Whether you do it yourself or hire a professional website designer, building a website is an investment in the success of your business. Your website is your virtual front door, and if you’ve taken your classes online, a fully functional and engaging website is more important than ever before.

If you’ve decided to update your website or build a completely new one from scratch, going the DIY route has probably crossed your mind. You’ve got the industry expertise and, perhaps, you also like to write. The DIY options advertised online certainly look easy to use. So, do you really need to hire a professional website designer, or could you build your new site yourself? Here are some questions to consider before making a decision.

Are You Web Savvy?

Drag-and-drop website editors make it easy to build a website with limited design and web experience. But even with these tools, you’ll still need some knowledge of web design and SEO (Search Engine Optimization) to create your website. Title tags, meta descriptions and mobile responsiveness are all important to the functionality of your website. If you use a class scheduler and online payment system, you will need to connect those applications to your new website, as well. If any of these concepts are new to you, it may be worth seeking out the help of a web designer.

Do You Have Great Content?

Unless you hire some help, you’ll be responsible for sourcing and creating the content for your website. This includes all the text, as well as beautiful images and even video. Many yogis enjoy writing, especially when they get a chance to write about their practice. If this describes you, you may be able to put together the content for your own website with a little research on how to write for the web. If you find writing intimidating, you may want to hire a copywriter. Keep in mind that there is a difference between factually stating what you do versus crafting a headline that actually compels people to take action.

What’s Your Budget?

Your financial investment in a DIY website will be less than what you’ll pay for a professionally designed site. If your budget is slim, building a site yourself will save you money. While a professionally designed website could cost you more up front, you’ll be confident it functions and proudly showcases your business. In addition to the cost of building a great website, be sure to consider the downstream costs. Updates, maintenance, security, backups and tech support should be included in your assessment of value.

What’s Your Time Worth to You?

If you do build your website yourself, you may save money. But, it will cost you more time. Designing a site, writing content, selecting and editing images, integrating social media and optimizing for SEO all take a significant amount of time. What is your time worth to you? If you used the hours you would spend building a website to teach more classes or offer seminars, would you make more money than you would spend on professional design? It’s possible. In that case, investing in professional web design help would be a wise choice.

SitesForYogis.com offers an affordable range of solutions from DIY coaching to full design and development. We’re yogis, we get it and we’re here to be your trusted communications partner. Free consultations are being offered to the YOGA + Life community.

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