If you are someone who is struggling with making the decision whether to go with custom website development or template based, this piece will help you. Here, we are going to discuss with you everything about custom and template-based website development to help you understand which one is a good choice for your business.
One thing that you need to remember is that this decision of choosing between custom and template-based websites can make a huge difference in your future online performance. In this piece, we are going to take you through all the different aspects – budget, project timeline, level of branding, uniqueness, and user experience.
Let’s begin…
Custom Built Website
A custom website is a process where the entire website is developed from the very scratch as per your expectations and specifications. This allows you to bring your conceptual idea to life. Everything is customised in the process, from navigation and architecture to graphics and every element, depending on personal choices.
Let’s get to the list of advantages of a custom-built website –
1. Customizable
With the growing online competition and rising demand for businesses, having a custom website for your business can prove helpful. Where the customization allows you to have more control over design, content, and functionality. Especially the businesses that can’t find everything they need in the templates must opt for custom website development.
2. Unique in itself
With custom websites, you get a chance to achieve a high level of uniqueness since you will be designing the website from the very scratch. Having a unique website design will attract more and more people and will engage them.
3. Improved user experience
Another benefit of choosing a custom website design is that it enables users to have an interactive experience on the website. With the growing number of websites online, it has become very important to be unique and discrete from all other competitors to catch the attention of users.
4. Effective marketing tool
If one thinks about a long-term marketing strategy, creating a custom website is great. It is best if you create a custom website design that reflects your marketing strategy and resonates with it.
5. Responsive design
As the competition is rising, the demand for modern custom websites is on the rise. Since most people are using their mobile devices to surf the internet, it has become a necessity to develop a website that is responsive.
6. Improved performance
Another benefit of custom website design is that it enhances the performance of the website since you get to code it which makes it leaner and lighter.
List of Disadvantages of the custom-built website
1. Expensive & Time Consuming
Compared to template-based websites, custom website development is very expensive and time-consuming. Since you have to design every graphic, code every functionality, and design all the elements from scratch, it takes more time and costs you much more.
2. Cannot be easily managed
For custom-built websites, you always need to have a development team handy. Since it is custom coded, you cannot simply play around as you can in template-based design.
Coming to the template-based website development…
As the name suggests, a template-based website is a website that is made using pre-designed templates, usually available online for a few bucks. Several platforms have come into existence allowing users to create template-based websites like – Wix, WordPress, Weebly, and more.
List of advantages of template-based website
1. Cost-effective & Less Time Consuming
The very first benefit of the template-based website is that it is quite cost-effective. This is a perfect choice for small businesses and startups. Since templates are pre-built
2. Easy to manage
Since it is very simple to manage these template-based websites, it is quite easy to manage. Platforms like Wix, Weebly, and more can be easily managed.
Disadvantages of template-based website
1. Limited option of customization
With template-based website development, you only get limited options of customization which restricts you to bring more personal touch to the website.
2. Slow speed
Since you are not the one writing the code, you will not be able to experience the fast speed that you can with custom website design.
3. Limited functionality
Theme-based websites also have very limited functionality. This means, that if you need any custom functionality to work on your website, it becomes very difficult with template-based development.
Which customized and template-based website should you choose?
Depending on each one of the points mentioned above, you should make a decision. We, however, recommend custom website development for better speed, performance, and design. This, again, is best for businesses that have a clear and very discrete vision and have a good budget to spend on development. Startups and small businesses who have less budget to spend on website development must go with template-based website design. So, we hope you know what type of website development works best for you. If you need professional help, all you have to do is contact us.
