Template vs. Custom Websites: A Strategic Comparison

Your website is, in most cases, the first introduction to your company. It’s professionalism, ease of use, and structure can mean the difference between gaining a sale or losing out on potential customers.

If you’re reading this article, though, you probably already know this. The big question is whether you want a templated WordPress site or a custom designed WordPress website.

Before making a decision, let’s look at the difference: timeframes, pricing, ease of updates, and work involved.

WordPress Template Site

WordPress, as a full Content Management System (CMS), is just a bunch of files that have pre-made programming in it. Just like buying a box of cake mix saves you time when making a cake, WordPress save time (and money!) when making a website. While the core functionality is the same, there are hooks, extensions, and even the design overlay that a developer can easily adjust.

WordPress themes are the design overlay on the website. Anyone can buy a theme from any number of websites include ThemeForest, Elegant Themes, Template Monster, etc. If you use a premade WordPress theme, your website is regarded as a “template” site.

WordPress Premade Template Pros

While your site is a templated site when using a pre-made theme, this doesn’t mean it has to work less effectively. A well-developed WordPress Template site can have good design, architecture/structure, call to actions, and good conversion rates. It can be a highly effective marketing tool for your business.

Faster Build/Launch 

If you need a website yesterday, a WordPress theme is the way to go. Typically, I recommend leaving about 4-6 weeks for your average WordPress site build in a theme, but if your content is ready-to-go and your site is small, this can be drastically sped up.

Lower Initial Cost

With White Fox Creative, a template site will run you around $3,000. This is less than 1/3 what a custom designed website starts at. This includes not only the customization of the premade template (colors, logo, layout, images), but also basic SEO, website marketing strategy, site structure, basic accessibility, enhanced security features, and even training. Everything you need to successfully launch and utilize your website for your company.

Pre-Built Design Structure

The design itself is pre-built, so while the colors and the order of sections (header, services, reviews, etc.) can be changed, the design will look similar to the original theme you’re showed. This limits your ability to custom brand your company, but it makes the entire process easier and faster.

Flexibility

These themes provide a builder that will allow you to build out any number of layouts. This allows more flexibility moving forward in the design, but can come with huge downsides.

WordPress Premade Template Cons

But not everything is a positive, of course. Here are some of the downsides of using a premade template.

Lack of Custom Branding

Your website will look like a themed website; it will also look like many other websites on the market. With your branding, colors, and content, this can be kept to a minimum and we do strive to make each template site look unique. However, this will never have the uniqueness that custom branding can provide for your company.

Code Bloat & Speed

Template websites come with code that you might not be using. While we mitigate this downside with caching, compression, and image optimization, we can’t fully alleviate this issue. A template site will be slower than a custom-made site. For companies that are just starting out, this speed may not be a huge issue, but as the company grows, you want to avoid any extra loading time.

Design Creep

While WordPress themes have a huge amount of flexibility built in, that flexibility can end up making your site disjointed. Say an office manager adds a section to the website and adds a pink button. That’s doable in the system, but might not be in your branding. If not carefully controlled, this can lead to a website that’s more of a hodgepodge of elements rather than a cohesive design.

Skip to the WordPress Custom Design Section ▾

Process for a Template WordPress Website

To create a website in WordPress using a template, the process is fairly straight forward.

1. Picking out a Theme

After discussing the desired overall feel for your company’s website, we’ll go find some appropriate theme options. These can be related to words like “open” or “clean” or “inviting” or “friendly”. Whatever feeling you want your potential and current customers to feel when they first see your site, we’ll find designs that give you that feel.

2. Setting up a Staging Site & Homepage

Once a theme is chosen, we’ll set up a staging site that is password protected for you to view while we’re building the theme. In addition to talking over design with you, we’ll discuss requirements for the homepage.

Whether you have a strong opinion on what goes where or no opinion/experience at all, we combine your knowledge of your clients/customers and our marketing experience to make sure your homepage has a strong foundation to convert.

3. Site Map

At this stage, the site map is finalized. We start building out the additional pages, while you have time some to view the homepage, both the images and content.

4. Finalizing Content

With the pages all built out, content will need to be finalized, both text and images. Throughout this process, we’ll guide you in choosing images that help convert and appropriate call to actions to make sure the user knows exactly what to do.

5. Mobile Review

Most sites are viewed on a mobile phone, so we leave time for a specific mobile review. This aligns with content edits on your side, while we optimize the site for phones. All the themes we use are pre-checked for mobile-friendly designs, but sometimes a few small adjustments must be made to keep the design intact.

6. Pre-Launch

It’s time for the final review: the whole site is checked for spelling errors, weird line breaks, correct links, and contact information. At this point, we’ll complete your basic SEO titles and descriptions, make sure any redirections are completed from your old site, review the 404 page, and ready your site on the technical side for launch.

7. Launch

Celebration! The site goes live while we double-check links, forms, connect Google Analytics and Search Console. We remove any plugins that aren’t needed on the live site, and do one last site sweep to make sure it all looks good. After launch, we have a 1 hour training session with you to make sure you know how to log in, where your hosting and registrar are located, and how to make basic edits.

If you’re choosing to move forward with a regular retainer, we’ll set up our updates, site management tool, and walk you through how that works.

If you aren’t needing regular updates on your site, we recommend getting a Health Check every quarter so that your website stays fast, secure, and error free.

Meet Silverman’s Construction

Silverman’s Construction is a small construction company in Santa Clarita, California. Their original site they had was old and unprofessional and they needed something that would look clean, inviting, and organized for their clients.

Their site is a simple WordPress theme, with some basic color branding and their current logo.

But the results were anything but basic. With just a simple website with basic SEO and call to actions placed strategically, their work increased by roughly 25% from the new site launch. Not a bad return on investment!

The Fine Print No One Tells You

A basic website build can rocket your business into huge gains, but before you get started, here’s the stuff no one tells you.

The timelines are flexible and hugely dependent on your response time. If you’re slammed with keeping your company running, you might want to either wait for a slow time or put someone else in charge of it. We like launching on time, but we also are aware that, especially for small business owners, it might be difficult to get everything done that’s needed. We build in extra time in our timeframes to account for this.

Content is harder than you think. We don’t provide content for your website, but we will help you know what you need and where it goes. If you have a larger site, we recommend hiring a content writer to help get the site to the finish line. But ultimately, no one knows your customer like you do. Content needs your input.

Once chosen, themes are final. We want you to love your website and enjoy showing it off to everyone you know. But we also want to make sure it doesn’t stay in production for 2 years with no launch date. Once chosen, the theme is locked in so that we can move you quickly toward the launch of your main marketing tool.

Size does effect pricing, but “simple” sites still take time. With over 20 years of experience building sites, structuring SEO, and creating pages that will convert, we’re pouring all that knowledge into your website build. It’s absolutely OK to start with a basic Wix or Squarespace website if your company is just getting off the ground. One of the great joys of White Fox Creative is watching people start their dream company and become successful. If the cost is just a bit too much right now, don’t worry. When you’re ready to upgrade, we’ll be here!

Some features seem hard and are easy; some seem easy and are hard. Check with us if you’re looking for a specific feature that’s outside of text, images, and slideshows on your site. If it’s easy to implement, we might be able to simply include it in the base cost. On the flip side, some features are harder to set up than expected and might even take significant overhead to keep up-to-date. We’re happy to help guide as needed!

Ongoing Costs: Hosting & Domains. Even with no updates regularly, all websites cost. The hosting, or where your website files are located, costs a monthly fee (though people often pay yearly). The domain registration costs yearly as well, though significantly less, typically costing roughly $15. If you don’t have experience with these, feel free to ask and we can provide recommendations.

WordPress Custom Theme

In contrast with the WordPress Template site, a custom theme is just that: completely custom. These themes are not customized; they are  coded from scratch and developed only for your company’s website. Custom themes will not be used by any other business or resold; we create it to the designer’s specifications, approved by you, and it will only be used on your company’s website.

All of our custom developed themes operate using ACF, or Advanced Custom Fields, allowing a modular page builder. This gives you flexibility without the danger of design creep turning your website into a hodgepodge of elements. You’ve paid for a designer to brand your company, and that branding will be held firm throughout the site.

After your approval, the design is split into “modules” or rows that are then coded into the theme. After launch, you’ll be able to drag-and-drop these modules, edit text and images, add additional ones to a page, or create new pages with them.

WordPress Custom Theme Pros

If you’re looking into the extra cost of a fully custom theme, there are some big upsides to taking on the extra expense and time.

Full Brand Alignment

A custom theme is the ideal for a company that is growing since it can fully support branding recognition. The layout, design, call to actions, and overall site structure are all cohesively planned to optimize the marketing power of the site.

Keep the design tight and true

You paid for the design; we don’t want to immediately ruin it. The custom modules we use provide some options for adjustments, but nothing outside of the design scope.

Fastest Loading Speed in the Galaxy

There is nothing in the theme unless it’s required. The code is clean and, dare I say, beautiful. A custom theme also allows us to build in some elements that would need to be done with plugins otherwise, cutting down on additional code bloat.

Easily Editable by Anyone*

Between custom themes and templated themes, the custom ones overwhelmingly get praised by clients for their ease of use. There are very few things to remember – like hitting the save button – and they are very difficult to mess up.
*most anyone

Anything* is Possible

While themes can restrict some edits, with a custom theme, if you can dream it and it can be coded, I’ll make it for you. If you’re looking for a fully unique website that scrolls sideways, plays through music while people are scrolling, bringing a comic book to the screen – no worries. I’ve got you. Check out Pitsberg, a graphic novel.
*ok, not anything; but like, almost

Easier Scalability & Site-Wide Edits

Need something to be the same on every page and only edited once? No problem. Need a new module for extended functionality? Not an issue. The modular approach coupled with highly organized coding files means that we can extend as needed even years later.

WordPress Custom Theme Cons

It’s not all good news for the custom themes. There are a few cons.

Higher Investment: Time & Money

The initial step of a custom theme is working with a designer. This step alone can double the overall timeline. Custom themes are ideal for planned websites, but not ideal for a quick launch. Custom designed websites start at $10,000, quite a bit more than the $3,000 templated site. It also requires more input from the client – you. Design requires significant client feedback, revisions, and more client feedback.

Don’t let that dissuade you – it is worth it at the end. But before you start, make sure you carve out some time in your schedule.

Module Flexibility

Custom themes have flexibility, but because of the tight adherence to the design, it does mean that additional layouts will require additional coding. With the number of modules provided and the options included, this shouldn’t be a problem for a while, but it might come up.

Process for a Custom WordPress Website with White Fox Creative

When building a custom WordPress site, the process is longer and requires more feedback from you.

1. Discovery Phase

In this initial phase, we lay out your website goals, current pain points, and create an initial site plan. Whether the site is 5 pages or 15, we’ll use this to guide our decisions, especially in the extensive design phase.

2. Design Phase

This phase will take roughly the same time as the development phase. During it, you’ll meet with a designer who will discuss style guides, design direction, and will create a few mockups for choosing a design direction. You’ll need to provide feedback to move us forward at each design junction.

Each page will be laid out with the new design elements and include text/images or, at the least, sample text.

3. Development Phase

This phase is largely hands-off for the client since your hard work was put in during the design phase. We take the designs and create them pixel-perfect in WordPress using our ACF modules. Each page will be laid out exactly like the design, and then optimized for mobile responsiveness.

4. Pre-Launch

Before launch, we’ll complete the same type of final review as the templated site: spelling errors, weird line breaks, correct links, and contact information. The basic SEO titles and descriptions will be added, redirections from the old site are completed, the 404 page is reviewed, and we prepare technically for the site launch.

5. Launch

We go live! In the process, we double-check links, forms, connect Google Analytics and Search Console. Plugins that are no longer needed are removed, and we completed one last sweep of the site confirm it’s ready to go.

Just like the template site, we have a 1 hour training session with you, or any employee who will be making edits.

If you’re choosing to move forward with a regular retainer, we’ll set up our updates, site management tool, and walk you through how that works.

If you aren’t needing regular updates on your site, we recommend getting a Health Check every quarter so that your website stays fast, secure, and error free.

Meet Kern AEC

Kern Adult Education Consortium is an extensive project we completed in conjunction with Kandula, Inc. and with Olga Severina as our designer. This website was a overview of their current site, switching their never-finished theme into a fully-functional module-based custom theme.

With the changes made, it allowed adults who were continuing their education to easily find the opportunities available to them.

Choosing between Custom & PreMade Template

The most obvious difference in custom and premade are the time and cost. If one option matches your budget more closely, it’s a fairly easy choice. In the same way, if your timeline is under 2 months, you’ll need to go with a premade (at least for now).

There are few other considerations, if the price and timeline aren’t deal-breakers.

Brand Maturity

For early-stage businesses, going with a premade template can help get your company off the ground significantly quicker. Keeping the overhead cost down can also be a boon for those new company budgets.

That being said, if you have the budget and time to spend on launching a branded website for a new company, this can help your company explode into the market you’re targeting.

Larger, more established companies can benefit from the website branding consistency. The average consumer needs to a see a product 7 times to buy it. But what if they don’t know it’s the same product? Branding consistency through a website, images, social media, press information, and collateral make sure they know it’s your product they’re seeing – and hopefully wanting.

Marketing Goals

Marketing goals can change overtime, based on exactly what your company is focused on growing. You might be working on lead generation, e-commerce, conversion optimization, authority in your field, value of the product, etc. Some goals are better supported by a custom theme than they could be on a premade template. This is highly specific to the goal, though; feel free to ask for our advice!

Can you start with a Premade and move to Custom?

Yes! In fact, if you don’t have content already prepared, a premade site can be a great step into the website world without being overwhelmed with the amount of feedback and information you need to provide for a custom theme.

When you’re ready for a custom website, your current site can be a good starting point for understanding your needs. Add to that the data you’ll have from analytics, and you’ll be starting from a much better position.

What About More Services?

Are you looking for more services like content creation, extensive site review, sites that are over 100+ pages, company branding, etc.? While we don’t handle all of that in-house at White Fox Creative, we have put together a team of experts we work with to tackle large sites.

The Hidden Costs of a Bad Website

A bad website can absolutely SINK a company.

97% of people who visit websites will form an immediate opinion on the reliability and credibility of a company in the first 5 seconds. A professional design can mean the difference between people trusting your company and buying, or rejecting it for a more reliable-seeming competitor.

The website loading speed can also scare customers away. You have 2-3 seconds for loading before customers will start leaving. At 5 seconds, you’ll have lost the majority of your customers.

If they stay on the site, being able to find what they’re looking for is the next hurdle. Poor or confusing site structure can frustrate potential customers to the point that they will click off to find a competitor whose website is easier to navigate.

Bad UX (User Experience) can not only deter people from hiring you, but it can kill your repeat customer base. Poor UX can be anything from no receipt email to a website loading slowly.

Finally, one of the biggest mistakes made on websites is expecting users to know what to do instead of providing clear Call to Actions. Call to Actions are any button, form, or interaction that you want the customer to take on your page. Just presenting what you can do won’t matter if the customer doesn’t know the next step. You’ll see clear Call to Actions through my website. In fact, here’s a nice clear one below:

Why Work with White Fox Creative

I fell in love with programming websites over 20 years ago, and I still love the strategy, design, and build of creating something new from a blank page. WordPress has been my focus for almost 15 years, allowing me to have the strategic and technical expertise to create WordPress sites utilizing more advanced development like git repositories, SASS, Gulp, Localhost/Staging versions, and more.

While the technology and skill is vital, I bring a personal touch to all my client’s projects with clear communication and a belief that collaborating to build a new website should be enjoyable.

Kim is a different breed of web developer. Of course, she’s incredibly talented. But what truly sets her apart is the human-centered approach she brings to every project. Kim doesn’t just build websites, but instead carefully crafts solutions that feel sustainable and manageable and uniquely tailored to each client’s individual needs.
– Nicole, Director of Marketing

If you’re looking for a website developer for your project, whether large or small, or need a reliable developer to join your team, I’d love to connect.