Hello! I have zero experience in website design/development, but self-taught myself enough to get a WordPress site set up with my domain name and have put some content in there, but it needs a lot more work to look appealing and professional, and that's where I'm lost. I've been looking for work on Elance, so decided to post a request for help and got lots of responses. I've hired someone, but am having a hard time even telling him what I want. I've basically told him about the business, showed him some sites I liked, told him a few specific things I need (social media buttons, an email list generator, etc.) and kind of told him to run with it. Not sure how it's going to work out, but I'm just a little frustrated that even hiring out the work I feel overwhelmed! Just curious who out there designed their own website and who hired it done, and how daunting a project was it for you? Having a website that I'm proud of is step #1 before I can do anything else in terms of marketing. Just curious to hear if anyone else was as frustrated by this task as I am and if you have any suggestions. Thanks!

Liz

I made my own website. I spent some time learning WordPress and created on my own site using iThemes themes.

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Paulette R.
Romero Communications

Liz,

I've done both, building more than a handful of my own sites and outsourcing the construction of sites, and I'd definitely choose outsourcing the construction of the site.

I think its useful to have a basic working knowledge of Wordpress, but your time is better spent building your business, not building your site.

Here's the best tip I have for you: capture a screenshot (or better yet, video) of 4-5 sites that you really like using tools like Camtasia or QuickTime. Detail what you like and what you dislike about those sites and send that to your developer to give him or her a great idea of what design to use for your site.

Good Luck!
George

I build websites so I built my own. There are a lot of great themes for ppl that don't know coding in WordPress. If you are having difficulty and don't want to use elance , I would spend time going through various WP themes until you find one that you like. WP is pretty user friendly.

I plan on building my own. There's tins of tutorials on youtube on how to use wordpress.

I won a website build 4 years ago when I was writing parenting articles for regional parenting mags and absolutely loved my site - I was so new to all of the online adventure. And I knew NOTHING about WordPress, etc.

So I knew that I'd have to start saving and "got in line" to work with Ron Doyle at Waterday Media again. He does beautiful work and I love my JanUdlock.com. And to be honest, my hubby asked me more than once why was I spending so much money on my site? However, since then, I've had a lot of people contact me to ask about my VA services.

I'm NOT saying that you have to spend a lot - but I am saying that your site needs to look professional and it needs to represent who you are as an VA and as an individual.
j

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Jan Udlock
Freelance writer, Virtual Assistant,

I would agree with George that one needs to carefully manage where one spends time. If building a website is interesting and exciting to you, than maybe it is worth it. Wordpress sites are quick and relatively simple to use. However it may be easy to have someone do the initial leg work and give you a quick training on how to take it from there. In doing so, you may receive a more robust site void of glitches and errors that might result from a beginner's effort.

Also think about how you may wish to scale your site. Will you need to conduct payment options, or implement electronic forms or other more complex pieces in future? Ensure the platform you choose enables such growth and flexibility so you don't get stuck recreating in future.

Good luck!

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Joanne Macdonald
Marketing, Communications & Event Management https://twitter.com/jmacd

I plan on outsourcing the construction of my site, since I don't have much experience with website design. I think having a professional and user friendly website is so important in building a business.

I built my website, however I used a theme I purchased on themeforest.net. I learned everything I needed to know about building a Wordpress website on lynda.com.

Good luck!

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I built my own for the joint venture with my son's VA business. My old career was website design so it saved a lot of money.