DIY Website: How to Save Thousands of Dollars

This post originally appeared on tBL member Joshua Lyon's blog Joshua Lyons Marketing Blog and is republished with permission. Find out how to syndicate your content with theBrokerList.

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A friend of mine recently saw a website and said something along the lines of "Josh, this website is amazing. I want to find out the name of the developer so he can build something like that for me. He's going to have to be really good." The website he was looking at really did look good, aside from not being an SEO friendly design. But then I ran the website through an analysis and told him he could buy that exact website design for only $44. I'm excited to share this blog post with you, because anyone looking to buy a website can really benefit from the following information.

First, look around the internet and find some websites that look good to you. Look at your competitors. Look at others in the industry, in major cities around the world or at least around your country. Look at websites in similar industries. Go web surfing and see what you like. Whenever you see a website you like, copy and paste the URL into a document, so you can remember that URL for later. This is how you can find some general designs you like.

WordPress is an extremely popular platform for building websites. There are thousands of websites that have been created by developers and are sold for almost nothing to the general public. Once you find a website design you like, you can purchase the design and use it for your website. These website designs are called a themes. You can find the perfect theme for your business and then purchase and edit it.

Remember I told you to go surf the web and find websites you like? The next step is to paste each URL you found into a theme detector. I like to use WPThemeDetector. If the website was built on the WordPress platform, this theme detector will tell you the name of the theme that was used, who created it, how much it will cost if you want to buy it and other information. Most themes are less than $100, from what I've seen. Now that you've identified the themes you like, you can simply pick out your favorite theme and buy it for yourself. This approach is far less expensive than hiring someone to build a custom website for you, for several thousand dollars.

Use this tool to identify which WordPress theme someone is using. Click To Tweet

You can probably find just about any type of design you want for around $50. However, if you're really particular about what you want, you can certainly hire a reputable website developer to build a nice website for you, based on your custom specifications. I know some really great developers that I truly trust and respect. Do you spend thousands on a custom website or do you pay somewhere around $50 for an already established WordPress theme? That's something you should really decide for yourself. However, I do believe most people can get what they need from the $50ish dollar option. My suggestion is to find a WordPress theme that fits what you're looking for and just get that theme. If that's not an option for you, look into getting something more custom.

All themes will have some basic elements. You may purchase a theme that has extra menu options and editing features. If that's the case, you'll probably be able to find some support documentation from the developer. Sometimes it's easy to figure out how to use the extra features, without having to even look for support documentation. However, you should be familiar with the basics of editing your WordPress theme. Here is a very good video that introduces you to the basics:

If you decide to buy a beautiful website design for only $50, you may have a little more in your budget for other things. If that's the case for you, I'd suggest investing those dollars into your SEO and online marketing strategy. This is important because your SEO is what makes it so people can actually find your website on Google. Seriously, what's the point in having a beautiful website if nobody can find it? Many people spend a ton of money on a beautiful custom website. Afterward, they often don't have enough money to make sure the website is designed on the backend to rank well for search engines like Google.

You can do all the remaining website work yourself, or you can hire someone like Joshua Lyons Marketing to help you… [wink wink]. Regardless of who sets up your website, here are some of the things that will still need to be done:

I'm in the business of helping people get their websites positioned for success. That means customizing WordPress themes, writing copy, doing keyword research, search engine optimization and so much more. I don't build websites from scratch. I don't need to build websites from scratch. I use WordPress themes for my clients and this saves my clients a lot of money. I want you to know that you can get a great website that will function very well, without having to pay an arm and a leg. I think it's of value to you, to be able to use the WPThemeDetector to find themes that look good. If you can do that, and build a website yourself, then I'm happy to have helped. Then again, if you happen to need help along the way, or want me to take care of the entire website process for you, I can totally do that as well. Either way, you now understand that a website doesn't have to be as expensive as it used to be, thanks to inexpensive WordPress themes.

How to save thousands of dollars on your new website! Click To Tweet

Here are a couple related blog posts you may find interesting:

About Joshua Lyons

Joshua Lyons has written 22 post(s) in this blog.

Joshua Lyons is a marketing professional based in Pensacola, Florida. Since finishing his bachelors degree in 2009, at the University of West Florida, where he studied public relations and marketing, he has actively developed his marketing career. Josh has honed his skill set with a specific emphasis on internet marketing. He currently works with five commercial real estate offices across the southeast and has other non-commercial real estate clients as well. He is particularly interested in helping businesses and professionals who are either trying to establish a new marketing presence or are trying to enhance their poorly performing marketing presence. He figures out what isn't working, and fixes it. He also finds untapped online marketing opportunities and helps his clients make the most of those opportunities. To talk to Josh about your own marketing, you can email him at [email protected] or call him at 850-760-0232. You can also follow him on Twitter at @JoshuaJLyons or visit his website at JJLyonsMarketing.com.

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