Websites – is it cheaper to do it yourself?

Or can using professionals actually SAVE you money?

Picture the scene.  You’ve started a great new business in a building which now just needs a big sign outside, a new window and a secure door, so customers can see what you do when they walk past and be encouraged to come in (but that burglars will be prevented from coming into when you’re not there.)  Then you’re ready to show the world what you can do!

You look up the cost of materials, and you realise that you could buy some lettering, a big pane of glass, a door that’s roughly the right size, some hinges, latches and a bolt for a pretty cheap price.

Should you get professionals in to fit them?  You’re a young business, and money is tight.  So should you consider just doing the job yourself instead?  Surely that’s cheaper?

The answer – for websites – will probably surprise you.  But for now, let’s look at how you might think about your options in this real-life example of your physical business exterior.

• Firstly, do you have the skills to make it all look good, and be secure?  Because these things are both important to your business.  This is a customer’s first experience of you –  you want to make sure that your signage, shop window and door all look good, the window doesn’t steam up and the door doesn’t jam – and obviously, you can’t risk someone breaking in through an ill-fitting or insecure door.  You need to be confident you can do it all, and do it well.
• Secondly, do you have the time to invest in this?  Not just for the job itself, but for all the YouTube videos you’ll need to watch to make sure you’re not making any basic errors.  And the time to keep everything maintained in good order of course.  What’s the actual cost to your business of all that time – how much more income could you have generated if you’d concentrated on your core business instead of doing building and maintenance work?
• Thirdly, do you have the tools to do what needs to be done?  Expert sign-fitters, carpenters and glaziers have specialist tools (big ladders, huge spirit levels, glass lifting/positioning tools, and any number of smaller things) that you will either need to buy, hire or do without (which would make the whole job lengthier and more amateur).  This can be a major source of expense over and above the raw materials cost.
• And finally, will the short term savings definitely outweigh the long term costs?  Will doing it yourself now without being quite sure about what you’re doing mean, for example, that poorly-sealed windows might rot the surrounding wood over time?  That your insurance is higher?  Might you be risking a break-in?  And could any unforeseen problems require an emergency locksmith or glazier later down the line, at great (and unplanned) expense?

If you’re happy and confident in your answers to all of the above – great!  You can possibly save some money by doing the job yourself – it’s definitely worth looking into.

However, if you’re like me, you’ll certainly be at least pausing for thought and wanting some quotes from professionals so you know how much you could potentially save.

But here’s where it gets really interesting.

Getting a professional might cost LESS than you doing it yourself.

Why? And how?

• Efficiency.  When you’ve got years of skill, you know exactly the right amount of raw materials to buy, you know which manufacturers supply the right quality without overpaying, you make the very best use of what you have, and you don’t waste anything.
• Scale. If you buy hundreds of big sheets of glass per year, or thousands of hinges, you can get them for a fraction of the price that a consumer would be charged for buying only one or two.
• Small extras don’t add big costs.  You might only be able to buy beading in 3-metre lengths – but a glazier’s always got some on the van, so if you only need 20cm of it to finish the job nicely, that’s no problem.
• Time.  These folks are pros!  They can be in and out fitting your sign, windows and doors in a couple of hours, whereas you might have spent a couple of days wrestling with the same job.  So their hourly rate begins to look pretty cheap compared with your day rate!
• Warranties.  Professionals can give warranties of up to 10 years on work like this – you can relax knowing you will have no unexpected costs whatsoever.

How does this help me save money on websites?

This analogy is pretty direct – and got us thinking.  For our own MyStartupSite service, how much would it cost someone to get all the same things together themselves?  Remember, in website terms, we’re talking about the raw materials – the domain, hosting, SSL, development, search engine optimisation, backup, security tools etc. – not the time or effort to use them.

Well, we did the maths this morning – and it would cost you £32.06 per month if you source them yourself.

Our entire MyStartupSite service – including all the time and expertise we use to set it up, maintain and upgrade it – is currently only £29.99 per month.

So in other words, before even considering time spent, it’s cheaper to get a professionally-built website from us than it is to build it yourself.

Wait, what?

Yes, we knew it was an awesome value service, but the fact that it was even cheaper than DIY surprised us too!

We’ve worked it out like-for-like, of course.  You could probably get cheaper materials, or skimp on some aspects you think are less important.  (Security perhaps?  Or backups?  Or just how nice it looks on mobile versus desktop?)

But this is where the “physical building exterior” analogy comes in handy again – the expertise in choosing materials, and the warranty provided in case of any issues.

Who better than the professionals to know what materials have proved themselves time and time again to be attractive, cost effective and reliable?

We build and maintain websites for a living; we are the ones who need to ensure that every site we build is effective in finding you customers (whatever device they use), and we’re the people who would spend more money and time on those sites if anything were to go wrong.

We’ve spent years selecting exactly the tools you need for a great website.  And we genuinely believe that what we’ve costed up in our calculations represents what you’d need to spend to do a decent job yourself.  Just on the tools, remember – we haven’t even begun to consider the costs of your time.

So save yourself some money, and LOTS of effort and time.  Ask us today for some FREE website advice, and to find out more about our great range of professional website services.  We’re so confident in the value we provide that we have a 100% money-back guarantee if not completely satisfied.  Cheaper, better, less effort – and, of course, our famous five-star rated support service.  Contact us today!