Have you tried a free website builder

Have you tried a free website builder

If you are looking for a low cost way to get your business onto the web then using a free website builder might be the answer you have been looking for. This article explains more.

What is a site builder?

There are a number of software products around that Web hosting companies can setup on their servers, which allow their customers to create professional looking websites using a wizard type tool this means that it is possible to build a DIY website, in something like the way you can create a presentation using MS Powerpoint.

What are the advantages of a site builder?

Typically site builders or website builders as they are sometimes known are bundled up within a web hosting package and are therefore free once webhosting is purchased. Here are some other benefits:-

Easy to use - normally there are a series of steps, first choose a template, then select a colour, then page by page you can create a website

No coding or design skills required,  building a web site  needs a combination of a creative skill to put together a design and technical skill to create html code for each page, a web site builder does that automatically which means that you don't need either of these skills.

Feature rich - Often site builders will include features such as contact us form, guest books or even flash effects, all of which are hard for novice users to implement alone.

No software needed - Creating a website normally requires web design software such as Macromedia Dreamweaver and publishing software known as FTP software. With a site builder all that is automated so you don't need to spend money on expensive software.

Speed - typically you can build and publish a respectable looking website in less than 15 minutes and if you have a few hours to really work on it you can build something reasonably good.

Experiment - If you are new to website design then its sometimes good to have somewhere to start, once you have written your text and seen it on a webpage then you get ideas for what to do next, it is hard to do that when you have no point of reference or previous experience.

Web Presence - If you are looking for a web presence then a site builder is an ideal way to put basic information online such as Contact details, name address and directions.

Search Engines - Recently Google the leading search engine has started excluding parking pages from the search results, also known as SERPS, so having a basic holding page created using free site builder is a great way to start your web history with Google, the age of pages and links are an important factor in the Search Engine Algorithms.

Are there any disadvantages?

There is a difference between the sort of quality you can reasonably expect from a free site builder and  a professionally built website which may cost several thousand pounds. Here are some more differences:-

Templates - Whilst templates can look and feel professional they will always be generic and are not going to exactly match your own brand

Unique - templates are just that, designed to be used by lots of difference business websites, so your website design will not be unique.

Reflection of your business - Increasingly customers are expecting to see professional websites, that reflect the type of business they are dealing with, if you have a free template that will not necessarily give the right impression to your prospective customers.

Time - Creating a professional website can take some time, typically between 2 weeks and 2 months depending on the complexity involved.

DIY - You can end up spending a lot of time working on a website when that time would be better spent promoting or working on your own business projects.

Professionals - If you have a budget then sometimes its better to get professional web designers to work on your project for you.  You would use a Lawyer for your legal work, web designers are professionals also.

Summary

DIY website builders are a great option, particularly if you have no budget for web design work, you might also want to get a quote for a professional web design.

How can Discount Domains help?

Here at Discount Domains we have our own in house team of web designers and coders, plus a free web site builder. That means that you can have the best of both worlds. You can start with a free DIY website, then talk to our team about taking the next step upwards.

We can handle almost all web design projects.

Static website, Ecommerce stores such as Prestashop sites and Content Management sites using Wordpress or CMS made simple.

If you need help or advice with any web project, reach out to our team and we will be delighted to quote for a bespoke project or give you an introduction to our own site builder product.

Adrian Lawrence is the author of this article and is one of the webmasters at Discount Domains https://plus.google.com/u/0/106088322856862782725/posts


Other Articles You Might Be Interested In

Web design Birmingham
London Web Design
Manchester Web Design
Telford Web design
Ecommerce Websites
Web Design UK
Discount Web Design
Prestashop is a great solution for your ecommerce store
Have you thought about an Ecommerce store?
Web Design Shropshire

Need Help? Contact Us
020 3475 2777

© 2024 Discount Domains UK (a brand of Astutium Ltd)