Operate a website now - enhance it later

In the real old days, let's say 10 years ago, it would have been considered terrible practice (some might say it still is) to put up a site that's not yet fully developed. There were sound reasons for this. Namely, that you could really mangle your reputation by allowing users to access your site when nothing worked properly - I'll have more to say about this in due course. But things have changed; so hear me out...

Web development now is not what it used to be. Most developers won't develop something from scratch if they can possibly avoid it. Virtually anything you can imagine has probably been programmed somwhere or other for someone else. So why re-invent the wheel, right?

Ok, so take this a step further. When using a prebuilt site (or any site based on Drupal, Joomla, etc) we already know that the functionality is stable and working. It's probably already been tested out by thousands of other people by the time you get your hands on it. It works!

Safe in the knowledge that any prebuilt site you use, works, why not make it live immediately? After all, it's been designed to do exactly what you need.

There's a couple of reasons you may want to avoid doing this. Namely, if you know that you actually have to make serious modifications to the site as it stands. If this is the case - DON'T GO LIVE IMMEDIATELY.

Assuming most of what you need is already there, then go ahead. The site may not look exactly how you want it right now, but it can do it's job. Let's go back to the car analogy: Your prebuilt car can get you from A to B, no sweat. It might not have the paint job you want, but if you need to drive it, why keep it off the road?

Here's the clever part! Drupal based sites enjoy great modular design. This allows you to play with the theme (the look and feel) without affecting the functionality. Even better, you can play with a theme without showing it to anyone else (other than yourself) until it's ready.

So, operate now; enhance later. In other words, don't sit around fiddling with CSS or HTML when you should be out building a business. Your prebuilt site isn't hideous and it's perfectly good enough to do the job. Work on the theme as and when you have time; and when it's ready, upgrade at the click of a button. In the meantime, at least you'll have the luxury of having built up some traffic and credibility with the search engines.

Say it again: