There are many ways to build a website. In this article, we will outline 3 of the most popular ways to build a website, ranging from easiest to most difficult.
1. Using Website builders like wix, squarespace, or godaddy.
These are incredibly handy if you have never made a website, and you are not a developer who knows code. They are built for ease of use, and they deal with all the complexities involved in hosting and server-management. They provide many templates and design options, so that you can drag and drop to design it or just select a template and fill it in with your own images, colours and text.
What to look out for:
- Individuality. Your site will look like other sites, as others may have liked the same theme, and therefore used it for their site. In that case, your website won’t be very unique, meaning that your customers are less likely to remember your website.
- Speed. When a website is built using a web builder, it can contain a lot of extra files that clump up your site, affecting loading times. This has a negative effect on searchability and your SEO score. It can also be frustrating to users to use a slow site, and people with a slow internet connection may not even be able to use it.
- Responsivity. A good website should have 2 versions of its design. One for phone screens and one for desktops. More often than not, it is very difficult on these platforms to make sure that a website works well on all types of screens. The simple fact nowadays is that most users are accessing your site from a phone, and often you may choose a feature that looks great, but will become warped when shown on a phone screen, as the text may not fit into the box, or the pictures will overflow off the page, so that users have to scroll horizontally on a phone. As they are not used to doing this, they will find your site annoying to use and will not assign so much trust to your company.
- Brand recognition. Using a predesigned set theme for your website means that you may not be able to perfectly align the design to your brand theme and personality. Keeping consistent with your brand style is key for helping customers to recognise your company and become repeat customers or brand ambassadors.
2. Using content management systems (CMS) like wordpress, Ghost, or Drupal.
A CMS is a step up from website builders in terms of flexibility and control. They are designed to make publishing and updating content easier, without needing to dive into raw code every time you want to make a change. This makes them especially popular for blogs, news sites, or any website that requires regular updates.
With a CMS, you install the software on your hosting (sometimes it’s one click through your hosting provider), and then you manage your site through a dashboard. You’ll get more freedom to design and extend your site compared to a website builder, thanks to themes and plugins that can add functionality — like contact forms, SEO tools, or even full e-commerce systems.
What to look out for:
- Maintenance. Unlike a website builder, where all the complex code updates and security management are handled for you, a CMS requires ongoing upkeep. You’ll need to update plugins, themes, and sometimes the CMS itself. Neglecting updates can lead to bugs or security risks, which will in turn affect performance as bugs and spam clog it up, and outdated versions potentially cannot compete with your competitors' sites.
- Learning curve. CMS platforms are a user-friendly way to build a site without having to learn coding, but they can still be overwhelming at first. Expect a bit of a learning curve as you find your way around the dashboard, plugins, and customization options.
- Performance. Adding too many plugins or using a poorly coded theme can slow your site down. Optimizing images, choosing a lightweight theme, and keeping plugins to a minimum are important steps.
- Costs. Often, a CMS will allow plenty of customisation on a free plan, but they will limit the range of options available before you upgrade. They also may take advantage of your lack of knowledge to upsell you features that you may not really need. This means that you could end up having a hefty bill each month, which can range from nothing all the way up to £100 - £200!
- Security. Because CMS platforms like WordPress are so widely used, they are common targets for hackers. They also make the use of plugins made by external developers. You are only as strong as your weakest link so those external plugins bring more openings for hackers. You will have to make sure to install security plugins, use strong passwords, and regular updates are essential.
2. Building with code
This last one definitely has the steepest learning curve but is by far the most rewarding. Coding a website yourself involves learning HTML and CSS, which are a lot easier than you think. It also involves learning some basic javascript. But on the plus side, it allows you to remove any costs relating to managing and hosting your site, and gives full flexibility for customisation, and integrating with any system or CRM.
You can also follow my tutorial here for setting up a basic landing page site, using Github and deploying it live with vercel’s free hosting plan.
These days we thankfully have chatgpt and other AI agents on our side, which can literally write you your website code. You can ask ai to generate a piece of code that does exactly what you ask. You can also ask any questions you like and it will give you a detailed explanation in the way that you can understand. Before this, users only had google and code stack blog sites to answer any questions, so that if you had a specific problem, it took a long time to find the answer, and required a lot more work.
If I had to go back in time and learn everything again, but with ai, I would start off by inputting this kind of prompt:
I don’t know how to code or use vscode. Please walk me through a step-by-step process in setting up a remix js project with vscode, teach me about github and deploying with vercel, and teach me how to update the site and where to find everything.
What to look out for:
- Maintenance. Similarly to a CMS, you may need to run the odd update now and again, and these updates can cause errors, but with some practice, it’ll become easier to fix any bugs due to updates, as the documentation online is vast.
- Learning curve. The learning curve is pretty steep on this one, and will seem highly overwhelming at first. Luckily there is a wealth of tutorials and information online to help you, and the developer community is very friendly when asked for advice on things. But once you know how to do this, you can very easily set up additional websites with absolutely no cost.
- Responsivity. A common mistake developers make is to only make the site for large screens. The proper method for building a site through code is to start off with designing it for mobile, and then adding or showing extra parts only for desktop screens. This process can be painstaking, but will allow for a smoother UX on phones.
To summarise
The best way to build a website depends entirely on your needs, budget, and how much control you want over the process. Website builders are the quickest and easiest route, but they can limit individuality and performance. CMS platforms like WordPress strike a balance between flexibility and ease of use, though they require more maintenance and a bit of a learning curve. Coding your own site offers complete freedom and zero ongoing platform costs, but it demands time, patience, and practice. There’s no one-size-fits-all answer. The right choice is the one that aligns with your goals now, while giving you room to grow in the future.