If you’ve been wondering whether or not you should “cough up the big bucks” to have a web development company make a brand new website for your company, then please read the information below. The following “5 reasons” will save you a lot of time, money, effort, and frustration.

1. Nice-Looking Websites Are Not That Valuable

If you think you need a nice looking website, then you really don’t understand the point of a website in the first place. Unfortunately, too many business owners think that their website should be a place where somebody can find out more information about their business—like an online brochure. This is the wrong perspective. You should consider your website to be a marketing tool—that is, an educational powerhouse that actually makes you real money because it causes your prospects to draw this conclusion, “I’d have to be an absolute fool to do business with anybody else but you regardless of price.” In order to have this effect on your prospects and clients, you need to have the right content and message on your website. If you have the right content and message, then the design basically doesn’t matter—as long as the design is not terrible or distracting, your website will be effective.

2. Custom Web Designs Take Too Long To Develop

Today, the best way to get a website built quickly is to use an existing template. There are many incredible templates created on a number of different platforms like: Joomla, WordPress, RapidWeaver, etc. that can be customized and ready to go for your business within days instead of weeks or months. Why wait for endless revisions on a custom design, when you can simply pick a nice-looking template and get started NOW? I know that some people worry that their website will look like other websites on the internet if you use a template. However, this is an illegitimate concern. The likelihood that someone looking up your business will recognize your website as being similar to another website using the same template is probably statistically less likely than being eaten by a shark. There are so many websites out there (into the millions) and furthermore, you can still customize your template to make it unique—so don’t let a custom web developer pressure you into their high priced custom designs by telling you that custom is the “only way to go” to avoid looking like other websites out there.

3. Custom Web Designs Cost Too Much Money

If you want to give away tens of thousands of dollars for no good reason to a custom web development firm so that you can have a custom web design that doesn’t make you any actual money, then go for it! It’s your money. But think about this—you can have a website that is just as aesthetically appealing as a custom design for 50% to 75% less by simply using a template. Remember, it’s the content on the website that matters a thousand times more than the design.

4. Custom Websites Cannot Be Easily Changed

If you use a template-based website, you can usually make complete changes to the look-and-feel of your entire website in a day or two (in some cases it can be done in a matter of seconds). That’s right, a few clicks and you have a completely new website! This can be done quickly and inexpensively if your website is starting to look dated, or if you just want a new design. With a custom website, you’re going to have to start from scratch and spend tens of thousands of dollars again.

5. Web Designers Don’t Know How To Create Valuable Content

There is a big problem in the web design industry that is not really being addressed though it is easily explained and understood. Here it is—web designers are not marketing consultants or copywriters and they usually have no idea how to create or help you create good content that actually generates sales for you. On the flip side, a good marketing consultant or copywriter who does know how to create good content and craft powerful strategic marketing messages usually has no idea how to design a nice looking website. So, you end up with one of the following: a nice looking website with worthless content, or a website with great content and a strong marketing message that looks like garbage. It’s a real problem. The best way to solve this problem is to work with an agency that has both the web designers who can quickly modify and customize existing templates and marketing consultants in house who both share the same vision for your company’s website. This way, they can both focus on their individual and unique competencies, as long as they both are looking to create a website with the purpose of being used as an effective marketing tool, and not just a fancy online brochure.