Having your own website should be as natural for companies as having a telephone line by now. Nevertheless, in 2018 only 66 percent of all companies in Germany had their own business website . So every third company still does without an internet presence.
With the abandonment of your own website these companies are giving away sales potential . After all, many potential customers use the Internet as their most important information medium – whether you are looking for a craftsman, a doctor or a tax consultant.
A reason for the renouncement of a firm homepage might be the Worry about costs being too high its. Many people still think that creating a website automatically involves costs in the four-digit euro range. But this is no longer true. Even with a small budget, professional websites for businesses can be created without any problems.
Time expenditure
Difficulty
Required skills
Best provider
- 1. Do I need my own company website?
- 2. Can I create a website without technical knowledge?
- 3. Beautiful design templates from Wix
- 4. Beautiful design templates from Jimdo
- 5. Beautiful design templates from GoDaddy
- 6. Create a company website in 8 steps
- 7. What should I look for when choosing a provider?
- 8. Which website construction kit should I choose?
- 9. 1. Place: Test winner "Wix" in detail
- 10. 2. Place: Jimdo (Best German provider)
- 11. 3. 1st place: Beginner-friendly provider GoDaddy in detail
- 12. Summary
- 13. Special knowledge: What should be considered when choosing a web address?
- 14. Special knowledge: What should be considered when building a business homepage?
- 15. Special Knowledge: How do I ensure that my homepage is found by potential new customers??
- 16. Special knowledge: What else should be considered for a business homepage?
- 17. You still have questions?
1st place: Wix Homepage
- Test permanently free of charge
- Best design in test!
- Very good operation& Functions
2nd place: Homepage from Jimdo
- Test permanently free of charge
- Very good design
- Very easy to use
3rd place: Homepage of IONOS by 1&1
- Especially simple and secure
- 30 days money-back guarantee
- Create it yourself or get a designer
Do I need my own company website?
No matter how big your company is and which target group it addresses, an Internet presence is necessary. Even the kiosk on the corner is well advised with it, because even in stationary trade hardly anything runs without the Internet. So, in the meantime, tourists ask their smartphones where is the next opportunity to buy a newspaper. So if the kiosk doesn’t have a page, it will be difficult to find by this clientele.
What applies to the aforementioned kiosk, however, is also important for all other industries. In short: with a business website you will reach a wider audience. Where cost and benefit should be in proportion. Because for the kiosk just mentioned, a 10.000 Euro expensive website from an agency absolutely overdimensioned. But there are extremely cheap and, above all, very easy to master alternatives to create the website for your company.
Overview of all reasons to run your own website:
- Not having your own website looks unprofessional. If existing or potential customers are looking for your company on the Internet, you can expect a corresponding website.
- A company homepage serves as a service for existing customers: When customers are looking for a telephone number or the e-mail address of a contact person in your company, they use the Internet to do so.
- Many potential new customers inform themselves in advance about the Internet , If you want to hire a company. If you don’t operate your own website, these customers are automatically lost to you.
- Having your own website boosts your company’s profile. Internet users become aware of your homepage and thus of your company.
- Present your team and your services in detail and with pictures on your website. How to create Personal connection to potential customers .
- It’s not just online stores that can generate sales directly , but companies from all imaginable industries. For example, fitness studios that accept online registrations for paid memberships, or hair salons where customers can book binding appointments online.
- Companies can offer customers on their website to sign up for a free newsletter log in. Regularly sent news, information and offers will intensively bind customers to the company.
Can I create a website without technical knowledge?
The effort to program and run your own company homepage must always be in proportion to the potential revenue of the site. Whereby we do not want "revenue" to be understood only in the sense of turnover. After all, a company website contributes a lot to the reputation, customer loyalty or awareness of your company.
With a website construction kit, you or one of your employees can create a website within a short time and without any programming or design knowledge. In the meantime, website construction kits meet the highest aesthetic requirements as well as professional demands, such as those of complex store systems.
In addition to the programming and layout effort that you are spared, the providers of web building kits also take care of the administrative issues. They provide servers and domain names, they ensure the security of your website and the smooth running of all processes. This will save you time, money and resources.
As an alternative to a website builder, company websites can also be created with a CMS (Content Management System). The most popular system here is WordPress. It is available free of charge and offers practically infinite possibilities to build your own company website.
Just like a homepage construction kit, WordPress is easy to understand and produces satisfying results very quickly. However, the CMS quickly develops a high technical complexity. This is mainly due to the plugins that users use to extend it. These influence unpredictably and make it necessary in the medium term to ask a professional for help. In addition, the administrative burden is on you. You need to provide or rent the server. You will need to take care of the domain and ensure the security of your website.
You see, despite its freedom from costs WordPress is not for free. In addition, the administrative effort is quite high. For these reasons, the website builder is preferable to the CMS in most use cases.
Of course, the website of your company should make a high-quality and professional impression. After all, it is the signboard of your company in the World Wide Web. To achieve this impression, you need an appealing design. Our test winners Wix, Jimdo and GoDaddy realize that with a few clicks. With the following examples you can convince yourself.
Beautiful design templates from Wix
Beautiful design templates from Jimdo
Beautiful design templates from GoDaddy
Create company homepage in 8 steps
- Step: Register with the website builder (e-mail address is sufficient)
- Step: Select template
- Step: Customize template
- Step: Set navigation points
- Step: Insert texts, pictures and videos
- Step: Functions like calendar, booking service etc. add
- Step: Optimize company website for search engine
- Step: Publish the website
Since each website builder requires a slightly different approach, we will explain the steps for our test winners Wix, Jimdo and GoDaddy below.
But before that, here are a few tips from us on what you should consider in order to find the right web construction kit provider for you.
What should I look for when choosing a provider?
Avoid offerers, who want to bind you immediately with a contract. Our test winners all offer the free and non-binding opportunity to try out. At the same time, Wix and Jimdo even have a permanent provision for running a free website. Whereby this comes up with limitation that make the free tariff unsuitable to run a company homepage. However, in this rate you can test and try to your heart’s content to create the best possible company site.
The third place in our test, GoDaddy, allows you to test your website for 30 days free of charge. After that, the site expires unless you switch to a paid plan. However, these are very cheap, which certainly makes Godaddy interesting for companies with a very small marketing budget.
This table shows the exact differences between the free and paid-for versions.
Which website builder should I choose?
All three test winners are highly recommended for the simple and quick construction of a company homepage. But as so often, the devil is in the details. In addition, the construction kits differ in the operation and range of functions.
In general, we can of course recommend our test winner Wix to anyone who is interested. It leaves nothing to be desired in terms of design choice and functionality. But it may well be that you are more satisfied with Jimdo or get along better with GoDaddy. To help you make the right choice, we will now introduce you to Wix, Jimdo and GoDaddy and guide you step-by-step through building a company website with each provider. So you have a good impression of the respective system and can make your decision.
Notice:
As providers regularly release new products and improve their kits, we update our reviews accordingly.