Many local businesses will get a website up in attempts of attracting local customers.  Having a web presence is not that much of an investment and can give your business possible notice to those locally searching for your services on the internet.  Many pay money for quality web design for the site.  Is this a good or bad thing?

If you have a good looking page, it can be a good thing.  For one, it can make the page a bit more appealing compared to what the site originally was.  There are also graphics that you can't do on your own that you will need done by a professional.  This helps since you would struggle on your own to do the same thing.  Overall there is nothing wrong with quality design.  There are just a few things that you need to avoid else it can become a bad thing.

First of all, don't get ripped off.  Many pay thousands of dollars for something that could be purchased elsewhere for less than one hundred dollars.  At times there are free templates that look much better than many paid ones that cost hundreds of dollars, so be careful.

Another huge problem is that some sites that are designed artistically become a bit of a distraction.  If the customer doesn't know what to do on the page, it's not a good sales tool to use for your business.  Many times simple or even sloppy works better than something with a complicated design.

At other times a well designed site loads slowly.  This means that what could have been a customer might become impatient and leave before seeing anything on the page.

The only way to know if a good design or a simple design is better is to actually test them and see which one gets you better results.  Have a goal for your site whether it's to get a phone call or get a lead and make that the main thing that people can do on your site.