It’s time to put some snazzy accoutrements on your website and make it look as good as it reads. However, as a business owner, you might be at a loss for where to begin.
Do. Certainly not.
You can create a website that looks like you hired Jeffrey Zeldman to design it, but without breaking the bank.
To make sure your website looks like a million bucks, you should get ready, buckle down, and look into the following choices.
Create a Beautiful Website Without a Staff Designer
1. Buy a Professional Theme
Buying a premium theme designed by a professional developer is the most cost-effective way to build a stunning website.
Essentially, a theme is a “skin” for your website that has already been designed. The theme determines how your site appears to visitors, though you can still change things like the plugins, menu items, and colour scheme to suit your tastes.
The benefits of purchasing a theme include:
- Premium themes are the highest quality available and come with a wide range of features and customization options.
- Fully-coded — All the advantages of a fully-coded website, with none of the learning curve.
- If WordPress is updated, your theme will automatically be updated as well.
- Prices for premium themes typically range between $29 and $150, making them much more cost-effective than having a designer create a brand new design from scratch.
- Themes are fully functional, and making minor adjustments is straightforward.
Purchasing a theme does have one drawback, though: it restricts your creativity. To illustrate, if you’re not comfortable with CSS and want to make some changes to your website’s design, your options are to buy a new theme or hire a designer.Once you have a theme installed, you can easily customize it yourself. You don’t have to know how to code — just how to navigate WordPress.
Tip: Want to do more with WordPress? Check out WPBeginner for in-depth how-tos.
Here is a collection of top-notch guides that will assist you in setting up your WordPress site, adding content, and customising its appearance and functionality.
- How To Make A Website
- How to Create Your First Web Page
- How to Add a Menu in WordPress
2. Hire a Freelancer
Hiring a freelance designer is another great option if you don’t have a designer on staff but don’t want to handle the design work on your own.
Freelance designers typically purchase pre-made WordPress themes and make minor adjustments to fit your needs. You can complete the task on your own, as was just stated. A learning curve and some practise are necessary, but the effort is worth it in the end.
The savings in time and effort that can be made by using a freelancer is the main benefit. The time you would have spent learning WordPress could be put to better use earning money. Aside from the obvious benefits to quality and timeliness, hiring a web designer means your site can go live much sooner.
Tip: Not sure if hiring a freelancer is worth the $$$? Check out our guide to DIYing vs. delegating small business tasks.
Freelancer, Guru, and Upwork are just some of the places you can look to hire a competent freelancer.
Always keep in mind that if you hire a freelance designer, your website will look fantastic and will likely be live sooner. If you ever find that you need to make a modification, though, you’ll have to either do the necessary research yourself or hire a freelancer once more. However, once a website is live, it’s not hard to pick up the skills necessary to make speedy edits in WordPress.
3. Use a Design Agency
A professional and reasonably priced design service is a great option if you don’t want to mess around with your WordPress site or are nervous about working with a freelancer.
The benefits of working with a professional web design company are manifold.
- Quality —Most design studios offer quality assurances of the highest standard.
- The majority of paid design services will also ensure that your design is search engine optimised, which is a huge step up from DIY methods.
- Your website must be mobile-friendly if you want to connect with your target demographic. Hiring a professional design firm allows you to ensure that your theme is optimised for use on mobile devices.
You can rest assured that the quality will be high, the turnaround time will be short, and the design process will be tailored to you when you hire a professional design service rather than doing it yourself or working with a freelancer.
No Designer, No Problem
If you’re the DIY type, you can buy a theme and teach yourself WordPress. Freelance content mills make it simple to find and hire a worker if you enjoy collaboration with independent contractors. The final product will be a stunning website regardless of which option you choose. True, but that’s what really counts, right?
