Help > Do It Yourself: Traditional Software vs. the CityMax Website Builder

Do It Yourself: Traditional Software vs. the CityMax Website Builder

As a way of saving money, many business owners consider building their own website. The traditional way is to use a combination of different software. The CityMax website builder, on the other hand, offers a way to do it yourself that is easier for people with little to no programming skills .

There are benefits and drawbacks to either method, so it's important to understand what they are so you can choose the one that best fits your needs.

1. Starting Out
2. The Learning Process
3. Building Your Site
4. Overall Costs

1. Starting Out

Before you can start setting up your website, there are a number of things you need to have ready. Depending on which method you use, you may have to research your options to get the right products and services for your needs.

2. The Learning Process

It's important to consider how much time and money it will take to learn the software you're going to use to create your website.

	Traditional Software	CityMax
Learning Tools	Training courses & instructional manuals Traditional software is more complicated, plus you have to learn 4 different programs to get the job done. While this gives you more flexibility for your site, it takes more time and effort to learn.	Easy-to-follow documentation & online customer support CityMax is designed to be used by people with very little computer experience. Adding text and images is similar to Microsoft Word. Creating business tools is a matter of filling out a few fields in a form.
Cost	$2300+ This cost estimate includes $1000 for a basic Dreamweaver course, $1000 for a basic Photoshop course, and $300 for a basic Frontpage course. Courses for advanced functions cost more.	Included ($19.98/ mo.) All the builder's documentation is available for reference online directly in the website builder. Unlimited online customer support is also available.
Time	8+ days This is the required amount of time for the 3 introductory courses for Dreamweaver, Photoshop and Frontpage. Even with the courses, it can take a long time before you're comfortable with these programs. There are many subtleties that take hours of practice before it becomes intuitive to do.	Less than 1 hour Because the website builder is simple, it's easy to learn by yourself using the guides. Once you've learned the basics, the builder's other functions are easy to learn as they all use the same software. It takes little time to become fully comfortable using all of them.

3. Building Your Site

When deciding how to build your site, you have to consider how much time you'll have to do it. With traditional software it takes more time to create all the parts of your website. That's because you have to create every feature from scratch. With CityMax, all the different features are built into the website builder.

	Traditional Software	CityMax
Site Structure	Several hours to several weeks Depending on the complexity of the site, building the basic site structure, including menu and layout, can take a lot of time.	No time (Built-in to website builder) You don't need to spend any time building the site structure because it's already done before you start.
Design (Look & Feel)	Several days to several weeks If you want to create a look and feel for your site that matches your business's logo, you'll likely spend more time working on the design.	2 – 20 minutes It only takes 2 minutes to apply one of CityMax's 1500+ design templates to your website. You can then change the colors and dimensions as you like. Or if you want a professionally tailored look that incorporates your logo, you can use CityMax's design services. Learn more.
Business Tools	1 – 3 weeks per tool Website business tools, particularly interactive ones, can take weeks to program.	2 – 10 minutes per tool All the website business tools are already built-in the website builder. All you have to do is click to add them to your site then enter your specific information to the page.

4. Overall Costs

Below are some comparison charts of the overall costs associated with building a website using traditional software vs. the CityMax website builder.

Initial Costs

Monthly Costs

Total Cost Comparison

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