WordPress: Pros and Cons – Is It Right for You?
If you’ve ever thought about building a website, you’ve probably encountered information about WordPress. In this article we will look into pros and cons of WordPress, and you’ll be able to decide whether it meets your needs or it is better to consider something else for building your website.
WordPress accounts for over 1/3 of the 10 million most popular websites on the web. Its market share has also been steadily growing over the past few years, rising from 29.9% to 33.4%.
Many people turn to WordPress as it is relatively cheap compared to building a website from scratch. Let’s compare custom-made websites and WordPress.
The decision between a custom made website and WordPress should consider factors such as budget, customization needs, and long-term goals related to functionality and scalability.
Custom-made websites take much more time to create since they need thorough coding and testing. The more time a development team spends on the work, the more you’d need to invest in the project. WordPress, on the other hand, is faster to set up, and it will definitely save you money. But will it be the same? Not the same, but if you don’t need some specific functions, it will serve you well, and you’d kill two birds with one stone by saving a huge amount of money.
Situations when you may prefer custom-made solution to WordPress:
- For platforms with communication functionality. WordPress is a content management system and it doesn’t imply communication functionality.
- For big shops. You can use the WooCommerce plugin in WordPress to sell something, but volume of product is restricted by number.
- You have specific design needs that can’t be reached with already existing WordPress themes and plugins. Or you simply don’t want to use ready made options.
- When your website requires specialized features, functionalities, or integrations that cannot be easily implemented using WordPress plugins or extensions.
- Custom websites offer greater scalability and flexibility to adapt to your evolving needs and growth. They can be designed with your long-term goals in mind and easily modified to accommodate changes in your business or user requirements.
- It can be built with robust security features to mitigate potential vulnerabilities. This is especially important for websites handling sensitive data or requiring stringent security protocols.
If you are not ready to wait long production time and you are short on budget,
WordPress remains a good alternative, here is why:
Design: the number of WordPress themes is continually growing due to the active community of theme developers, marketplaces, and the ever-increasing popularity of WordPress as a website platform. In 2021, the official WordPress Theme Directory lists over 8,000 free and open-source themes available for download. However, this number does not include the vast number of third-party WordPress themes available from other sources, including premium themes which need to be purchased. We can guess that, by now, WordPress has more than double of the themes it had in 2021. Don’t forget that you can hire a specialist to customize existing themes or create your own. You must be really spoiled if you decide on a custom-made website only for the reason of design.
A2 Design will be glad to help you. Our team of highly-skilled WordPress developers can customize or build a theme according to your requirements.
SEO: Search Engine Optimization makes sure that your website has a high rank and it helps drive traffic to your website. It is usually not a problem in custom websites, as it was considered from the very beginning, but it can suffer in ready-made solutions. But fear not! WordPress is pretty SEO-friendly, but under one condition, that themes and plugins you chose are also SEO-friendly. That’s why you may need a help of somebody experienced in WordPress.
Functionality: WordPress has lots of plugins to enhance functionality of your website. They are available in the official WordPress library and from third-party developers that you can easily install to add additional functionality to your website. Themes themselves have functionality that might be helpful to your site without the need to install additional plugins. As a rule, there isn’t much you can’t achieve with the help of the right theme, plugins and perhaps a little bit of custom coding. The biggest advantage of WordPress is that you don’t need to spend hours to develop a new function, each new function can be acquired by plugin installation.
Development: It is way much faster to develop a WordPress website. In most cases, you can choose a theme that you like and customize it by applying necessary plugins, resulting in a ready-to-use website without need for a long, challenging, and expensive custom development process.
Scalability: under scalability we mean ability to grow. With WordPress you can easily add more pages to your website, while with a custom website each page takes time and effort to develop. But you should keep in mind that custom made websites are more flexible. If you already have a grand project in mind with huge traffic and functionality that WordPress can’t offer, we suggest you go for a custom-made solution.
A2 Design not only can help you with WordPress website, but also we can build an on-demand custom website of any complexity.
Tip: It is also a good idea to combine both of the options (yes, it is possible). Make a custom made platform and add a blog in WordPress. This way you’ll manage to save some money on development and will be able to maintain the blog section yourself, without additional help from programmers. It leads us to another function.
Maintainability: WordPress is known for its user-friendly interface, making it easier for non-technical users to update content, add images, and manage the site.
You will be able to manage the website content without any technical background.
Custom websites may require specific technical expertise for maintenance and updates, potentially leading to higher maintenance costs.
Security: as it was previously mentioned, custom made websites are deemed to be more secure. To be fairly honest, WordPress had some hacker attacks in the past, but it has a relatively long history, so since then (2003) the system has been reinforced.
Note that with the right hosting and a good maintenance regime, hacking is far less of an issue for WordPress than it used to be. The same is with the custom websites, their security solely depends on the skill of the developer who design your site and on hosting you choose.
In both cases it is important to know nuances. And while you can make a website on wordpress yourself, it will be more secure if you ask professionals for help.
Cost: it was noted several times in this article that a custom website is going to cost you more, due to the time and effort needed, compared to ready made solutions. But there is a catch. If you plan a grand project that you know, for sure, will later need functionality that can’t be reached with WordPress, don’t try to save money by starting it on WordPress. You won’t save, you’ll pay double, with cash and extra time on development. Anyway, not everybody needs complex functionality which brings us to ready solutions.
Community: the WordPress community frequently organizes local and global events, such as WordCamps and meetups, where people come together to learn, share experiences, and connect with others who share their passion for WordPress. It is built on open-source principles, and the community plays a vital role in contributing to the core software, themes, plugins, and documentation. This collaborative environment fosters innovation and continuous improvement.
With WordPress you can develop a blog or an e-commerce store. It is a free and open-source platform that allows you to create, customize, and manage your websites without any coding knowledge. But what are the other options?
WordPress vs Web BuildersEase of Use: website builders, such as Wix, Squarespace, or Tilda, are designed for beginners and offer intuitive drag-and-drop interfaces for building websites without coding skills. WordPress, on the other hand, needs some investigation. However it is not the same as learning a programming language.
Functionality: WordPress is a standout winner when it comes to functionality. Web builders typically have limits on size and pages and are only customizable to a point. WordPress offers more than 50,000 plugins allowing you customize your website according to your taste and needs. And don’t forget about the ever growing number of themes available.
Hosting: when you use WordPress or build your website from scratch, you can choose whatever hosting service you like. With web builders you are stuck with one host and there is nothing you can do.
Scalability: web builders may have limitations in terms of scalability compared to WordPress. Since web builders are built with simplicity and ease of use in mind, they may not offer extensive options for advanced customization or handling complex and highly scalable websites. However, time goes and some web builders have made efforts to improve scalability as well. Ultimately, the scalability of a specific web builder will depend on its infrastructure and technologies.
Maintainability: WordPress websites may require more technical knowledge to maintain and update compared to some website builders. Depending on the number of plugins and customizations, managing a WordPress site may become more complex over time.
In conclusion, WordPress is ideal for those looking for flexibility, scalability, and customization options, while a website builder may be more suitable for beginners or those looking for a user-friendly and quick website creation process. Custom websites will provide you with bigger flexibility, but at the same time you’d need constant support of a development team to keep your website afloat. Assessing your specific needs and priorities will help determine which option is the best fit for you.
Contact us and we will help you to choose the best option specifically for your case!
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Contact UsCase Study – AlmoNature
AlmoNature is an Italian Pet Food and Supplies eCommerce Website. The brand of pet food produced with natural ingredients.
The content of the AlmoNature website is built with WordPress. All content is editable and managed by the internal AlmoNature team.
Our team has developed functionality that allows the AlmoNature team to manage the content on the website.
The product catalog is built with React.js. It is a multipurpose and scalable component. Updates are pulled from a centralized database.
Case Study – Mad Paws
MadPaws, an online Sydney-based marketplace for pet sitters and pet owners, started as an MVP.
The main feature of this project was the successful work of two platforms: WordPress and Laravel. This was due to the fact that the website was made entirely on Laravel and the blog was made on WordPress. The A2 Design team created separate landing pages for all categories of Madpaws’ services.
It garnered significant attention and success, raising $5 million in Series A funding from notable investors, including Qantas and Airtasker CEO Tim Fung.
By 2021, MadPaws went public with an IPO, achieving a valuation of $32 million.
Our developers noted that WordPress can integrate well with various technologies.
Reach out to us for professional help with turning your vision into reality!
