There's no doubt that low-cost website development can be tempting. After all, most SMEs want to save money and maximise returns. But while it may seem like an easy way to get your business online and your brand out there and working for you in the public domain, you really do get what you pay for when it comes to website design and development.
Inexpensive and low-quality websites often give a negative impression and do not adequately represent the professionalism of your brand. They tend not to have the sophisticated design expected by modern consumers and thus can leave an unfavourable impression of your business, undermining your credibility.
You'll pay more in the long run
Building a website is much more than just selecting an attractive design and adding some text. It's a carefully composed blend of design, technology, knowledge, and strategic thinking. Every aspect of your website needs to serve a purpose, helping your target audience get the information they need and driving them towards conversion.
Alternatively, opting for a low-cost website may not assure the required stability and security, leading to further expenses for maintenance and protection measures. Moreover, such sites might not perform well in search engine rankings, limiting the flow of organic traffic to your platform.
While it can be tempting to opt for a cheaper website development solution, it's crucial to understand what you may be compromising by doing so. Cutting costs often translates to skipping essential stages leaving you at a competitive disadvantage.
When you prioritise quality and strategic design, not only do you facilitate a secure and stable user experience (UX), you also pave the path for better search engine visibility. To achieve this, several factors should be taken into account:
- Strategic planning: In order for a website to function as a strong marketing tool, it must be designed with a clear plan that aligns with your business goals. It should effectively communicate your brand message, satisfy user needs, and drive conversions. A cheap website development may not take these strategic considerations into account.
- Website architecture: A well-structured and logical hierarchy makes your site user-friendly, allowing visitors and search engines to navigate it with ease. Poor quality sites often overlook this essential stage.
- UX: Construct customer journeys that lead website users smoothly from their initial visit to the desired action, creating a seamless and intuitive experience. A poorly designed site can lead to high bounce rates and lost potential conversions.
- SEO: The inclusion of strategically-placed keywords within valuable content isn't just good SEO practice, it's essential. It helps search engines understand what your site is about, aiding in higher rankings and more visibility. Cheap website development rarely involves a robust SEO strategy, which can significantly impair your site's visibility and performance.
- Content: Quality content is the lifeblood of any successful website. It makes your site valuable to users and therefore to search engines. Discount website development often results in thin, unconsidered content that provides little to no value for users and ranks poorly on search engines.
Considering these elements before starting the actual site build can shape your website into not just a digital showcase of your business, but a robust tool that generates leads, drives sales, and helps your business grow. The attention to such details might require a higher initial investment, but the returns garnered in terms of traffic, user engagement, and conversions makes it all worthwhile. The old adage, "it takes money to make money" holds true in this context.
Cheap website development means that you may have to pay more in the long run
Failing to properly set up your website from the beginning can lead to significant costs down the line. If initial steps like strategy, planning, and quality content development are overlooked, the website may not function properly or achieve your business objectives. The likely outcome is that you’ll end up paying again to fix or even entirely rebuild the website.
This unfortunate scenario underscores the importance of doing things right the first time. Investing in a well-built website, supported by thoughtful planning and high-quality content, allows for ongoing improvement and development.
With a well-considered initial build, updates and expansions become seamless, cost-effective, and beneficial to your business growth. Think of it as a long-term investment – The upfront cost may be higher, but the return on investment over time makes it the wiser financial and strategic decision.
Remember, a truly effective website is more than just a digital shopfront – it’s a dynamic tool for attracting visitors, converting leads, and nurturing customer relationships.
Low-cost, low-quality websites are unstable
A cheap website often carries the risk of not only presenting a poor visual appeal and UX but also having an unstable framework. These websites tend to be more prone to technical issues, including unexpected crashes. The compromised quality of a budget-based website often translates to slow load times and navigating difficulties, particularly on mobile devices. The modern consumer expects web pages to load quickly, and to be able to find what they are looking for straight away. Falling below this expectation may drive potential customers away.
Hitting an even more critical pain point, a weakly-structured website poses a significant risk in terms of cyber security. It may open an unintended gateway for cybercriminals to hack into your site and exploit it for malicious activities which are widespread, ranging from sending spam emails to uploading illegitimate content, both of which could severely damage your site's (and your brand’s) reputation.
Also, when you decide to develop your website with additional features or updates, you might encounter significant problems. The reason is that poorly developed underlying code does not provide a simple and efficient environment for upgrades or alterations. As a result, the new additions may not function properly, or unfortunately, may not work at all.
It's not only about being able to update your site's content every once in a while; it's also about making sure that your site works well on all devices and looks good at any size or resolution. It also means keeping up with the latest web development trends so that your website doesn't get outdated quickly as technology advances over time (and it will).
Get your domain right
Investing in an appropriate domain name is equally important for your online presence. A domain name that fails to represent your business accurately, is hard to remember, excessively long, or lacks uniqueness could deter potential customers. Such a domain might create an impression that your business lacks legitimacy and trustworthiness, ultimately affecting the perception of your brand.
A cheap website will look like a cheap website
Developers working within a limited budget are likely to resort to cookie-cutter templates, and not spending much time on crafting a tailored and custom design that truly resonates with the essence of your business and its particular requirements. The use of such generic designs inevitably results in a lacklustre visual appeal and if you want any visual changes, or development updates going forward, it can be problematic and results in security updating issues. This won't help you to stand out from the crowd, and be competitive in the market. A website is often the first point of contact a customer has with your business, and if your website fails to impress or engender trust, it can create an uphill battle for securing business leads and conversions.
Be competitive
You need to stand out. With so many websites accessible, it's hard to get noticed. You need not only great design and UX, but also to use SEO keywords that people are searching for in order to make sure that your site comes up when someone searches for those terms. This is where our expertise comes into play, since we know exactly how important it is for your audience to be able to find your website through organic search alone. Our SEO strategy and expertise has helped our clients to appear at the top of page one on search engines for niche keywords and phrases that reflect their business and also the type of searches hat their target audience will be using.
We offer the best value for money website services in Bolton, Greater Manchester
After over a decade of working with businesses big and small, across Bolton, Greater Manchester, and the whole of the UK on their digital design and development projects, we are confident that we can offer great value for money when creating a new website. Not only that, but we can also design and build a new website that you can be be proud of.
Whether you are looking to start from scratch or update an existing website that no longer works for your business needs, we can help. We work closely with each client to create a bespoke solution that meets their goals, appeals to their audience and fits within their budget.
Get in touch with us today.
