Professional Web Design or DIY Design Tools? – You Choose

There are numerous graphic design software packages on the market that enable business owners and newbie graphic designers to have a stab at producing graphic elements for their business. And some of the very basic solutions are even free to use.

But can these cheap tools do a good enough job to help your business flourish?

If you’re attempting to get your business off the ground on a tight budget, you may feel tempted to take the DIY approach, but in a world where first impressions are key, is “okay” likely to cut it? Because, in reality, there’s so much more to professional design than choosing images, colours and fonts.

Why a professional graphic designer is more powerful than using DIY design tools

There are five main reasons why seeking out a professional designer can be the best way to help your brand.

1. Knowledge and experience:

A designer is trained to think differently to the layperson. Designers are able to strike an effective balance between what the client has dreamed of and what is most useful for the end user. They will be able to consistently make crucial decisions about how to communicate a message as effectively and pleasingly as possible. Experienced designers will process large amounts of information into the most distilled formats, using their knowledge of UX to refine the overarching business premise down to simple, clear design. It’s the professional web designer’s job to bring order to chaos; allowing you to lay all your ideas, thoughts and visions out onto the table so they can be sorted and organised, and then each element can be individually considered to create a clear, attractive, cohesive design.

2. Bespoke design for your business:

A custom design will always be more relatable for your audience than a standardised web design template. Many DIY design packages do offer good designs, and while they are sometimes beautiful to look at, they will always lack the personality that your brand’s specific message and values should convey. It’s part of the web designer’s task to consider and communicate your desired messages through the design. And, as more and more people bring their brands online as a direct result of the availability of these DIY tools, the more we see the same template designs appearing again and again. Having a unique design rules out the risk of your customers seeing another company using the same template and being confused by the identity. This means your brand will remain fresh and focused.

3. Unimagined ideas:

A trained designer will have a creative vision that you, as a lay designer, will be unlikely to possess. The designer will have the breadth of view to be able to present several ideas and possible design concepts to you, alongside a full rationale of the reasoning behind them, so that you can reap maximum benefit for your brand. This spark of professional imagination and ingenuity opens up the possibilities for increased opportunity and value, by offering you alternative routes that you almost certainly would not consider when using DIY tools.

4. Technical aspects of design:

Do you need a print brochure, flier or digital business card? DIY design platforms can help you produce these valuable business tools, but professionally trained designers understand the technical elements and components of these important assets and expert input will make a marked difference to the end-result? Designers use industry-specific software to set up and create artwork for different purposes and know what settings and formats each piece of work requires to achieve the best result. Attempting to learn the technical side of design, as a layperson, can be stressful and time-consuming and may not, in the long-run, prove cost effective. We often hear from clients who tried to design certain marketing assets, such as fliers and ads, using DIY design platforms but the end results are not what they were hoping for. This can be a costly mistake and one which can be avoided by letting a professional designer take the strain from the outset.

5. A professional designer will save you time and money:

This one is important enough to repeat loudly. The amount of time and effort you will need to put in to designing your own website and associated business assets has a quantifiable cost to it – it is by no means “free”. And the potential stress you are likely to go through trying to translate your ideas into beautiful, workable solutions is something you may wish to avoid. How many other tasks are there ahead of you that would benefit from your focused attention other than the design? Would these aspects help to propel your business further, and more quickly? Hiring a designer means high quality design and this, in turn, leads to better connections with your audience, effective UX on your website and, above all, the right visual identity to create immediate brand recognition. – leaving you to focus on the elements of your business that need your expertise.

Talk to BORN Thinking today to see how our professional design team can help your business succeed.