Top 10 Reasons NOT to Be a DIY'er When It Comes to Your Website!

Are you thinking of (re)designing, developing, managing and hosting your website all by yourself? That's a pretty bold move, my friend! I commend you on (gulp) your willingness to take this on. Do you have experience in creating an engaging user experience, planning and structuring a logical sitemap, or picking the best hosting server architecture for your platform to thrive on...? These aren't just words with lots of syllables I threw up on a blog post to impress you (but they are fancy, right). They translate directly to your bottom line. Read on to see how.

Below are the top 10 most common things that go wrong, pulled directly from our clients' past experiences.

#1 | You need an industry expert: With years of experience in designing, developing, hosting, and supporting websites, we know what works and what doesn't. We do this all day, every day, so that you don't have to. Rookie mistakes can lead to much more expensive fixes later. For example, do you know to optimize your images to the correct rendering size before putting them up on the site? Do you know when to use PNGs vs. JPEGs vs SVGs, and how to convert them to WEBP to make sure they don't bloat up your site? If not, you're slowing down your site, and Google as well as users will notice.

Did you know that your site can break when you update your plugins, and when it does, you could get the white screen of death that you'll need to hire a rescuer to come in and fix? Until it's fixed, you'll then have no website... yikes. These examples (and more) are things we've seen from clients who come to us for help.

#2 | You don't have time for this: Designing, developing, hosting, and supporting a website takes A LOT of time. By working with Jollity, you can focus on your business initiatives while we create your world-class website. Do you do your own accounting? File your own taxes? Handle your own payroll? All of those things are confusing and complicated, and you have to get them right to stay in business. Websites are the same way. Your company today can't succeed without a digital storefront; it's absolutely vital.

#3 | Long-term cost savings: Hear me out. Do you test every revision on desktop, tablet, and mobile browsers? Do you make sure the site consistently looks and flows correctly in Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Safari? If not, then your company is losing customers. It's like trying to renovate your own home when you've never picked up a hammer. Can you learn how to renovate? Sure... if you have nothing but time. But don't you have a marketing department to run? Remember, "If you think hiring a professional is expensive, try hiring an amateur!"

#4 | Your website needs to feel good to your prospects: Design is our passion, and it matters to your prospects. Their first impression of your brand is not the words you painstakingly wrote. It's the look and feel that they visually experience when they land on your home page. It should match the experience that you're creating for them as a future customer. If it doesn't, then you have a mismatch that will turn off a prospect. We consult with you on a level other agencies simply don’t. We learn by listening to who your company is and who you want to become and creating solutions that produce results for both.

#5 | You need to be able to update it quickly and easily: We get it. You don't want to have to pay every time you need to change out a sentence, or a staff member, or edit a blog post link. Having to go through an agency for each small revision feels like a waste of money. If we've developed your website, we make sure your website is easy for you and your colleagues to navigate, update, and make the most of! HR can add and edit new careers, board meeting managers can easily post new board meeting agendas and resources, and marketers can add and edit blog posts. Also, your changes go live instantly -- no waiting for an overnight server refresh or next week's push to production to fix a single typo. Every website comes with a customized guidebook teaching you how to do it. If you don't want to deal with it yourself, though, we offer support retainers. We're always here for you, and flexible in how involved you'd like us to be.

#6 | It needs to function flawlessly on phones, tablets, laptops, and giant tech-nerd screens: In today's world, people use their phones to browse the internet way more than laptops and desktops. Gray-haired CEOs sit behind a desk on a giant screen, whereas anyone under 40 is browsing on a 3in screen with their thumb. Your website somehow has to look, feel, and function perfectly on all of those. The testing that goes into every design change, dev change, and new addition to the site is extensive. The coding to make it look great on all devices is 10x what it was 10 years ago. Using a solution that does this for you with automation is usually flawed, clunky, and outputs a bunch of extraneous code that is super confusing to Google search crawlers. We make sure your website looks great on all devices and communicates with Google, chatGPT, and other web crawlers efficiently.

#7 | it needs to be FAST: Your website has 3 seconds to capture a new lead's attention. Slow websites lead to visitors ditching your site for a competitor who loads faster. They'll hit the back button, leave your site, and browse to the next search result. Or, if it loads slowly, they'll judge it as a sign that you're a dinosaur. Is your company a dinosaur? Well, that's the impression you're sending if it loads slowly. ROOOOAARRRRR. The website needs to be efficiently coded and configured to load in browsers in a very specific way in order to be fast and effective.

#8 | hackers aren't picky: You know the neighbor complains on NextDoor about the neighborhood going downhill, then you come to find out they left the door unlocked, or potentially swinging wide open? Don't be that neighbor. You will get robbed. From obnoxious spam to all-out attacks on your site, hackers use automated software to scour the Internet for targets. Most common hackers don't pick specific targets -- instead, they use auto-generated lists pulled from publicly available domain lists. It doesn't matter if the site gets only 5000 visits/month and has nothing juicy to find on the back end. The website needs a security alarm, an electric fence, seriously awesome door locks, and someone monitoring who has the keys.

#9 | We’ll provide ongoing support, based on your unique needs: 15 years ago, websites were set-it-and-forget-it. You built it (back then with lots of flashing lights, Adobe Flash, and neon green), you launched it, and you're done for 7-10 years. Today, websites are like living, breathing things. They need to be watered, fed, and paid attention to, or they'll wither like the first houseplant you got after college that you forgot about for that summer in Europe. The software and code base needs to be updated on a regular basis for security and to keep up with ever-changing coding language trends. The site needs to be updated to reflect your services, products, staff, and careers as your organization grows and changes. As it grows, the structure of the site needs to be kept modern and updated. Jollity provides proactive support retainers to keep the website thriving and serving your marketing goals and customer base.

#10 | We’ll make your life easier: At the end of the day, working with Jollity will make your life smoother. You’ll never have to worry about your website or get an embarrassing text from a friend about an error or bug, because we take care of everything for you. Seriously. We understand the allure of those "create your own website" companies. We've tried them, we've played with them, and most importantly, we got a lot of our best clients from them! They work great for the un-funded start-up with a $0 budget. But, for ambitious or established small to mid-market companies, a templated (read: generic) DIY website is going to restrict your organization's growth over and over again. They suck up your time, create aggravation, and deliver underwhelming results (to put it delicately) for all your good intentions and work. Designing, developing, managing, and hosting a website is not an easy task, and certainly not one to learn on the fly. Jollity's "Jenius" team works hand-in-hand across each department, giving life to your from-scratch custom website. Much more than a pretty face, your website will be responsive, fast, secure, and tailor-made for YOUR goals. Plus, when things need to be updated or fixed, we're there with true PRIORITY support!

We're not just another marketing agency, we're your partners in creating an online experience that captures your vision and WOWS your customers…

Let's work together and create something amazing!

– Lauren Perfors, email me now. Yes, the contact form goes straight to me. Unless you're a spammer, in which case, please feel free to reach out so I can block your IP from our site, LOL.