Is custom web design and website development worth it? Do you need to spend a lot of money buying custom web design services or is unnecessary? The short answer is this: if you’re on a tight budget or have a close deadline – then probably you don’t need it. On the other hand, if you need a special website, I highly advise you consider hiring one of the top software development companies out there. With that said, you need to have a clear goal for your website in the first place.
Is going to be a pillar of your marketing efforts? Do you need any kind of unique functionality?
Without having a clear goal and strategy, it’s going to be hard for you to decide if you need to invest your money into a custom website.
Pros of Designing a Custom Website Development
So let’s break apart all this mystery.
Let me give you 12 reasons why doing a custom website might be a good idea.
1. Built Around Your Business Needs
Here is the problem with a template-based design: you’re trying to “fit” your business into the frames of a template. In other words, you’re trying to adjust the needs and strengths of your business to adjust to the template. If you select this approach, you might be limiting your success.
2. Fully Customizable
There are so many templates out there. Many of them offer a lot of blocks and pieces that you can use: home pages, contact forms, maps, FAQ sections, testimonial carousels, and so on. And they serve their purpose in most cases. So when a user clicks on a particular state, it zooms in and shows the cities in that state. Why you might want that kind of a map? Well, what if you have multiple locations in the US? And you need to display custom information about each one of them.
That might be tricky to do with a regular Google Map, especially if that information includes like a photo gallery or videos. If that’s the case, your template is very unlikely to offer that kind of widget.
3. Unique
I touched on this point earlier when I wrote that website development has to build around your business needs. But it’s worth elaborating on this. When going with a template instead of buying website development in Illinois, you will face this dilemma:
4. Better User Experience
User experience is extremely important for your website to generate leads and convert them into customers.
5. Higher Security Levels
It goes without saying that security is extremely important for any website that has sensitive data on it. If you are collecting people’s personal information like names or emails (which most websites do), or you have some kind of a payment system integrated into your website – you have to be EXTREMELY careful about it. That’s why you’ve got to be very careful when you buy a theme. You have to make sure that all the plugins were built by a good and reliable developer.
6. More Flexible for SEO
When it comes to SEO, there are so many factors that play a role. A lot of them are a part of the on-page SEO optimizations. Things like loading speed, user experience on mobile and tablet devices, internal linking, AMP pages, or rich snippets are all a part of it.
That’s when many of these templates can be limited.
1. User experience on mobile and tablet
2. AMP Pages. AMP pages are essentially simplified versions of a page on a website development that Google indexes and shows to users on mobile devices.
3. Rich Snippets. Rich snippets are like an extended version of a page from your website that Google shows in search results.
When Are Custom Web Design Services a Waste of Time
Now that we know what are the main advantages of a custom web design in Illinois, let’s talk about the disadvantages of this approach.
In my experience there 3 reasons why a template-based website can be a better choice. So let me go over them step by step.
1. Budget
It goes without saying that website development in Illinois will be a more expensive option. Hiring a good WordPress consultant or a specialist like a LearnDash developer will be costly. The reason is that it requires more work and attention to your project from your service provider.
If you’re interested in learning more about this subject – check out our ultimate guide to website pricing If you are curious how much would a custom web design project cost you, I would have to say that prices range like crazy. But from my experience, on average you can expect to pay anywhere from $8,000 to $20,000 for a corporate website for your business.
That’s assuming you’re working with a small or medium agency in a country with an advanced economy like Canada, US, or Australia. For a template-based solution, I would say that the price is likely going to be somewhere between $3,000 to $10,000.
So if you’re working on a smaller budget – you might abandon the custom approach altogether.
2. Time
The second most important factor is time. If your main objective is to do something very quickly and you’re even ready to sacrifice the quality a bit – custom web design is not for you.
You can get the job done much faster with a template. But please keep one thing 1 mind: plan your website structure before you buy a template.
If you don’t do this, you might find yourself in a situation where your template doesn’t fit your needs and you’d have to either modify it heavily or buy another one. And neither of these will save you time in the long run.
3. Your Needs
The 12 advantages of a custom website that I’ve written about earlier mostly apply to high-end brands or more complex solutions that require custom functionality. Or even websites that work like software. If you need a landing page to quickly start generating leads, then Clickfunnels or Unbounce is probably the best way to go as they’re built just for those purposes. Another use case might be a simple blog. If you love animals and you want to write about them – then you don’t need to pay that much money for a tailored website. The best solution for you might be using WordPress to create a simple blog in under an hour.
Or maybe you don’t even need to own a website. Maybe Medium is your best choice. Who knows, you’ll have to try it out.
Conclusion
As you can see, custom website development has many advantages and disadvantages, and hiring one of the top PHP development companies might be the best way to go for you. The general rule of thumb is this: if you want something very simple and quick – go with a template-based solution. If your project is a complex one, you need a tailored solution that requires a lot of attention – a custom website should be your choice.