There are plenty of options out there to “build your own website”, some obviously better than others, but is it a good idea?

Well first off, it will probably save you some money up front and in some cases web builders are free. So it may seem an appealing way to get your self an online presence. But beware, there are a few drawbacks.

Firstly they will almost certainly be template driven, so don’t expect your site to be unique and one of a kind. Sure you’ll probably be able to add your own logo, but the layouts, colour schemes and pictures will more than likely be predefined. Secondly the code that the builder produces may well be very “un-search engine friendly”. If you want  your site to get to the top of Google then taking this route will not be your best option. The site builder may produce nests and nests of code that Google will dismiss and not list your site. The problem is that if this is the case Google may not continue crawling your site and it could take a long time for you even to appear on their listings. Also bear in mind  the disability act. Your site should comply with guidelines setup by the W3C, so people who are visually impaired can still navigate around your site using screen readers. The use of a site builder may not take this into consideration.

So to sum it up, although it might be an appealing option to use a site builder, there are some things to take into consideration. At the end of the day, the best way to build a website is from the ground up, with neat hand-built code. Which of course is all that us folks at Edge of the Web do!