Congratulations! You’ve finally decided to take your idea or business into the digital space and create a website. Now the question remains which is the best route to take to go online? Is it best to hire a digital agency to create your site or do you take the risk and go the DIY route and try a website builder such as Wix, Weebly or Squarespace? After a quick Google search, you will quickly realize that there are a number of DIY website builders on the market that promise an amazing website for a reasonable price. But what does this actually mean and is this the best way to go about building your brand new website? 

If you spend some time doing a little research surrounding these DIY website builders you will realize that they aren’t what they seem. Building a website is like building a house, to be done right, it takes a team of people. With Little Dragon Media you get a user interface (UI) designer and user experience (UX) designer, a search engine optimization specialist and a backend developer if needed. Having a poor user experience is an easy way to lose visitors to your site quite quickly and if you do not have experience in web development it is impossible for you to know the basic principles of what it takes to make a great website. A website with a good UX ensures that you keep your visitors engaged, wanting more of your content and most importantly, keep revisiting. 

Another very important factor to consider is the security of your website when going with a DIY website builder. Because your website is hosted on a server with over a million other sites there is a greater risk of your site being compromised. In addition to that, if a server at one of these website builders were to go down due to a hack then your website would go right along with it. You need to also consider what additional security measures are being provided to you when you sign up for these services. Remember, if you are collecting customer or client information such as address and credit cards it is your responsibility to keep it safe. So ask yourself, will your site be monitored for downtime?  Are you protected around the clock against malware and hackers? Is your site being backed up daily with an easy way to restore your site in the event of a problem? All of these are important factors when thinking of the security of your website.

You also want to consider speed. When you are on a shared server with so many other sites you do also run the risk of your website being slow. This is because your capacity is spread thin and as a result, you could lose visitors along the way. No one likes to sit around waiting for a website page to load and the longer that takes the more likely it is that your visitors have hit the back button and are on their way to your competitor’s site. 

When using a DIY website builder it makes it harder for you to stand out from the crowd. The templates offered are used by a number of users on the platform and therefore has most likely been seen by your users in the past. Limited customizations make it difficult to put your own flare onto your website thus creating that bland boring interface that we are all so used to. What makes it even harder is that Google bots crawl your website for SEO purposes and once they notice that your layout is similar to other websites out there it automatically ranks your site lower. The key to ranking higher is having a unique website with great content, keeping your visitors happy and engaged. 

Also, be sure to ask yourself what your future plans are for your website as well. A lot of DIY builders often “own” your content when you sign up with them. This means should you need to move your website in the future it is almost impossible to do so. So save yourself the trouble before you go spending hours on designing a site you cannot take with you should you choose to switch down the line. In addition to that if you are using your website to capture leads or grow your business then these leads can also be hard to get off the platform as they may be owned by the builder that you decided to work with. 

Hiring a digital agency like Little Dragon will alleviate a lot of the headaches that come with building a website. The holistic approach you get from Little Dragon is something you simply cannot get with website builders on the marketplace. The reality is that custom web development is what we do and we never cut corners there.  We never own any of your content and simply assist you in bringing your vision to life. From website design to creation, optimizing the site for the search engines and making the site responsive so it renders perfectly on all devices is hard to find elsewhere. In addition to that, adequate security and monitoring are hard for DIY website builders simply because they are hosting millions of sites at a time.  

		Wix	Squarespace	Weebly
Company Type:	All-In-One Web Agency	DIY web builder only	DIY web builder only	DIY web builder only
Google Rating:
Company Origin:	CAN	ISR	USA	USA
Custom Design or Template?:	Custom 100% Original Design	Template based	Template based	Template based
Who builds your website?:	We Do	You Do	You Do	You Do
Who handles bugs, crashes & security?:	We Do	You Do	You Do	You Do
Content creation services offered?:
Malware Scan & Protection:
Daily Backups:

Learn more about our affordable website design packages which includes website maintenance and security.

The reality is that website builders take time and they often leave you with two choices at the end of the day. Either you have wasted countless hours that you put into a project that you are simply not proud to showcase to the world because it looks ugly. Or alternatively, you go live with a site that you are not proud of because you refuse to have those hours wasted. Whichever you choose both are bad options. The better choice is to just hire us to do it for you at an easily digestible monthly cost while you sit back, relax and watch your creation come to life. 

Stella Naggenda

Stella Naggenda is a marketing assistant and a passionate web developer with a background in real estate sales and marketing. Having worked in the real estate field for 6 years, Stella’s passion and interest for technology grew. She enjoys spending her time learning new technologies and working with systems that help optimize a business’ online presence.