Does your business require a New Website? If yes, then there are certainly a few factors to consider and many choices to be decided upon. One important question is whether to go for a Custom Web Design or a website template. This will leave us with a very important question to be asked...
“Why should my business pay a Web Developer to build a Custom Web Design for my business when I can just purchase a Website Template?”
Before this very critical question is answered, it is important for you to understand the advantages and disadvantages of both cotton Web Design and a Website Template.
This blog post will provide you with a detailed comparison which will make it much easier for you to choose what is best for your business.
Custom Web Design
Advantages of Custom Web Design
The biggest bonus of getting a Custom Web Design is that it will make your Website stand out to your competitors and also be memorable to the crowd. This is highly important in today’s saturated web environment. Custom Websites are quite a bit more search engine friendly than Website Templates, so they tend to rank higher through a search engine.
Not only does a Custom Website adhere to your business needs in a better way but it also gives you the area to incorporate your company’s brand into it. There is a factor for growth with Custom Websites and they grow as your business grows. An additional benefit to a Custom Web Design is to be able to manage the content from anywhere. This makes it much easier for businesses to keep the website updated from anywhere.
Top Five Advantages to a Custom Web Design
1. Website Design Tailored to Your Branding
Like building a custom home, your Website provides businesses with an opportunity to showcase not only their unique products and services but also their personality. With Custom Web Design and Development, any business can partner with a Web Design Agency team to give their website a personalized overall look and a unique user experience that is not limited to what a drag-and-drop template offers.
2. Customer Experience-Optimized Design
Customization of your Website also enables any business to build a Website focused on delivering real business results, via an optimal Calgaary Web Design structure and user experience. Prior to developing and designing a Website, your Web Desvign Agency should be asking you about your future business goals. You will want to have an idea of the customer's journey with regards to your product of service. A good example, if you're running an electrical business, you’d likely want your homepage to have a “request service” from front and centre to drive leads to contact you.
The bottom-line: Design your Website to be customer-centric, which helps visitors to navigate the sight early and take action that produce your design results.
3. Increased Search Engine Optimization
Another benefit of a Custom Website Design is that it will enable better Search Engine Optimization. From having a Custom Web Design Package, you’ll get help from not only Web Developers but also Search Engine Optimization Specialists. With a Custom Web Design project, you’ll get help from the Web Developer and also the Search Engine Optimization Specialist. This implements a good practice that’ll help your Website rank better in a search. Some ways in which they give a Custom Websites a boost over time include:
- Crating your metadata, page URLs, alt tags for images, and site content that incorporates relevant keywords, keywords imbedded in your images
- Working with a web development team to incorporate a websites architecture that is mobile-friendly and user-friendly
- Identify what pages should be “crawled” by search engine bots or not
- Inserting internal links that enhance the user experience across the board
4. Ability to Evolve in Response to Business Changes
Having a Custom Website Design will give businesses the freedom to enlarge the development process. Your developer will initially set up a proper setup while creating the roadmap of the Website. You may also require additional functionality or content in response to your business changes. Thankfully, through your relationship with the Web Design Agency, you’ll be spared the headache of trying to do this on your own and potentially making errors that will foul up your Website. That being said, it’ll likely create additional costs, so be prepared for that. Template websites are developed to remain static or of even worse, aren’t updated properly or maintained to meet the changing needs of the web.
5. Flexibility with Hosting
If you decide to go with a Customized Website Design, this offers you greater control over your Website’s hosting provider, especially if you would like to change from your current provider or have business-specific requirements. The drag-and-drop styles of Website Builders, unfortunately, do not offer any hosting flexibility. Benefits that come with the freedom to choose a respectable hosting company might include:
- Ability to advance beyond a “shared” hosting setup
- Automatic file and data backups and customized backup storage locations
- Server performance and uptime monitoring
- Integration with other tools and technologies that might have been restricted from a drag-and-drop setup
Website Templates
Disadvantages of Website Templates
The best way to explain a website that is template-based design offers you a pre-defined boxes to place your content into. You basically find a template that will closely match your criteria and make small customizations with colour and images. A good example is WordPress. They offer a variety of templates to choose from, some are more expensive than others.
With any website template being easily available online, there are high chances that your competitors and other businesses are also using the same website template that you are using. Because of this, your website will be lost on the internet and it will look like a rip-off.
Website templates are not designed with any Search Engine in mind, so they linger at the bottom of the search rankings. The poor support and browser compatibility is also a great issue that is associated with website templates.
When you purchase a website template, you can not customize it according to your requirements. Fitting web elements such as images, video and text is a great challenge with website templates.
Top Three Disadvantages of a Website Template
1. Web Design Limitations
There are many frustrating technical limitations to how far you can really customize a website template, even with really good services and some basic coding knowledge. Sooner or later, you will reach a point that prevents you from being able to implement a function that you require. So you either try to work around it or make do without it, or try to fit your requirements to the limit of the website and this is an upside-down approach to web design.
2. You Have to Writer Your Own Content
Your new website template will most likely come with text boxes filed with generic filler text that you will have to create your content yourself. If you are a writer you may wish to do this, but many business owners simply don’t have the time to do this. Furthermore, your content should be optimized correctly in order to boost conversations and search engine visibility. While it might take you days to come up with the appropriate text to fill each box correctly without guaranteeing it will be correct for web use. Poorly written copy leaves a bad impression on your visitors and can affect your rankings on Google.
3. No Search Engine Optimization
Having a template website comes with very little or no on-page Search Engine Optimization options. This factor will highly negatively affect your Google rankings, as an important part of Search Engine Optimization is to be able to adjust your Meta Tags, Page URL’s CSS images and any other technical details. With this disadvantage, your website rankings will drop and keep you at the bottom of your competitors with a custom website.
Who Should Get a Custom Web Design?
Every business has many different needs. If you require a website that is scalable, search engine friendly and highly unique, then a Custom Web Design is an ideal choice. The added benefit of a CMS is that it will save you some money by keeping your Website updated and well maintained. Although it might take longer and cost you a bit more, you will get a website that is catered according to your business needs and will deliver an exceptional user experience to your Website visitors.
