Creating a new Website – DIY or Loads of Money?

I get a bit fed up with people telling me how easy it is to set up your own website, how you can easily do it your self, or just spend a couple of hundred pounds on Elance and its done. You see, with my extremely limited ability on all things technical, plus a perfectionist streak, which means I want it done properly, creating my website took longer, cost more, and was more complicated than I expected.

Now I am not going to reveal how much I spent, but I wanted a good professional site with a strong back office functionality which means I can track, monitor, and process customers, without too much hands on activity by me and the team, after all we are about making a difference to peoples lives, helping you quit your corporate job and find the work you love, not spending all our time on admin!

This of course is the challenge, because whilst we do not want to spend too much time on admin activities, it’s the customer experience, particularly when they make a booking to one of our live events, that helps differentiate your brand in a crowded, but poorly serviced market. It is the slickness of the way you follow up enquiries that reassures customers that firstly you care, and secondly that you are competent.

So creating the website myself was never an option, and therefore I had to choose between outsourcing it to a professional consultancy who could handle all the bells and whistles, or go in to the market, but project manage it myself, and therefore deliver a website at the lowest possible cost to me. On the basis that you don’t know what you don’t know, I chose the first option, and I went with the professionals.

I chose vie Digital, mainly because I liked the guy who ran it, and who would act as my interface with the various designers and programmers involved on the project. In hindsight, the thing I have enjoyed most about working with them, is that I can change my mind one hundred times about content and layout, and they never complain, or increase the charges! They have also tried to reduce my future costs by training me on some of the basic maintenance and updating facilities, but as teaching me is like herding cats, their future revenue is probably secure!

So am I happy with the final site? Was it worth the investment? Take a look at http://www.james-kneller.com and let me know your thoughts, and while you’re on the site, grab hold of my Free 7 step system to finding the work you love!