SITE-SMART Small Business Services | Online Systems Development, Inc. | SMARTEN UP U | Developer of E-commerce applications, Specialized Internet business management solutions, Search Engine optimization, marketing, in-depth website analytics and dynamic application development, i.e. CMS, blogs, forums and training applications

Does small business need help leveraging technologies?

August 7th, 2006

Building a business website
Can you do it yourself or should you hire someone ?…

A big question with no simple answers. Let’s narrow the scope of this topic. There are indeed many things that you may have to consider. I can tell you right now before we get into the nitty-gritty of this question that you better weigh the pros and cons with due diligence. Failure to make the correct decision will cost you time, money, reputation and perhaps the very success of your online business presence.

The cost of “time”… You must be honest with yourself in determining whether or not you are really interested in learning all of the disciplines involved in developing your own website. At the very least you will have to have a sound working knowledge of the following:

• Programming:
You will be using one of the more common scripting techniques such as html, xhtml transitional, xhtml strict, css, asp, .net, php, dhtml or javascript ?

• Static vs Dynamic web pages:
If wanting to utilize a current design and dynamic generation of web pages you must have some working knowledge of database design and functionality. Most dynamic websites today use the opensource MySql database. Static websites have limited useful applications these days. Avoid them unless you a a specific requirement for their use.

• Authoring packages:
Several good ones are available, i.e. Adobe-Macromedia Dreamweaver, Adobe GoLive CS2, Microsoft FrontPage, CoffeeCup HTML Editor, NetOjects Fusion, etc.. There are many to choose from and you will find some of them expensive and extremely sophisticated (read complex.) Conversely there are many that are free and simplistic ( not to be confused with needing little knowledge or skills to use).

• Graphic design:
Understanding how to create graphic images, laying them out in an esthetically pleasing manner and being able to incorporate them into a useful web page design can be challenging for the very best of web authors.

Being aware of image color depth and size is of primary importance even before you tackle the scanning, acquisition and manipulation of the chosen graphic materials.

The cost of “time and money”…
Moving on to the expense involved. The equipment and software applications are anything but cheap. There is a lot of opensource software that is very capable. Although the documentation is not that great in many cases and support is often offered only as a paid extra. I personally believe that much opensource software is superior. Such application software should not be looked upon as free.

Regardless of where you get the equipment and or applications to accomplish your goal of being able to successfully design and deploy a website, there is always significant cost involved. You will be able to decide for yourself if the do-it-yourself approach is the way you want to go.

With this is mind you must certainly consider the routine maintenance of the website. It is an ugly thing to undertake the monetary, time consuming and mental investment of building the business website only to then be to sick-of-it for the continued routine of freshening content and the maintenance required of every successful web presence.

The cost of “your reputation”…
There is really no mystery about whether a business reputation effects the bottom-line.
If you have a nice business site that works properly and you deliver to the customer in the expected manner, then you will establish a good baseline reputation.

Should your website be difficult to navigate, poorly designed and it puts-off the customer in any manner; believe me, your reputation and bottom-line will suffer. You will develop what-ever reputation is paid you by the customer.

There is just to many places to buy what-ever widget or service you are selling. Customers are very discerning and demanding these days and competition for them is truly intense. Don’t risk your reputation and your investment.

In Summary:
Gone are the days of the late 90’s when you could get by with a clunky static website.
Everything is anew and everything has changed. If you have friends and neighbors that are giving you advice about your website and they are not currently involved in that industry directly as a business…. run..run..run from their advice.

If you really have the time, money and desire to forge ahead with self authoring, deployment and maintenance of your business website, then I encourage you to follow your dreams and pursue that pot-of-gold at the end of the rainbow.

Should you be very interested to the point of shear excitement in tackling the aforementioned and you have the aptitude and determination; you may become quite fulfilled in developing your own online business presence.

Et cetera ….
First and foremost; Are you or is someone within your business or resource available circle of acquaintances “very skilled” in current web authoring technologies? Is spending your time or paying for in-house or a paid outsourced acquaintance to do the job— really cost effective? One must weigh all these factors and more against paying a professional to perform these and the many other aspects of marketing your online business.

— Julie Foster ©2006
Does small business need help leveraging technologies Part I – Building a business website
Does small business need help leveraging technologies Part II – What makes a website good

Entry Filed under: 3 - New Business Start-ups, 1 - Title Articles, 2 - IP Technologies