You know that your insurance agency needs a website but building one may be intimidating. The effort required to make a website means that many agencies are tempted to use website builders. While these are convenient, they are far from the best idea. In fact, there are numerous reasons that you should avoid using these website builders for your insurance agency.
Website Builders Often Make Websites That Look the Same
When you use a templated website builder, it’s likely that you’ll end up with a generic website that doesn’t stand out or reflect your agency’s brand. You want to stand out from your competition, not blend into the crowd.
They Can Be Bad for SEO
As you create your insurance agency website, you want to make sure to incorporate all of the SEO best practices that you can. Unfortunately, using a templated website builder will often limit your ability to do so.
The biggest issue with website builders in terms of SEO is the code. Most prebuilt sites tend to have messy, bloated code. While that is all behind the scenes, it can still affect your website’s SEO.
However, messy code isn’t the only SEO-related issue with website builders. They also tend to lead to slower websites, which is actually partly a direct result of the code. That code is not just messy, but it also tends to be bloated with features that you aren’t planning on using. After all, website builders need to have the code for all of the features they offer, whether or not they make sense for your insurance agency. Just because you don’t use a particular feature, that doesn’t mean that the coding for it disappears. It is still there and slowing down your website.
Remember that if your website loads slowly, you will have a higher bounce rate. That worse bounce rate will also negatively affect your SEO ranking.
They Still Require Effort
Don’t forget that while website builders may save you a bit of time, you do still have to put in time and effort to building your website. Often times, people underestimate the amount of time that it takes to build and customize your website to get it to a point where you’re satisfied with it – and even with a number of compromises. If you are going to put the time in, you might as well work with someone who can help you get something that you truly love.
You Have to Stay with the Platform
Perhaps one of the biggest issues with templated website builders is that once you decide to use one, you can’t change your mind. If you do, you’d have to create a new website from scratch – you’re locked into their technology, their pricing models, and their support options.
On top of that, it puts you at the mercy of their servers. If the website builder’s hosting servers are slow, then your website will load slowly. As mentioned, that could hurt your search engine rankings.
As mentioned, you also can’t easily move your website to another hosting solution or even another platform. The builder owns the code behind your website, so you would need to make a completely new website, from the code up.
Support Can Be Questionable
Another major issue with website builders is customer support. Even with the biggest names, you may struggle to get good technical or customer support. Most companies rely on chatbots and automated systems or overseas support.
By contrast, having an actual person or business handle your website will give you a point of contact. You simply call or email the company that manages your website to resolve any issues.
Conclusion
While website builders may seem like a tempting option, insurance agencies should avoid using them. You will have fewer customization options and your website will rank poorly from an SEO perspective. It will also be slow, and you will be tied to your chosen builder. Instead, rely on the professionals!