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Namely, is there repetition in style
amongst your competition? If you where starting a business to rival
NetFlix & Blockbuster movie rentals online, you would immediately become
aware that the two look very much identical except for the color scheme.
In a similar respect, you may even find two websites using the exact
same design in the same industry. Then you may find the exact same web
design on a web design template site! This situation is the low point of
template web design buying. If you decide to use a template (and I will
argue that sometimes this is the way to go) you MUST KNOW YOUR
COMPETITION! If nothing else,
template web design can spark ideas. There are many template sites out
there like BoxedArt.com and TemplateMonster.com, and even a variety of
free ones, with decent web site designs. When browsing through these
sites it can be very helpful for sparking the idea in your head of what
you may want your web design project to be like. Adversely, many of the
templates found are also very generic to a certain point. There tends to
be an overwhelmingly corporate feel to a high percentage of templates on
the market. Not all web designs call for a corporate look but just
simply need to look professional to gain credibility. Take aspects that
work from different designs and merge them with the current identity you
are looking for. Don’t get carried away with this process though, if you
take away a little from each one you may get a very disorienting look
and feel to the site as each design may vary. Likewise, when I say take
it is important to emphasize that I am not talking about stealing. These
template designers have spent time and expect return, however if you
find a font you like and match something as simple as this to a similar
font that would fit in with your design then use the idea. Don’t
directly take images or color layouts. This browsing of templates for
ideas is very much like browsing your competitor’s websites for ideas
and scoping the market.
If you are looking at purchasing a
template make sure to follow these guidelines:
1. Know that your competitors are not
using this template. If you are a national chain, you will probably not
be reading this as you may very well have your own unique design team.
For everyone else, how far does your competition boundary spread? If you
own a local hot dog stand, you may only have a handful of competitors in
your area that are branding themselves. Buying a template that can be
purchased by the public even after you purchase it may be ok in this
instance if the hot dog template is a great design. In this case it
would be a perfect fit for a low priced design that may be high quality.
If however you may run into multi-state or national competition for your
product then you may opt against the generic template as a foundation to
your design.
2. Make sure the template is only the
foundation to your web design building. This may mean that you use the
overall structure of the design, but change all the graphics to make the
design more personalized. Often times this also means that you will
change the color scheme to fit with your current identity or logo. Also,
maybe only a portion of the template should be used. Does it have a
great looking header or search box, but the rest of the site is left to
be desired?
3. Always make sure to follow the
guidelines of the company your purchase your web design template from.
This is important as certain amount of “redesign” of the template is
most likely expected in the user agreement.
Templates certainly are not for
everyone, however when small business owners are just trying to get
there feet wet online, a template may be the best choice. They are
typically professional looking, well thought out (in many industry
themes), require less knowledge to build from than a web design from
scratch and most certainly more affordable than starting a web design
from scratch.
As a side note: There are many web
template sites out there that also sell limited download web design
templates for a little more money. These are templates that once
purchased a few or one time are taken from the template library and now
longer available for purchase. These can keep branding in house and save
time and money if the design is what you are looking for.
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