Website Builder companies, such as Wix, Weebly or Squarespace, offer a generic platform for what should be a fun and interesting display of your business.
Your business’ website is an investment. Like any investment, you want maximize the value it is producing.This is the main reason why many business’ turn to large website builder companies, such as Wix or Squarespace. They believe they are getting a bargain because they found a low price.
If these website builders produced value in excess to the price you pay, however, I wouldn’t be writing this article. Website builders contain a wide-range of serious drawbacks that prevent your business from achieving the level of success it is capable of. In our increasingly competitive and digital world, a professional who specializes in website management can make an enormous difference for your business.
Here are seven ways website builders should not be used for your business website:
Your SEO takes a huge hit
Search Engine Optimization is a key element in this, and it is one of the biggest reasons your website is better off in the hands of a professional.
Website Builders produce coding that is not structured very well for SEO. In other words, they don’t contain the necessary elements that help business websites rank higher on Google. While there are many elements to SEO, including your content’s wording and accessibility, none are quite as complex as the on-page factors.
On-page SEO factors include the code and structure of the site. When you build your website with one of these website builders, you don’t have control over these factors. The only thing within your control, then, is the design of the page.
Finally, most website builders limit your page count and charge you extra when you try to add more. If you want your website to rank, it is essential you consistently add and update your current information. This includes creating blog posts and adding pages that further explain your business. You won’t be able to easily do this if you use a generic website builder.
These SEO drawbacks alone should steer you away. Just imagine all the traffic you could be missing out on because of these factors.
You don’t own the content on a Website Builder
This is another incredibly important drawback hat every business owner should take into consideration before using a program like Wix, Weebly, or Squarespace. When you add or create content on your website, you would like to operate as if that content belonged to you. Website builders, however, technically own the content you add to their system.
Imagine a simple hypothetical: you designed your website using a website builder and it looked okay. Afterwards, you loaded about 50 pages or blogs from your old site onto your new platform to get things going. Then, you consistently added more blogs to their site until you had over 100 individual posts. At this point, if you decide to leave their platform, you cannot take those 100 posts with you.
If you load 50 blogs into their system, add another 50 while you are with them, decide for whatever reason to leave them they don’t allow you to export your 100+ pages to leave.
Website management professionals use CMS (content management systems) like WordPress or Joomla instead. With CMS’s, you can easily transfer from host to host easily without website interruption.
Generic builders slow your website down
Speed is a critical factor when it comes to retaining your visitors. Every second your page takes to load, you’re exponentially more likely to lose your customer. This is because people in today’s world have justifiably little patience for slow webpages. With all the competition out there, they are likely to opt out of your website in as little as 4 seconds.
Large website building companies use the same server for all their clients. Overall, this gives you less access to resources, slowing your website down. If you hire a qualified website management professional, they will host your website on a server more capable of handling your website’s workload.
Many Website Builders are still Flash-based
Flash-based software was once used rather widely. In recent years, however, many search engines have moved away from it. This includes the most prominent search engines, such as Google and Yahoo!. They don’t recognize flash anymore, meaning it will be harder for your prospects to find your business through most major search engines.
One of the main reasons for the exodus is that Flash is very insecure. Additionally, it doesn’t have text content and cannot be searched for. These two factors alone suggest you should stay away from website builders that use flash.
Some builders aren’t even mobile friendly
If your website isn’t mobile friendly, you will take a huge hit in traffic. This is because pandering to users on multiple platforms is essential in our increasingly digital world. According to Econsultancy 62% of companies that designed a website specifically for mobile and 64% that designed a site for tablets had increased sales.
Website Builders rarely optimize your page for mobile devices. If they do, it is often poorly constructed in the eyes of even the most casual mobile users.
They distract your visitors by advertising on your site
An important factor to consider on your website is each page’s attention ratio. The attention ratio of a page is the number of things you can do on a webpage verses the number of things you should do. Most pages are designed with a few goals in mind, whether you want the visitor to opt in for a newsletter or buy a product. The study of this in and of itself is complex and difficult at times.
Factor in that major website builders will advertise on your website, and you will have an even tougher time funneling your visitors attention toward what you want them to see.
You won’t have access to key analytics
A very important part of website management, and business in general, for that matter, is constantly analyzing with is and isn’t working for your business. If an aspect of your product could be improved at the margin, you would be wise to identify and solve that issue.
The same is true for websites. Analytic applications have come a long way in the digital world. We can hone on exactly what does draw your visitor closer to a sale and what does not. Website builders don’t offer any sort of comprehensive analytics, leaving your business’ success up to a pile of educated guesses.
You should be working with individuals who understand these analytics and constantly test your website to see what could improve.
Conclusion
There are more reasons why you should use a website manager instead of a website builder like Weebly, Wix or Squarespace. Personal attention and care, for instance, is not a quality you will find at these large companies. Here at Web Design by Knight, we work under a code of honesty and transparency. We will tell you exactly what your business needs to be successful online and help you move closer toward your professional goals.
Call today for a free consultation!