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Starting with a "Template" can Save you BOTH Time & Money.

A web site template is an essentially finished generic site. It is designed with all the graphics and coding to help you get your website online with as little cost - and in as little time - as possible.

Templates run anywhere from $30 to $200 - a professional design will likely cost you 10 times that; starting with a good template can increase the speed of the website creation process by a factor of 5 to 10. All you or your designer needs to is customize the template to meet your needs.

However, there are even more compelling reasons for starting with a template:

First, you probably know by now that web site planning is hard stressful work and - more than that: it's critical work. But did you know that 70% of your project costs are committed in the first few decisions you make?

"Although up-front building and design costs may represent only a fraction of the building's life-cycle cost, when just one percent of a project's up-front costs are spent, up to 70% of it's life-cycle costs may already be committed."
~ Efficiency expert Joseph Romm, author of "Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution"

It's just like the old saying known well to builders and contractors: 'when designing a building, all the really important mistakes are made on the first day.'

Yes, you're going to making your worst - most costly - mistakes on that very first day. There's no way to get around that, but you can minimize the costs.

The two most critical challenges you'll face that on that first day is 1) coming up with a visual design that will compellingly drawing your customers/clients "in" and 2) laying out a specific information architecture so that your site's information content is organized in a way that your customers/clients can immediately understand and use it.

A great template can go a long way to helping you successfully tackle these initial critical challenges. This is because a good template will have taken into account good information architecture and compelling visual design. If you're not sure how to evaluate the visual design and informational organization of template, you should consult with a knowledgeable designer who has usability experience.

Finally, if you're looking to build an eCommerce site, in addition to the above benefits, a good eCommerce template can ahelp you solve the sales funneling problem, i.e., how to get consumers to move from awareness of your product to making the decision

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