Web builders are basically a magic toolkit for non-web designers. What was once beyond people’s reach can now be grasped with little effort. But there are things website builders can’t do that web designers can do. The question now is, should you hire a web designer to make your website for you or just use a website builder and build it yourself?
Web builders like Wix, IMCreator, Weebly, and Jigsy have helped millions of people create websites easily, even without Photoshop or coding experience.
For people with small website needs, these tools are a big help. There are many website builders that have popped up in the past couple of years and people can simply drag and drop and launch their sites in a day. Likewise, there are literally millions of talented web designers out there, and the number is growing day by day.
This can be confusing, especially when you’re new to website ownership, but web builders and web designers have their pros and consthat you need to weigh carefully before making a decision.
The Beauty of Web Builders
For those who don’t speak the same language as web designers, website builders are a gift for them. There are lots of free website builders with hundreds of templates to get started and everything is very simple.
No coding, no FTP processing, no domain name and nameserver registration, and all the other technical stuff. Once satisfied, users can simply publish their websites and voila, it’s up and running.
Drag and drop features
The main attraction of the Web Builder is its ability to allow regular users to build websites with just a few mouse clicks. By simply dragging elements onto a canvas, users have control on how they want their websites to look.
User-friendly systems
Editing a website is also easy. If users want to change fonts, colors, and even images, they just need to click and apply the necessary changes. No modification of HTML and CSS files.
Another thing to note about website builders is that they are constructed in a way easily understood by people of all ages. Take Weebly as an example. Once users register, they will be greeted with a step-by-step website building guide. All they have to do is choose from a wide range of options.
This user friendly guide can be found on most web building sites.
Internal Features and Support
Website building companies understand that many of their users are non-technical. to have a team of people waiting just to answer people’s questions and help them with their problems.
But hiring web designers might be a better option because…
While web building sites seem to be all sunny and rainbow, they can easily lead to a big mess when not prepared enough.
Issues such as transferring websites to another host, limited functionality, and design redundancy are some of the common issues you might encounter long-term.
Let’s take a closer look.
File transfer can be a problem
Take Wix as an example. Since Wix websites are built using their specialized system, hosting the same websites on a different server is next to impossible. That would mean whoever wants to migrate will have to recreate everything from zero.
Other web building sites like Weebly allow transfers from their host to another web server. But features such as forums and their own blogging and shopping systems will not be included in the transfer, including anything native to their system.
If you hire a web designer who can provide all the features mentioned above, you will have your own hosting account and you will not have to think about transferring your website from one server to another. And you won’t be limited by features and flexibility.
Your immediate needs will certainly grow as your business or audience grows. This is the problem with all web building sites, they will not be able to meet your needs as your website traffic increases. With a great web designer, you can request features that are otherwise hard to find on web building sites. Features like an image slider, user poll, sophisticated navigation, robust image gallery, and other stuff you might need.
Web builders can (potentially) cost more
The average price of using a website builder service would cost around $100 per year for premium services. Domain name and hosting included. Most website builders have monthly subscription plans, which helps you spread the costs. But in the long run, it could cost you even more.
To give you an idea, website builders usually cost around $100 per year. But if you want additional functionality, you can either purchase add-ons from the website builders themselves or through third-party vendors, which usually range from $10 to $50.
Now suppose you hired a web designer to build your website for $3,000. A one-time fee of $3,000 and a monthly hosting fee of $7 (for decent hosting). Initially, it will cost you $3,084 in the first year and only $84 in subsequent years. But the steal here is that you can request tons of features and things you want to include on your website.
Another thing that could potentially increase costs for web builders is when it’s time to switch to another hosting serviceand.
And believe me when I say that if a website does half as well as expected, a transfer will happen 100%. Especially for e-commerce sites.
In addition to paying someone to do the transfers, there will still be several problems to solve such as replicating features that remained on the web builder’s system and updating anything that needs to be updated, as web builders aren’t exactly known for rolling out quick updates, among other things.
So, Web Builders or Web Designers?
if your needs are simpleand most likely will be for years to come, spending a few hours building your own website through a web builder is handy. This is because catalog websites usually don’t need a lot of fancy features. Just a gallery, a place to include text and other simple things. The same goes for restaurant websites.
But if you need to open an online store, news website, membership sites, forums, etc. feature-rich websitesI strongly recommend looking professional service. This way you will save time, money and energy.
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