At Creative Shed, we do not create, edit or update template websites. You will find this will be the case with many established marketing agencies.
ARE TEMPLATE WEBSITES BAD?
Template websites are great if you are a start-up company with no budget or you want to showcase your local group or club. However, if you have a business, a template website can actually hurt your organisation. Template websites are renown for having a poor structure, incorrect and bloated coding, all of which causes your website to load slower than if you had a bespoke, custom built website.
The reason for this is because they are made for anyone to be able to download and make it work for their business. Which means, you will often have numerous fonts, plugins and functionalities within your website that you will never use.
WELL IF YOU CAN’T SEE IT, IT WON’T HURT YOU, RIGHT?
Wrong! We wrote a blog post on how having all this additional coding, plugins, etc. on your website actually hurts your search engine optimisation (SEO) performance which you can read here in more detail.
CAN’T I JUST HIRE SOMEONE TO REMOVE ALL THE EXTRA CODING?
Most web designers and developers will not touch a template website. The main reason for this is because a template website’s code can be very hard to understand due to it often being incorrect and full of additional extra plugins, etc. It can be like trying to find a needle in a haystack and will often take someone that long to correct or rectify, it works out cheaper to have a bespoke website built in the first place.
WEBSITE UPDATES CAN BECOME COSTLY
Another point to mention is when it comes time to update your website, you may also find it difficult to find someone to do this. You should update your website ideally, every time a new security update is available. Not updating it regularly can cause multiple issues and security risks and can open you up to hacking. You can read more about this on our previous blog, 5 Reasons Why You Need to Update your Website. As stated above, hiring someone to update or edit a template website will often take a considerable amount of time as they have to learn the code used in the template and can turn in to a money pit with most developers charging by the hour.
DUPLICATE CONTENT
One major thing to be aware of if you are going to use a template website is to not be conned by their “complete, out of the box copy content.” Using generic, automatically generated text for your website is a massive red flag for search engines and as a result, will affect your site rankings negatively.
CONTENT FIRST, ALWAYS
Arguably the most important thing on your website is the content. Your content should be the first thing you look at when creating a website. Without content, your website is no longer your virtual shop window, it is just a page amongst millions of others on Google. Most people when creating a business for the first time will pick a fancy template and then try to fill in the boxes with thoughtless text. Your content should always come first.
Who are you? What do you do? What do you offer to your customers? How do people contact you? Where are you located?
Write all of this down first and then, if you are going to use a template, pick one that matches what you want to say. Don’t ever pick a template just because it looks good.
WHY BESPOKE IS SUPERIOR
Of course bespoke, custom built websites are more expensive but remember, you always get what you pay for. With a bespoke website, you get a website that meets your business’ needs that support your business and marketing strategy. As a result, having a bespoke website can often save businesses thousands in the long run. You can find out how we can help you save money with our bespoke websites by getting in touch with us.
