Small Business Web Design
It is vitally important for all businesses to have a professional web presence for very obvious reasons. But it is even more imperative for Small business owners because often times their budgeted is much less than those of larger businesses who might have the money to throw around. Oftentimes small business owners will attempt to gag much less quality websites for cheaper just to get online when in fact what's happening is, you're wasting whatever amount of money that you're spending. I speak to so many small business owners who tell me that they have spent so much money to have this basically worthless website created, and now they don't want to pay more to have another website build because they already spent money, and got nothing. Unfortunately these are the lessons that often have to be learned in order find someone that can truly help your business take a foot hold online.
Lesson 1- Open source CMS's- Open Source applications can be very beneficial to specific types of business owners. It is a double edged sword, on one hand you have a free application that is very robust and can potentially handle all of your web presence needs. On the other hand you have to understand how to maintain this application, there are themes, widgets, and the application itself that all need to be updated. The widgets are developed independently so if a developer decides he does not want to update that widget then you can no longer use that widget. When I talk about open source possibilities to small business owners I have to mention to them that open source applications by definition mean use at your own risk. I personally do not use open source CMS's.
The cost of your web presence may surprise you especially when you can use an application for free. Using the open source applications is only free as long as you use the out of box templates, as soon as you need someone to custom program anything for you are now going to be spending money constantly on keeping your website updated. Having an HTML/PHP website gives you much more flexibility and a better ability to control cross browser compatibility. especially given the changing nature of the world of web design and development with the incoming technologies HTML 5 is bringing.
