I build websites for a living, so you’d expect me to tell you to never touch a website builder and always hire someone. I’m not going to do that, because it isn’t true, and you’d see through it anyway.
Wix, Squarespace and the rest have got genuinely good. For some businesses they’re the sensible answer, and if that’s you, I’d honestly rather you saved your money and used one than paid me for something you didn’t need. So the real question isn’t “are website builders any good.” They are. It’s “which one is right for where your business is right now.” Here’s how I’d think it through if you were sat across from me.
What a website builder is genuinely great at
Let’s give them their due, because they earn it.
A builder like Wix or Squarespace lets you drag blocks around, drop in your own words and photos, and have something live by the weekend for the price of a couple of coffees a month. No developer, no waiting, no invoice. You’re in full control, you can change a price at midnight if you want to, and the templates are, frankly, nicer than a lot of “professional” sites were ten years ago.
For a certain kind of business, that’s exactly right:
- You’re testing an idea and you’re not sure it’ll stick yet.
- You genuinely need one simple page: who you are, what you do, how to reach you.
- Money is truly tight and a monthly fee is easier to stomach than a one-off cost.
- You actually enjoy fiddling with it, and you’ve got the time to.
If two or three of those are you, start with a builder. There’s no shame in it, and you can always bring someone in later once it’s earning. Anyone who makes you feel daft for using Wix is selling something.
Where a builder quietly costs you
Here’s the part the ads don’t mention. A website builder is cheap in pounds and expensive in the things you don’t put a price on. The costs are real, they’re just hidden.
Your time. This is the big one. “Free” and “£12 a month” ignore the two weekends you’ll spend wrestling with spacing, fonts and why the thing looks fine on your laptop and broken on your phone. Your time is the most valuable thing your business has. Spending twenty hours saving a few hundred pounds is not the bargain it looks like, especially if those twenty hours could have gone on actual customers.
The 80% trap. Most DIY sites get to about 80% and stall there. It looks nearly right, but the words are a bit waffly, the buttons don’t quite lead anywhere, and it never gets the final polish that turns a visitor into an enquiry. Nobody’s fault. Finishing is the hard, unglamorous 20%, and it’s the bit that actually makes the site work.
Getting found. A builder can make something that looks lovely. Making something Google actually shows to the right people, that’s a different skill, and it’s where a lot of DIY sites fall down. If nobody finds it, the prettiest site in the world brings you nothing.
Renting, forever. That monthly fee never stops, and your site lives on their platform, in their template, by their rules. Moving it later is often a rebuild, not a copy-and-paste. It’s a bit like the difference between paying a mortgage and paying rent on a flat you can’t decorate.
The ceiling. Builders are brilliant until the day you outgrow them. The moment you want something a little bespoke, a proper shop, a booking system that actually fits how you work, a specific way of doing things, you hit a wall the template won’t move.
None of that means builders are bad. It means “cheap” and “expensive” aren’t always what they look like on the price page. I’ve written more on that in what a small business website really costs, because the sticker price is only half the story.
What you’re actually paying a person for
This is the bit people get wrong. When you hire someone good, you’re not paying them to operate the software. You could learn the software. You’re paying for judgement, and for your time back.
Judgement is knowing what to leave out so the site stays clear. It’s structuring the pages so a visitor glides to the one thing you want them to do. It’s making the site fast and findable, writing words that sound like you and actually explain what you do, and quietly handling the fiddly technical bits you’d otherwise lose an evening to. It’s the difference between a site that exists and a site that works.
And it’s someone you can reach. When your hours change or you add a service, you send a message and it’s sorted, instead of it going back on your own to-do list forever. That’s worth a lot more than it costs.
The honest catch has always been price. Agencies do proper work but charge thousands and wrap you in account managers. That’s the gap I try to sit in: proper, custom work by one real person, at a fair fixed price rather than an agency one. If you’re curious, here’s exactly how I price things, agreed up front so there are never any surprises.
A simple way to decide
Forget the marketing on both sides. Ask yourself these, honestly:
- How much is my time genuinely worth, and how much of it will this eat? If your hours are precious and scarce, that changes the maths completely.
- Is this a simple shopfront, or does my business have a specific way it works? Simple leans DIY. Specific leans hire someone.
- Do I need to be found on Google, or will most people arrive already knowing me? If getting found matters, that tips it towards a person.
- Will I actually finish it, or will it sit at 80% for a year? Be honest. A finished Wix site beats a half-built anything.
- Do I want to own it outright, or am I happy renting the platform long term?
There’s no universally right answer, only the right one for you. A brand-new side hustle and an established firm that lives or dies on local enquiries should make different calls, and both can be sensible.
If you’re not even sure which state your current setup is in, I broke that down separately in the three states every small business site is in.
The honest bottom line
I’d genuinely rather you built a tidy Wix site than overpaid an agency for something you’ll never fully own. If a builder is right for where you are, use one, with my blessing.
But if you’ve read this and quietly thought “I don’t have the time, I want it done properly, and I don’t want agency prices,” that’s the exact spot I’m here for. A proper, custom small business website, built by me, fast and findable and yours outright, without the weekend-eating or the four-figure invoice.
Either way, you’re welcome to a straight opinion before you spend a penny. Tell me a bit about your business and I’ll tell you honestly whether you need me at all. Sometimes the answer is no, and I’ll say so.