for your small business - why not invest on your web design too? An amateur web site will make your business look amateur - which means that all of that other investment will go to waste.

2. Do you know how to optimise your small business web site for search engines?

The type of web design you go for will have a huge impact on whether or not your small business shows up on search engines. There are a lot of different factors to take into account here: meta tags, keywords and content to name just a few. WYSIWYG editors like Frontpage also add a lot of unnecessary code to your design, which increases your file size and confuses the search engines - as does invalid code. If you didn't understand any of that, you'd be better off leaving it to the experts!

3. Do you know how to make your small business web design accessible?

Your web site design will look different on different browsers - unless you know how to make sure it doesn't! For example, the site you designed that looks fine on Internet Explorer could look completely different on Firefox, and vice versa. You'll also need to consider accessibility for people who are visually impaired: certain colour schemes are more difficult to read than others, and people who are colourblind may not be able to view certain graphics or coloured text. Are you confident that you can design a website that will be accessible to all? If not, leave it to the experts!

4. What do you really want to get out of your small business web design?

Stop for a moment and think about what you hope to achieve from having a small business web site. Do you want to increase your sales, boost your profile, or just advertise your services? Are you confident you can create the best possible web design to do that? If not? well, you fill in the blanks!

But I can't afford a professional! They charge too much!

Well, some of them do. Not all web site design is expensive, though. First of all, ask yourself what a good web site design is worth to your small business. If it's worth having a website, it's worth having a good one - and you may find that it's not quite as expensive as you might think.

Amber McNaught is co-owner of Hot Igloo Productions Ltd. - the small business specialists. Hot Igloo offer a range of services to businesses, including website design, public relations, internet marketing, copywriting and more. Visit their website at: http://www.hotigloo.co.uk

reliable home cleaners Northbrook ...

In The News:

Uber teen accounts now feature live video streaming from the driver's camera, but encrypted recordings stay on Uber's servers for up to 14 days.

Router firewalls and software firewalls serve different roles in protecting your home Wi-Fi from unwanted traffic and suspicious connections.

A Chrome extension with 70,000 users and a 4.7-star rating began injecting fake update warnings after a threat actor acquired and weaponized it.

Amazon's Alexa+ rolls out free to Fire TV devices across the U.S., but hands-free microphones and stored voice data raise key privacy questions.

Meta's new teen accounts settlement sets a default two-hour daily limit on Instagram and Facebook, plus night mode and school mode restrictions.

The CareCloud data breach exposed Social Security numbers, banking information and medical records belonging to more than 3.75 million people.

Waymo reveals its custom 5-nanometer chip and dual computing systems designed to take over instantly if the robotaxi's primary computer fails.

Identity theft now includes account takeover, phone hijacking and payment card exposure. Here's what to look for in identity theft protection services.

Stay up to date on the latest AI technology advancements and learn about the challenges and opportunities AI presents now and for the future.

The FBI and Justice Department seized domains tied to QScan and QTRouter, tools allegedly used by China-linked hackers to breach NASA and other agencies.

Uber Eats drone delivery launches later this year through a Zipline partnership, starting in Dallas and Houston with a goal of one million daily flights.

Medicare Open Enrollment scams start with data broker targeting months before October. Learn why August is the time to remove your personal info.

The World Humanoid Robot Games' crashes show how far the technology still needs to go to be useful, "Survivor" reality TV star and robotics scientist Christian Hubicki says.

X-Humanoid's TianGong Ultra ran 100 meters in 9.32 seconds at Beijing's World Humanoid Robot Games, beating last year's winner by more than half.

A tap-to-pay charity scam is turning small $15 or $20 donations into charges of nearly $5,000, with victims losing thousands before they notice.

Kurt Knutsson shares seven emergency preparedness lessons from surviving Hurricane Katrina inside a New Orleans hotel as conditions turned desperate.

A contractor stored credentials in a Google Doc set to "Anyone with the link," and Google Search autocomplete eventually surfaced the password string.

New Orleans 911 uses Carbyne AI to triage repeat auto crash calls, but strict limits keep human call-takers in control of all other emergencies.

A single card skimmer can generate $1 million in stolen funds, and Secret Service video shows criminals installing them in under two seconds.

ChatGPT, Meta AI and Google now use memory, connected apps and past chats to personalize ads and responses in ways most users overlook today.

MagicalAuth by Glide.id uses cryptographic SIM credentials to verify bank logins without sending SMS OTP codes that scammers can intercept or phish.

A humanoid robot named Lightning Bolt ran 100 meters in 9.39 seconds at the World Humanoid Robot Games in Beijing, edging Usain Bolt's record.

An AI agent using Claude AI canceled another person's gym booking after finding a security flaw in the reservation system's authorization checks.

Trump signed a memorandum allowing vetted private U.S. companies to conduct cyber operations against foreign criminal organizations under oversight.

Your Social Security number appeared in a breach, but exposure and identity theft are not the same. Here's how identity restoration actually works.

Should You Design Your Own Website?

Web Development