Are you sacrificing anything when you build a website for free?

Simple answer: Yes, you can build a website for free. Not so simple Answer: Depending on your goals, probably not.

Consider these points when deciding whether you should build a website yourself, pay a non-professional web designer to do it for you, or pay a professional web design firm to design and build it.

• If you’re better than your competitors, shouldn’t your website be better than theirs? There’s no doubt your prospects will be looking at your, and your competitor’s, websites. If your’s isn’t more memorable than theirs, you’ve just lost your chance to make that good first impression.
• If you expect to be found on a Google search (through SEO), or a GEO or AEO search, then you definitely need to be working with a professional web design company. SEO and SEM are entire eco-systems unto themselves and because of that, require those who live in that world (that’d be us!) to make it work for you.
• If the images you use aren’t high-end professional images, it makes your company look unprofessional. Web design companies subscribe to high-end photo and video stock services. (More on video below.) They know what images work best, is more engaging and intellectually stimulating.

And for the love of all that’s good, please do not use pics of people shaking hands! Shaking hands is NOT a benefit, it’s just filler.

• When it comes to video, having a professionally-created one on your homepage goes a long way to making your website stand out. And not just a simple video. Having a video with copy that explains what makes you different than your competitors is what educates your audience quickly. Since we all have short attention spans, educating a prospect in 30 seconds gets their attention, engages, and educates them. See some videos we’ve created for our clients below.

To see examples of  homepage videos we’ve done, click the links:

• American Heritage Homes
• MBIE Transit Specialists
• Columbus Jewish Historical Society
• Rust Belt Offroad
• Shadow Six Racing
• The Cottages at Burnett Trail
• Foster Georgia

• If you don’t have a marketing perspective, you’ll bore your visitors. What does that mean? It means if you talk about your company, and not what your company can do to make your customers lives or businesses better, easier, or solve their problems, your site isn’t marketing-focused. We’ve found no one wants to read about you – or us – until they know what you – or we– can do for them. All they really want to know is “What’s in it for me?”

Do you want to be found on Google?

If you do, then your probably shouldn’t build your own website. It’ll end up costing you more in the long run by NOT being found online, and not being in front of your prospects.

Without a working knowledge of Search Engine Optimization (SEO), there’s no chance of showing up well in Google’s search results for your services or products.

Sure, someone might find your company if they know your company name, but what if they don’t? It’s our experience that more people don’t know your (or our) company name than do. Since pretty much all searches are for what you do, and not your name, SEO is critical.

More people don’t know our company name than do, and we suspect the same is true for your company. So it’s critical when people search for what you do (in our case, Columbus web site design) you show up in a search.

In the world of SEO, focusing on a few exact-match keywords (ie: Columbus web design company) is old school. Now, SEO is all about toward topical authority, user intent, and natural language. Using AI to write your blogs and pages can actually work against you.

Your website should rank for lots of terms, synonyms, voice searches, and long-tail keywords rather than just a few phrases.

SEO is built into a website’s DNA. It’s not an afterthought.

When your website is built by a professional web design company, your website actually helps you get new business. And when that happens, your sales efforts become so much more effortless.

From experience, we know we get new clients through our website. So when time and experience (and yes, money) is invested in your website, it should pay off in new business.

Sure, Wix says SEO is “built into their DNA,” but it’s like them saying your website can be built in a day. There’s so much more that goes into a website’s SEO it than they lead you to believe. They want you to think it’s simple, but when your company’s future depends on getting business from your website, that’s a dangerous assumption.

Is a “free” website a short-term option, or a long-term solution?

Platforms like Wix and SquareSpace (while not free, are inexpensive) can make launching your website site feel like it’s a huge savings — the fine print matters.

When platforms like Wix, SquareSpace, and Weebly promise a website can be built in an afternoon, with no technical knowledge required, that should be a red flag. There’s no way someone can build a good website in a few hours. Even if you’ve built one with them before, that’s a ridiculous claim (in our humble opinion).

The reasons you still might want to build a website for free.

The biggest reason is obviously cost.

If you’re a small start up, building your own website is definitely an attractive option. Using pre-built templates in Wix and SquareSpace, and have hosting as part of the package, means there’s no server to configure and no security updates to be done. For a small business owner, freelancer, or hobbyist, that’s incredibly handy.

However, you’ll likely notice other limitations over time.

Their SEO tools are often restricted, e-commerce features are locked behind paid tiers, and — critically — your content lives inside a closed, proprietary ecosystem. When you’re ready to get to the next level and go with a WordPress website, that site has to be built from the ground up. That’s why migrating away from Wix or SquareSpace to a custom platform like WordPress can be painful, because it’s rarely a clean export.

All that said, free website builders are great for getting started if you have with modest ambitions.

But if you’re building a business (and consequently, a website you hope to get business from) you intent to grow should factor in the cost of upgrading the free plans. Or, just consider a WordPress website from the start.

Oh, and just thought we’d mention, we can help you with a great custom website if that’s the way you want to go. Contact us to learn more.