Should I Build My Own Website or Hire a Designer?

Building your own website on Wix or Squarespace takes most small business owners 60 to 80 hours.

That's the number that never makes it onto the pricing page. The DIY subscription is $16 or $17 a month, which looks like the whole cost right up until you count the two work weeks you spend learning the editor, writing your own copy, hunting for photos, and figuring out why the whole thing looks broken on a phone.

So the real question is what those 60 to 80 hours are worth to you, and whether you've got them.

What DIY actually costs

A DIY website builder runs $200 to $600 a year once you add the custom domain, the premium plan, and the one or two apps you need for something the template didn't include. That part is genuinely cheap, but it comes with a hidden cost.

Take the 60 to 80 hours and put your own hourly rate against it. At $65 an hour, a 40-hour build is $2,600 of your time. At $100 an hour, it's $4,000 to $8,000. Nothing left your bank account, so it doesn't feel like a cost, but you spent it, and you spent it on a job that isn't the one you're good at or the most passionate about.

This is what no one tells you about DIYing your own site! It isn't $200 against $2,000. It's $2,600 of your time against a designer's fee, and once you write it that way the math looks different than it does at 11pm with the Wix editor open.

What hiring costs

For the other side of it, so you're comparing real numbers.

A freelance designer runs $500 to $5,000 for a small business site, with most solid builds landing in the $1,500 to $5,000 range.

An agency starts around $5,000 and climbs.

On top of the build, a custom site runs $50 to $200 a month for hosting and upkeep, versus the $0 to $50 you'd pay on a builder.

So for most small businesses the honest comparison is roughly $2,600 of your own time and a template you're not sure about, against $1,500 to $5,000 and a site someone built on purpose. Whether that trade is worth it depends entirely on the next two sections, so keep reading before you decide.

The part the hours don't capture

Even after you spend the 60 hours, you're still the designer, the copywriter, the photographer, and the tech support. Those are four different skills, and DIY assumes you have all of them and the time to use them.

When you are DIYing it, the template may look great in the demo, because the demo was built by a professional with real photos and real copy. You drop in your own logo, your own words, and a photo from your phone, and it stops looking like the demo. You can feel that something's off, but you can't name what, because naming what's off is the actual skill a designer has. So you nudge things for another six hours and end up with something that's fine, and fine on your website is expensive, because a visitor forms an opinion about your credibility in under a second and "fine" reads as "not for me."

The 60 hours buys you a website. It doesn't buy you the judgment that makes the website work, and that's the part you were actually missing.

The question to ask yourself

Forget the price for a second and answer this honestly.

Do I enjoy this kind of work, and do I have the hours?

Both have to be yes if you want to a DIY site done well. The DIY builders are genuinely good now, and if you like designing and you've got the time, you can make something clean and save real money doing it.

If it's a no on either one, you don't have a cheaper option. You have a slower, more frustrating version of the same expense, paid in evenings instead of dollars, and a result you'll probably redo.

What I do

At The Brand Barn, the website is built on the message, not the other way around, which is why it isn't a standalone service. The Website Build costs $1,000, and it comes built on strategy to get you sales, not just traffic. You own everything, and you're not renting a page you spent 60 hours on.

You stop being the designer, the copywriter, and the tech support, and go back to the work you actually started the business to do.

Click here to learn more about the Website Build.

Recap

• A DIY build takes most owners 60 to 80 hours. That time is the real cost, not the $17 a month.

• At $65 an hour, 40 hours is $2,600. The comparison is your time versus a designer's fee.

• DIY makes you the designer, copywriter, photographer, and tech support all at once.

• A visitor judges your credibility in under a second, and "fine" reads as "small."

• If you enjoy the work and have the hours, build it yourself. That's a real answer.

• If you don't, DIY isn't cheaper. It's the same cost paid in evenings.

If you're not sure which one you are, that's a normal place to be, let's talk.