Work website overhaul but with who?

[Steveocee]

My works website is due to be updated shortly and I’ve been asked to look at some alternatives.

Currently we go via a company who designed and deployed on something they’ve developed on Wordpress. It’s a bit blocky and we can’t easily update anything.

We have been offered a rebuild from a designer we work with, again on Wordpress. So far my input has been that it needs to be simple enough a lehperson could easily build an additional page and advertise a new service. We’re not heavily IT involved despite what we work with.

My thoughts are, is this the time to move to an even easier WYSIWYG website builder? Something like squarespace or wix for example? We only need something to show what we do (page per service) and all pages will have a link to contact us.

Any thoughts please?

 

[OspreyO]

Maybe it would be easier than trying to save money by updating it yourselves just pay the designer to do it. Basic website is very simple stuff, but if no one wants to take it on internally. Stop trying to.

I'm bias though I really dislike wordpress websites. They all the same and most are clones of each other.

In our place marketing took the website off the IT Dept because they hated being unable to do it themselves. They outsourced it and still can't update it themselves. Only now it outsourced, expensive and looks awful.

 

[Steveocee]

Maybe it would be easier than trying to save money by updating it yourselves just pay the designer to do it. Basic website is very simple stuff, but if no one wants to take it on internally. Stop trying to.

I'm bias though I really dislike wordpress websites. They all the same and most are clones of each other.

In our place marketing took the website off the IT Dept because they hated being unable to do it themselves. They outsourced it and still can't update it themselves. Only now it outsourced, expensive and looks awful.

This isn't a cost saving exercise. We don't have a support contract on our current setup which we aren't enammered with and we are wanting to be able to dynamically add or remove content as we need without waiting days. This is something that internally we are very up for doing which is why I'm looking at exploring easier to use frameworks.

We want to peel away from the team who designed what we have, we have a new designer lined up but it's not their 9-5 so again changes may not be in the timeframes we want.

We are only a small business so it's not like we get thousands of visits per day.

 

[InkZ]

I would go with Wix or Squarespace for a simple brochureware. The problem is with Wordpress is you've constantly got to review and update the plugins etc so you don't get hacked. Get a Wix site and you can just forget about it.

Even if you outsource and get a designer to do it, they still use a template. I started building websites in the late 90s, and everything was bespoke, we just aren't in those times anymore.

We have an inhouse site built on Umbraco, but that's only because we have a load of custom functionality. We still use an off the shelf template.

 

[Limenote]

I would go with Wix or Squarespace for a simple brochureware. The problem is with Wordpress is you've constantly got to review and update the plugins etc so you don't get hacked. Get a Wix site and you can just forget about it.

Even if you outsource and get a designer to do it, they still use a template. I started building websites in the late 90s, and everything was bespoke, we just aren't in those times anymore.

We have an inhouse site built on Umbraco, but that's only because we have a load of custom functionality. We still use an off the shelf template.

+1 to this. I’m a professional web developer and would never suggest hand rolling brochure sites as these platforms do such a good job these days.

 

[Steveocee]

I would go with Wix or Squarespace for a simple brochureware. The problem is with Wordpress is you've constantly got to review and update the plugins etc so you don't get hacked. Get a Wix site and you can just forget about it.

Even if you outsource and get a designer to do it, they still use a template. I started building websites in the late 90s, and everything was bespoke, we just aren't in those times anymore.

We have an inhouse site built on Umbraco, but that's only because we have a load of custom functionality. We still use an off the shelf template.

+1 to this. I’m a professional web developer and would never suggest hand rolling brochure sites as these platforms do such a good job these days.

Thank you both