If it’s DIY … Why Hire A Squarespace Web Designer?
Have you ever found yourself wondering “if Squarespace is a do-it-yourself solution for small business owners who want beautiful, quick, easy-to-build, easy-to-manage websites, then why would I ever hire a professional Squarespace website designer?”
Turns out there are lots of reasons why you might want to invest in a website designer and in this blog post, we will explore the top 5!
Before I dive into that – who the rubber duck 🐥 am I? If we haven't met before, I’m Shaz and I run Elmtree Digital Marketing. I’m a Squarespace designer and educator and have been building websites for eons. I’m a solopreneur since (ahem … let’s just say a long time ago). I’ve seen lots of good design and lots of not-so-good design and now I help small business owners get seen + noticed + remembered online with great design on easy-to-maintain squarespace websites. If that’s of interest to you …
👇read on …
Level Up Your Online Presence: A Squarespace Web Designer Can Transform Your Website
Are you struggling to make your website STAND OUT from the crowd? Are you looking to take your online presence to the next level?
How Many New Websites Are Created Every Minute?
Ever wondered how many new websites are created every year? every month? every day? Here’s a crazy stat for you - prevailing research shows that 252,000 new websites are created every day! That means three new websites every second or 175 new websites are created every minute. There’s been fifty new websites since you started to read this sentence.
Looking for a widget like this one 👇for your website? Check out Elfsight.
Maybe you set out to DIY your website using Squarespace thinking you could put it all together in a weekend. Or maybe you were just trying to save a few bucks. Maybe you were ready to invest in a working with a designer but couldn’t find one whose schedule lined up with yours or whose design aesthetic was what you were looking for.
And now, it isn't working out quite the way you thought it would. You thought it would be easy to navigate the digital space like a pro, understand all the ins and outs of web design, and create engaging content.
How Does If Feel to DIY Your Squarespace site?
And now you find yourself feeling like some of my clients used to feel (before they were clients of course!)
“I feel like I’m on a never-ending treasure hunt, trying to figure out how all the pieces connect. Anyone else feel that way?”
“Creating content that people actually want to read is harder than I thought. It’s like trying to tell a joke that everyone finds funny.”
“I want to be strategic with my website redesign and generate new business, but it feels like I’m playing a game without knowing the rules.”
If you have been struggling with your new website and can't seem to get it to reach its full potential, it may be time to consider hiring a professional.
In this blog post, we will explore why you need a Squarespace designer and how one can help you achieve your website goals along with your aspirations of navigating the digital landscape, building an online community, telling your brand story, sharing your voice online, creating engaging content, connecting with your target audience, and optimizing your website for conversions.
Unlock Your Website's Potential: The Magic of Better Web Design
Whether you are building a new website, or starting a website redesign on your existing website, as a small business owner, you goal is probably to convert visitors into customers effortlessly. A designer can help you achieve that with better design on your custom Squarespace website. Squarespace templates are great, but they offer limited customization options that may hinder your website's true potential. An expert can help you create a unique brand identity by designing a custom squarespace website, optimized for conversions and tailored to your target audience's needs.
Web design is so much more than just building with a design aesthetic. It also involves:
strategically designed site focused on the user experience
usability & accessibility
integration of key features like your email provider or CRM
installing custom code
use of your brand’s custom font
search engine optimization (SEO)
A Squarespace web designer is a specialist who can help bring your web design to the level by:
creating an optimized home page or service pages
crafting engaging content that highlights your branding
designing custom landing pages that drive more conversions,
Helping you launch your next online course, or even,
introducing you to brand new functionality like Squarespace project management tools
Do Your Really Save Time When YOU DIY Your Own Website?
DIY website building is not only time-consuming but also requires some level of expertise. Yes, you can scroll YouTube and watch endless videos on 12 Squarespace Hacks to Build a Site Fast or 51 Squarespace Tips for Creating an Amazing Website or you can just hire an expert squarespace web designer who possess both the technical and creative skills that can help you save time, mitigate mistakes that could occur during the DIY process and help you stay on track towards your aspirations. We bring focused attention to your project, ensuring you meet your aspirations on time and within the budget you have set. Plus, a good web designer and project manager will train you on exactly what you need to know to maintain your own website after the build.
A good Squarespace web designer will also know when to optomize the use of native design functionality like customizing your fonts and when to install code onto your site for a custom look and feel.
Let’s look at the actual cost of DIYing your own site.
How long does it take to build a Squarespace Site from Scratch?
The average website takes me 80 (or more) hours worth of work, and I’ve designed my first website in 2010.
What could you do with an extra 80 hours?
You need to ask yourself, what you could be doing with those 80 hours that might be more valuable to your business (or life?) You could:
Spend that time communicating with your clients:
80 hours is 160 discovery calls with your potential clients. You could be CLOSING business.
Implement Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Tools:
If you are like me, you spend way too much time on administrative tasks. Spend time AUTOMATING your processes and enjoy the payback for years to come.
Create and launch a new product or service:
Dedicating 80 hours could allow a small business owner to brainstorm, plan, and launch a new product or service that meets the needs of their target market.
A Custom Squarespace Website Can Unleash The Power of Brand Storytelling & Strategy
Crafting an effective brand story is key in resonating with your audience and making them feel connected and inspired. You have probably spent time ensuring your brand story is compelling, communicated effectively and resonates with your target audience.
A custom web designer can bring that story to life through design. Strategically, choosing the right imagery, fonts, colours and styling will tell your story in a visual way on your website. And you can take this strategy over to your social media and email marketing to make sure your whole brand story is aligned.
Save the TECH Overwhelm
There is a tonne of behind-the-scenes *stuff* that happens when building a new website. Stuff like:
connecting Google Analytics
optimizing images
Installing SEOSpace and/or a heat map
connecting your domain
making sure your site is fully responsive
integrating your email provider, CRM or scheduler
connecting payment processors
testing purchase processors
setting up a pop up
creating an announcement bar
setting up access permissions
and lots more ….
In fact, I dedicated almost 3 full days of my 2 Weeks to Launch Website Package to these activities. And the most important is making sure your BASIC SEO is in place.
It is a well-known fact that optimizing your website for search engines like Google is critical if you aim to increase website traffic. Partnering with a professional who is well versed in Squarespace SEO and who can use well-proven SEO strategies to optimize your website, making it rank higher in search engines based on the keywords your target audience uses. This is great in helping you connect with your target audience and drive more web traffic to your website.
⭐ If you want a DIY option, you’re in luck because FINALLY, there is one! Check out SEO Space, a Chrome extension that will help scan your website pages & give you improvement suggestions, tips, and check for errors.
With free and very affordable paid plans, all come with a community & access to the SEO Space team for questions & help.
*Affiliate link ☝️
Ongoing Support - Build a Relationship with an Expert
After setting up your Squarespace website, ongoing support is crucial to ensure your new website keeps up with industry trends and changes in the digital world. This is where we come in. Squarespace experts can provide support plans that ensure your website stays relevant, updated, secure and fresh with new content.
For example, in just one month (August) this year, Squarespace introduced:
new online course functionality *this is HUGE!
new project management functionality
update to the back-end navigation
changes to how Acuity handles weekly scheduling summaries
new mailing list options on the bio-site integration
restructuring of the member’s area and digital product sales
all new paywall options
express add-to-cart options in e-commerce
new automation triggers for email campaigns
new integrations with Progressier, MYOB and XERO
It’s not a wonder you can’t keep up. But your design partner can - and they can keep you informed of changes that will affect your site and your business.
Here’s the deal … Getting your small business found by your ideal client shouldn't be so hard. It shouldn’t have you feeling each day like you want to throw your phone across the room or even worse - that feeling that you just want to give it all up.
In fact, it should be something easy - AND something you enjoy doing that gets you bucketloads of results.
DIY website building is great, but when you are struggling to achieve your aspirations of building your brand, a Squarespace web designer can help. They bring expertise, creativity, and time to ensure you achieve all of your aspirations of crafting your brand story, creating engaging content, strategizing social media, harnessing the power of email marketing, and optimizing your website for conversions. If you thought Squarespace web designers weren't necessary, think again!
