Congratulations – You have finally completed the web design process, and your website is now live. It’s been a long road, but you are thrilled to see the final result. The web designer has done an excellent job; it looks just like how (or better) you imagined it would when you first sat down for that initial consultation.
When your website goes live, there will undoubtedly be people who come along and offer advice on what they would have done differently or commented on elements of the design they don’t like. Your web designer may also get in contact with ideas for improvements or changes they already have in mind.
If you’ve worked with a web designer from an early stage, this can be very frustrating. However, it’s important to understand websites are an evolving platform for your business. They aren’t static; over time, websites get updated with new content like blog posts, changes will be made to existing pages, and new pages will often be created for new products, services, and events.
However, many people make the mistake of trying to do this themselves, either to cut costs of further web design and development or because they feel it is easy or quick to do so. Well, here are three main reasons you should continue using a web designer once your new website is live.
1) Most people break their website trying to make webdesign changes
Web design may seem simple, but it is a complex process of code, scripts and optimisation for multiple devices that actually draws together the website we see online. If you are trying to update your website yourself, then there is every chance you will cause some error. In fact, web design mistakes usually result in the web page displaying incorrectly or stopping pages from displaying at all.
2) You will do more damage than good to your website
Web designers know what elements on a web page will be successful with visitors or customers, such as increasing page views, reducing bounce rate and being search engine friendly. You might think your changes look good; other people might too. However, you hired a web developer or design agency to build your new website, so why are you willing to undo all that investment? In the long run, it will cost more as you will have to pay someone to fix or undo your changes.
3) Work on your business, and not on trying to design your website
Over time you will undoubtedly want to add new pages or content to your website. Also, you will need someone to maintain it, ensure it’s updated, secure and performing as expected. You will already know your web developers pricing and how they price work (by the hour, per page or project), budgeting for that along with ongoing maintenance will free up time and save money. Outsourcing key work like IT support, web design and accounting will enable you to truly focus on growing your business and developing your products/services. Even spending the time assessing your market and competition is time better spent than on the things you could have other people doing for you. Don’t get caught up with unnecessary distractions; leave web design problems to web designers. Instead spend the time phoning prospects, customers and growing your business.
Are you ready to stop trying to edit your own website?
Hopefully, this brief article helps you avoid costly mistakes later down the line. All too often we see beautiful and functional websites around the internet that at some point have clearly been broken in some way by someone else other than the developer, it’s much like paying a specialist car restorer to rebuild that classic car, the day you get it back would you start tinkering with it? Would you start messing around under the bonnet? Would you risk doing something that meant that beautiful car could no longer run the way it was intended to?
Good luck!