Why Custom Web Design Is Better Than Templates

Individuals and businesses alike that have a limited budget can benefit greatly from using a drag-and-drop website builder and a template. However, this practice does have its drawbacks.

If you find yourself missing features or just needing more than a website builder and template can offer you, it might very well be time that you moved on to a custom web design and hosting solution. In this blog, we will explore some of the benefits of custom web design.

Tailored to your brand

The biggest benefit of investing in a custom-designed website is that it is tailored from the ground up to your brand or business. You will have complete control, enabling you and your web developers to create something truly special and unique.

In the same way as brick-and-mortar buildings, websites give you the chance to showcase not only your unique product or service but your brand's personality too.

As your design will be tailored to and designed for your brand from the ground up, your website will have a completely unique appearance. If you use a site template, on the other hand, your website will be almost identical to countless others, which will not be able to give your customers the unique, personalised touch that they crave.

Strong focus on customer experience

When compared to a website built using a template, custom web design will give businesses the chance to have a much stronger focus on the experience of their customers.

Before getting started with the project, web developers and designers will sit down with you to find out more about what you want to achieve and your business goals. You'll consider your average customer's journey, from the moment they find your website to the moment they convert.

Over time, a truly customer-centric design will help your visitors navigate the website easier, making them more likely to take the actions that produce your desired result, whether that is making a purchase, submitting an enquiry or booking an appointment, to name just a few.

Boost search engine optimisation

Website templates generally come with restrictions about how the site and its content are set up. This means it can be tricky to manage things like metadata, page URLs, alt tags and more, all of which can have a negative impact on your site's SEO (search engine optimisation).

By investing in custom web design, SEO best practices can be built in from the start, helping your site to rank better in the long term.

Easier to update and add new features

When compared to a web template, it is much easier to make changes and scale up the development of your website if you have a bespoke design.

Web developers will create a solid web architecture from the beginning, and as you go, they will be able to easily add in new features or content as your business or brand grows and develops.

This kind of ongoing development is often much harder with sites that use a template, as you rarely have access to the code behind the site; and even if you did, you run the risk of making mistakes if you do it yourself.

The templates themselves may not even be updated as often as you would like for simple bug fixes and improvements, as this depends entirely on how active the developer team behind the template are. This is a problem that can easily be avoided by opting for a custom web design and working with a reputable web developer who will be able to keep on top of their own code and stay ahead of major technical changes and updates.

Increased flexibility with hosting

Opting for a custom-designed website can often give you much greater flexibility when it comes to how your website is hosted and the infrastructure behind it.

By going for a bespoke design, you can often scale your hosting as needed, enabling your website to properly support a growing customer base. This can have a direct impact on how your server performs and can prevent downtime too.

If you want the chance to test new features before rolling them out, your developers may also be able to set up a staging site where new features can be experimented with and any kinks can be ironed out before making them live.

These are just some of the many benefits of opting for a customer web design. If this has piqued your interest, why not get in touch with our talented web design team to start the process of building your very own custom web design template? Be sure to check out how else the team can help with the other services they offer.