Do It Yourself Web Design

Let's face it, we live in a "do it yourself" society. There are "do it yourself" manuals to be found on most any topic. Web design is no different. There are many web sites on the Internet that promote this philosophy and even provide you with the tools to do it yourself. Some offer these tools free or at low cost, particularly if you host your site with them. There are free or inexpensive web design and graphics programs available to help create your own web site. So, why shouldn't you? They make it sound so easy! Think of the money you'd save!

Is Training & Experience Important?

Let's say you painted a picture. Does this make you a successful artist? You manged to fix the leaky drain under your sink! Does this make you a plumber? You got your ticket reduced or dismissed in traffic court. Does this make you an experienced lawyer?

Unless you already hold the job titles described above, the answer to all three questions is "no!" Being able to paint a picture, fix a leaky drain or a traffic ticket does not make you an artist, a plumber or a lawyer. Just as there are many facets to each of these job descriptions, there are in fact just as many aspects to successful web site development. Key word being "successful."

Because we honestly believe that you should have the ability to make informed descisions about your web site, we're going to give you some things that you really do need to consider before taking that do-it-yourself adventure into designing your own web site. No, we're not trying to talk you out of doing it yourself or into having Digital Mouse Designs develop your web site.  We are giving you some up front information so that you can make this decision on an informed basis. We do realize that this is a lengthy explanation, but it contains some very important information that you need to be aware of.

Is it as Easy as it Sounds?

Yes, anyone can design their own web site! Will it look professional? Chances are not - unless you use a pre-designed template or you have graphic and layout skills. Does using a pre-designed template guarantee you a successful web site? No. Web page development is not just about  how your site looks, but more importantly how it performs. Do you save money?  Well, that remains to be seen yet.

Web Site Performance & Functionality

How your web site performs is a key ingredient to your site and your business success. Yes, it is important that your site look professional. To be very honest with you, if I go to a web site and it looks home-made I'm not going to purchase the product and I'm probably not even going to re-visit it. I'm going to go to a site that cares enough about it's product to display it in a professional manner and performs well and make my purchase there. I look at a home-made site or one that looks home-made and doesn't function like it should and can only think how much better that site would perform for the business if it looked more professional and performed properly. I'm not the only web surfer who feels this way. Your business is very important to you and the impression site visitors get from your web site can have a great impact on your business.

Let's take a look at a few of the things that experienced web designers deal with every day for every site they develop. The list below is basic and does not cover everything you need to be aware of. Be honest with yourself when reviewing them before making that all important decision to venture into developing your web site on your own.

Important Things to Consider

You have Front Page, so you're all set!

I know I do not speak for all Front Page designers but those I do know have told me it's honestly not the best program for developing a professional web site. I can tell a site created in Front Page by just peeking at the code and so I believe they are being honest and objective about the use of Front Page in general. These same designers have told me they prefer other design programs but will do a site in Front Page if the client insists on it. One drawback of using Front Page is that it automatically adds a multitude of extraneous code to each and every web page you create with it. Search engine bots need clean code to do their best job at indexing your site to give you good search results. All that extra code also makes for a slower loading page. Think about it, when you go to a web site, if it doesn't load quickly - do you wait around or do you go elsewhere? Our world basically runs on speed. When people want something, they want it now! Patience is pretty much a thing of the past, especially on highband connections. If something isn't fast enough for us, we're gone!

Do You Really Save Money?

Web sites that promote the "do it yourself" web site philosophy are there to make money ... for them not you! They have all these great looking templates so you can have that professional look without spending all that money on design programs or hiring a professional web designer. True, yes ... but ... 1) Do you want your web site to look like hundreds or thousands of other web sites? 2) Do you know what to look for in a well made template? Yes, even the template itself has a bearing on the success of your web site. 3) If you break the template do you know how to fix it or are you going to have to go buy it again and start over?

Those Out of Pocket Expenses!

A good coding program costs about $500, a good graphics design program costs $300 or more and if you want the really good ones you're talking $600 or more and many of them come as a "suite" now so you not only purchase what you think you'll use but you pay for what you'll never use as well. You like FLASH? That's $500.

Don't forget about all the little add-on programs you need to compliment your web design arsenal. Just to get started you can plan on at least a $1,500.00 cash outlay and don't even for one minute think that you're done there. The list of helper programs is endless as can be the costs which can nickle and dime you to death! On the other hand, you could have just spent this money on hiring an experienced web page designer who already has the tools, resources and knowledge to develop your site for you and you'll probably save money!

Hiring a professional web designer will most certainly save you precious time that you could be putting into other aspects of your business.

Page Load Time

Let's say you have just created what you consider to be a great looking site and it loads in a flash for you. You may have cable or DSL but did you know that the percentage of users that still use dialup is still in the 50% range? A web site that loads quickly on a cable or DSL connection is a far cry from how it loads on a slower 56k dialup connection. One major reason people leave a web site before investigating it is that it takes to long to load. Load time is absolutely crucial to the success of a web site. Some sites don't load at all on a slower connection! So, how many customers have you just lost?

Are You Being Objective?

Let's say you just created your own web site and in your eyes it's a "work of art." You're are all jazzed up about what you've just created. Yes, that's what usually happens to first time web page designers. The History of Digital Mouse Designs explains how it happened to me! In whose opinion is it a great work of art? Be honest ... you are the only one to have seen this unless you've shared it with a trusted friend or family member. Are these people going to be honest with you and tell you where they think you could improve or are they going to tell you "oh that's so cool!" and then turn and walk away shaking their heads thinking "man, that's the ugliest thing I've ever seen!" but because they love you and know how proud you are of your "new baby" they don't want to hurt your feelings or crush your spirit into oblivion.

Differences in Browser Rendering?

Did you know there is more than one browser available to use and that people do use different browsers? The entire world does not use what comes pre-installed on their computer! Even if they did - depending upon how old their computer is, if they haven't upgraded the browser it could be a much older version than what you use - thus rendering sites differently for that reason alone.

What looks one way in one version of Internet Explorer can and does quite often look totally different (and many times totally messed up) in another version of the same browser and even more different in say Firefox, Netscape, Opera or other browsers and that's just for PC users. What about the Mac users out there? What are they seeing? In most cases - believe me, it's not at all what you're seeing! So, in order to make sure your web site looks good in all of these platforms, are you prepared to install all these other browsers and run out and purchase a Mac so you can see what happens to a web site depending on the browser and OS your visitors are using? Just how much time and money do you have to devote to your "do it yourself" web site project? While you're doing all of this, what's happening with your business?

I could go on and on but I don't think that's necessary at this point. Ask yourself how much time and money are you willing to invest in your "do it yourself" web site project? How important is it to you to have your web site be as successful as it can be? One should never rely solely on their web site for their business success, but a good web site will help you become more successful.

"Can I" vs "Should I"

Yes, you can develop your own web site but a more important question to ask yourself is should you develop your own web site? When you hire a professional web designer, you not only hire someone who's already got the means to develop a site for you which includes the professional look and the working functionality - but you hire that designer's knowledge and experience as well. A professional web designer does not rely solely on their own eyes alone to judge the look of a site - they get objective opinions from other professionals who are not afraid to tell them where they can improve your site.

In a way it comes down to the fact that you can either spend your money on hiring a good web designer now and get your site up with that potential for success and making money - or you can do it yourself now and then pay a good designer later to redo what's not working for you. We have had people who have designer their own web site and found that it's lacking in what it needs for success and asked us to fix it. We also know of people who put quite a bit of hard work into designing their own site, watching it fail and then giving up. Hiring a professional web designer allows you to put your time and efforts into your business, into what you know - while we do what we know to help make it work for you!

More information on the topic of "Do It Yourself Web Design " can be found by visiting our Web Design F.A.Q.