And guess what? After all those hours you put into constructing your masterpiece, your web presence, 9 times out of 10, it's going to LOOK like you did it yourself.

It's positively tragic and sometimes even comical, when I visit a random website and think: "oh yeah, this guy (or gal) wanted to save some money and do it themselves." I'm not usually thinking: "wow, what a great product or service"... or "oh well, they tried".

Sometimes I even feel sorry for them. I usually can't tell if they have a good product or service. All I can see is a sad attempt at building a website that doesn't work.

Someone I know - and who will remain nameless because I like him - and who has a service business in a market that spends big bucks... is advertising that he (not only) built this website himself, but he didn't bother taking off the fact that his website uses one of the most widely used (free) Wordpress templates. Yipes. He might as well replace the built in tagline and put a new one that says: "I don't bother with details."

Well, of course I can build this custom website... because very few of my clients have ever said to me: "do whatever you want."

In fact, even those clients who hire me to create a custom look always request certain customizations appropriate to their business. Maybe it's just a slider, or a custom navigation bar, but it's always something that requires code to be written specific for the design.

A custom website is (quite simply) going to require custom work. So, I told my fellow business owner that he could certainly have all the features he wanted, but I offered him a tip on how to save on any developer's fees.

I recommended that he visit CodeCanyon or ThemeForest (see my resources blog to learn more), because it saves gobs to time to purchase code that has already been tested on different browsers... instead of reinventing the wheel and causing web developer nightmares.

... until yesterday!

I was enjoying reading Holly Ezell's Squarespace Plugins blog post about Kris Black's book, Squarespace for Dummies.

The idea that someone actually wrote a book on Squarespace made me so happy! I definitely want to help promote this book. It's only $9.99.

Yada yada, now I have an Amazon Squarespace widget that goes directly to Amazon... and I'm an affiliate! 

Plus it works like a charm!

(If you have a Squarespace site, it's very easy to check your site statistics in the Website Management > Statistics.)

As any obsessive designer would do, I decided to tear apart my site and rebuild it. Of course, if a client had asked me to do the same thing, I would begin by exploring their market, understanding their brand, presenting a static PDF design for approval, building a test site remotely, ya da ya da, before I even touched one dot of code.

I started by messing with this blog page... I wanted to test a gradient CSS background that also works on IE7. (As a web developer, I'm not sure sure why anyone still uses IE7, but let us all acknowledge that some folks never upgrade anything. I believe in being tolerant of all.)

And that's how it all began.

Before I could stop myself, I had pulled my home page down. (Arrgh, hopefully, that's what I'll be working on today, and if I can squeeze in a few more hours, I'd also love to get my testimonials page back up.)

People are visiting!! And my web house still hasn't received the new coat of paint!

 Yes, I am obsessed to get my new design uploaded... and show it off. And I'm not sure when I'll get to it. I'm just hoping anyone visiting will also read this blog post. 

Falling under the category of "do what I say, not what I do", I always recommend that a "excuse our dust" notice is posted and hide the pages we're developing. 

If you're looking around my site this week, please put on your hard hat!

Watched this today... it was filmed in 2006 and still relevant.

Because I was so busy, I advised him he should keep posting his question on the forum until someone answered it. The Squarespace forum is abundant with helpful developers. If you want to learn how to develop websites, this is the best resource! It's a wonderful community.

I wish I could have helped this young man, but I explained to him I was so busy with my existing clients, I wouldn't be able to help him figure out what he had done wrong... or how to fix it.

Well, the kid came back to me about a week later. I told him I would have to quote high and he agreed to the fee immediately! I looked at his messy code and fixed the problem on a remote site. (I opted to test his code before getting paid a retainer because I wasn't even sure I could fix such a disaster.)

Well, I did fix it. He was happy with the solution... and asked how he could pay me right away. (Ai karumba, I wish I were making this up! Ouch!!!) Days go by... and I discover TODAY the code I wrote is now on his client's website, working nicely.

I'm not naming names, because it's not my style. But am I sharing this annoying story so you will be aware of the dreaded "wanna be web developer".

Perhaps they appear to be a real bargain. Maybe some of them are! But from my experience, the amateurs really don't know what the heck they're doing. Worse for the buyer, these beginners swim in the same pond as the experienced web developers. 

It is not the first time I've helped out a newbie, but it is the first time I've been burnt by one.  Anywho, just because I ran into one bad apple (hmmm, this is a pun, considering his client sells fruit) I still plan on continuing to help newcomers to the field, when I can... but next time, with caution... or I'll do it pro bono.

In any case, custom websites are not so easy to build. When I build a custom website, I take the time to train my clients how to edit their custom site because I know the code intimately. If I don't know how to do something, I honestly tell my client I'll need to research his request. If I need to outsource anything (like a database, for instance), my client is the first to know.

Now that I'm thinking about it, I wonder how this amateur developer would even be able to show his unsuspecting client how to maintain their website. (I'm just sayin'... buyer beware!)

She called because she wanted to change the phone number on her brochure-style website. When I suggested that we could get her website much higher rankings with a Squarespace website, she told me all her clients are referrals and she doesn't get any business from her website.

Errrr, that was not a surprise. If anyone were hitting her website, it would be from clicking on a link from my portfolio page.

Her website is (by today's standards) ancient, and with a Flash animation featured on the home page, I can't imagine how anyone would even be able to find her online.

Besides that, counting on referrals is just not good business. Of course, I wasn't about to tell her that. I've certainly learned that offering unsolicited advice is worthless to the recipient.

I know she's struggling, but she doesn't have to wait for somebody to refer her! With all the free tools she could be using, spending maybe 15 minutes - tops! - a week, and with an editable website, she could be advertising to a much wider market... that is, if she wasn't so convinced that waiting for a referral was the only way to get business.

Coincidentally, just yesterday, I started to "concept" a new landing page for my newest service: Custom PDF Training Manuals for Squarespace clients.  I anticipate having that live this week... so for anyone reading my rambling thoughts, please check it out and let me know what you think.

The idea came from my client, Cuyahoga County Board of Health. There are 14 web techs editing and maintaining the website I built for them. I had already provided a few webinars, and a FAQ page, but when the social media coordinator asked if I would provide editing directions in a written, step-by-step format, I took it a step further and added screen saves of each step.

The concept was so successful, CCBH has requested training manuals for the other complex (and not so complex) areas of their website. I'm positively thrilled about this because so many of my clients haven't touched their website in months... and in a few cases, years! 

With a customized training manual, it's so much easier to keep your website fresh, and looking like it did "out of the box". (Hey, Squarespace designers who have clients who edit their own websites... you know what I mean!)

With so many options to promote my business, I usually can't decide what I want to try out next. New flavors every day to taste and test.

Next weekend, I'm shooting for getting my Pinterest page up, and my GooglePlus account. 

If it's not abundantly clear, I love testing out new stuff on my website. If you check this website next week, or even tomorrow, there will always be something new.

A few days ago, I posted a few random entries on my (often neglected) Merchant Circle page. Oops, I quickly became "hooked" on seeing how many "visitors" I had, checking my Merchant Circle page 3 times a day. Wonder if I'll suffer from withdrawal?

I also downloaded HootSuite and started posted again to my Twitter account. Until a few weeks ago, I thought Twitter was lame. Actually (errrr, duh!) I wasn't using it correctly. I should have realized I need to follow what's interesting to me (and it's not celebrities). Yippeee... a goldmine for me when I search for business marketing toys.

Oops, emails are stacking up! Deadlines to meet.