A web designer built your site a few years ago. Someone else did the logo. You pay a hosting company by direct debit, ring an IT person when the email plays up, and there’s “the guy who did our Facebook” whose number you hope you still have. It’s a common setup, and it’s why more owners are asking whether one local web design agency could look after the lot.
Each of those choices made sense at the time. The trouble starts when something goes wrong and nobody is quite sure whose job it is to fix it.
How small businesses end up with five suppliers
Nobody plans it this way. It just happens, one need at a time.
- You needed a logo, so you found a logo designer.
- You needed a website, so a friend recommended a web designer.
- The website needed hosting, so you signed up with whichever company came up first.
- The office computers needed sorting, so you found an IT person.
- Someone offered to “set up your socials”, and they did.
Every one of those people may be great at what they do. The issue isn’t their skill. It’s the gaps between them.
The finger-pointing problem
Here’s a situation plenty of business owners will recognise. Your business email stops arriving. You call the hosting company, who say it’s a DNS setting. The IT person says it’s the hosting. The web designer says email isn’t their area.
Meanwhile, customers are emailing you and hearing nothing back.
When your website, domain, email and IT are spread across different suppliers, each one only sees their own piece. Nobody has the whole picture, so problems bounce around instead of getting fixed. It’s not that anyone is being difficult. They simply can’t see what the others set up.
When one team looks after the website, the domain and the email, the same people can check all three in one go and fix the actual cause, rather than passing you along.
Lost logins and missing access
Ask yourself a few quick questions:
- Who has the login for your domain name?
- Who is the admin on your Facebook and Instagram accounts?
- Who set up your Google Business Profile, and under which email address?
- Where are the original files for your logo?
If the honest answer to any of these is “not sure”, you’re not alone. With five suppliers, access ends up scattered across five inboxes. When one of those people moves on, changes jobs or stops replying, you can lose control of something important to your business.
There’s the paperwork too. Five suppliers often means five invoices, five renewal dates and five sets of terms. A domain renewal reminder that goes to an old email address is an easy way for a website and email to stop working without warning. If you hold a .au domain, auDA, the body that administers .au domain names, is a good place to learn how renewals and registrant details work.
When your branding doesn’t match
Different suppliers often means different interpretations of your brand. The logo uses one shade of blue, the website uses another, and the Facebook banner uses a font nobody can name.
Each piece might look fine on its own. Side by side, they don’t feel like the same business. For customers, a consistent look is part of what makes a business feel trustworthy and established.
When the same team handles your logo, website and social profiles, they all start from the same colours, fonts and photos. Our branding and logo design work is done with the website in mind from the start, so everything lines up.
What one local web design agency looks like
Inversit is a small local web design agency in Lismore, working with businesses across the Northern Rivers and the Gold Coast since 2015. We’re a small team on purpose: Carrie designs websites, Bella is our photographer and graphic designer, and Luke is our IT consultant. No offshore teams and no handballing.
Between us, we cover:
- custom WordPress websites and eCommerce
- logo design and brand identity kits
- brand photography, so your site uses real photos instead of stock
- setting up and connecting your Google Business Profile, Google Analytics, Search Console, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn
- managed Australian WordPress hosting, business email, domains and DNS
- practical IT advice
That means one phone number when something isn’t working. If your email stops, the people who manage your hosting, domain and DNS are the same people answering the phone. Our digital setup service is a good example: we connect your Google and social accounts so they work together with your website, rather than each one living on its own island.
It also means the person designing your website understands how your hosting is set up, and the person setting up your Google Business Profile knows what’s on your website. Those connections are exactly where small problems tend to hide when several suppliers are involved.
Is one agency always the answer?
Not always, and we’d rather be upfront about that.
If you have an IT person you trust or a designer you love working with, there’s no reason to change for the sake of it. A good working relationship is worth keeping.
The goal is fewer gaps, not fewer people for the sake of it. A simple first step is to write down every supplier you use, what they look after and who holds each login. If that list makes you uneasy, it might be time to bring things under one roof. Our free Business Starter Checklist is also a handy way to check you’ve covered the basics, from ABN to Google.
Want one team looking after it all?
If you’d like to simplify things, start with a free consultation and we’ll talk through what you have now and where the gaps are. Or ask for a free website health check, about 30 minutes, in plain English and with no obligation. Give us a call on 02 6610 9202, Monday to Friday, 9:30am to 4:30pm.
