7 Reasons to Hire a Freelance Website Designer when Creating Your New Blog

Let me tell you an all-too familiar story:

• You decide to start a blog to share your journey, story, or interest.
• You don’t exactly know where to start so you join a couple facebook groups.
• You decide to purchase a domain name and hosting package.
• You then spend hours looking through themes, installing and deleting themes, and finally settling on a theme because you just want to go to bed.
• You start building your content and getting the word out about your content.
• You realize that your blog either looks like everyone else’s blog, your theme is frustrating to work with, and you spend more time messing with the website design and options more than building content to grow your blog.

Does this story sound like you? If so, you are not alone! Heather, here at The Super Mom Life, and several other experienced bloggers have very similar stories (including me!), but they all realized one thing – it’s better to have a website designer/developer create a beautiful blog that is designed specifically for you rather than go at it alone.

All of us had our reasons for hiring a freelance website designer, but I wanted to quickly provide you with 7 reasons why you should hire a professional the next time you want to start a new blog or refresh your current one.

1. You aren’t limited by what a theme can or cannot do

Every theme has its limitations, whether you purchase the professional theme or not, and every time you reach a roadblock on a theme, you are doomed to be frustrated. 

Roadblocks such as:

• Change the way an individual blog post looks
• Change the way each archive page looks (think category pages)
• Quick way to create multiple menus in the header bar
• Creating a custom footer to include menus and social media
• Create custom blocks on the homepage and change them out every season
• Wanting one look for a certain category and another look for a different category
• How the taxonomy and terms appear in a post page
• Size and placement of the post’s featured image

No matter which theme you are using, you are going to be limited in what you can and cannot do. With a freelance website designer, you are able to do virtually anything!

In fact, I’m working with a blogger/podcaster now who has a terrific theme and is using a terrific page builder. Even though the website looks sharp, she was having a tough time making the theme work the way she believed it should. We did our best, but sadly, were only able to get so far. If we started her website with building from the ground up, the sky would have been the limit.

2. You get to add your own sizzle and flair to your website

With themes, you are stuck with that themes style, layout, and appearance, but with a designer, you are able to let your blog match your personality!

If you are a serious person who wants to have a polished, corporate look, you can emphasize that fact. If you are a fun person who loves bright colors, patterns, and script fonts, you can lean into that reality!

Rather than being stuck with how a section block looks and feels, you are able to bring out your personal flavor on every corner of your blog!

3. It saves you on the amount of plugins used on your website

When you use free (or freemium) themes and free builders like Elementor or WP Bakery, you often have to use many plugins to make your website function the way that you would like! 

Now let’s be clear – you can NEVER get away from NOT using plugins with a WordPress based blog. You just can’t. However, when you use a developer who is able to create themes and layouts, you will DEFINITELY use less plugins. 

For example, here are two stats from two websites that I recently built:

Example one: Before I built Heather’s website, she used 33 active plugins. Currently, she only uses 27. 

Example two: One of my clients has two blogs. On her first blog (not designed by me), she uses 23 active plugins. On the website I created for her, she only uses 13 active plugins.

This should matter to you as a blogger because the less plugins you use, the less likely your website will break or get hacked!

4. You’re able to quickly scale as your blog grows

No blogger wants to stay small, but many bloggers don’t think about scalability when they first get started. As your blog grows and changes, you may want to do different page layouts, new category pages, create custom menus for brands and media kits. When you build custom, you aren’t confined by the restraints caused by using a default theme! You can change on the go!

Now granted, it may be difficult for you to do yourself, and this is why I offer a website maintenance package at a discount for those bloggers who go through me to build out their websites. You can learn more about my maintenance plan here. (outbound link -http://marchyde.com/wordpress-maintenance-plan/)

5. It saves you time, energy, and headache

You got into blogging because you want to create content, not tinker with your theme; however, so many bloggers waste precious hours on just figuring out where to start or where to go.

Whether you are a new blogger starting fresh or a seasoned blogger who is growing their platform, wasting time on figuring out what’s next costs you time and money.

Recently, I was able to design two blogs for two up and coming bloggers. One was a seasoned food photographer who decided to not sell all of her semi-exclusive posts but rather keep one for herself. The other blogger serves as a trusted virtual assistant who wants to become her own boss. 

Both bloggers were starting from the ground up and both worked full time. Rather than spend the time, energy, and effort of finding the time to design a website, both decided to hire a freelance website designer. The results? They were able to get their blog up and running much faster than going alone, and when people landed on their blogs, they made a beautiful first impression!

6. You are less likely to commit one of the 7 deadly sins of blogging

Recently, I wrote a post called the “7 Deadly Sins of Blogging,” and in that article, I broke down the 7 sins that many bloggers commit when they set up and get their blog off the ground. I won’t break down each point in this post, but I will quickly list those sins here. You know, for reference’s sake!

1. Choosing a bad host
2. Not using Google Site Kit plugin
3. Not making sure that you are indexing
4. Not compressing images
5. Not having a great caching plugin
6. Not having a security plugin
7. Developing your own blog

To read the full post, click here: https://marchyde.com/the-7-deadly-sins-of-blogging-tips-for-new-bloggers/

7. You gain a friend and partner (not an agency)

Here’s the deal, there are many agencies out there that make BEAUTIFUL websites, but the reality is that agencies have many clients and projects. When you hire a freelance website designer, you are hiring a person who will look out for your interests and partner with you to create the best product for you and your brand. Plus, freelance designers are generally a single person operation who jumps for joy whenever they land a client because their business rests in gaining new clients and partners.

More than just that, though, freelancers are often more reachable and personable. For all of my clients, I communicate with them in whichever way fits their personality. Sometimes it’s email and sometimes it’s Facebook messenger, but it’s always personable. 

And beyond the build, you may find your freelancer interacting with your instagram stories quite frequently (just ask Heather 😉).

Conclusion

All this being said, it’s no surprise that I think you should hire a freelance website designer. If you are a blogger who is wanting to set up a new blog or give your monetized blog a fresh look and feel, I would LOVE to chat more with you! You can learn all about me, my family, and my services by heading over to my website at https://marchyde.com

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