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6 Reasons Why a Custom Website Design is Better Than A Template

Every client expects the companies they do business with to have a website. When you work on your online presence, one decision to make is the website design. In many cases, this choice comes down to a premade template versus a custom website design.

A premade template is a theme that is sold to multiple businesses, has a lower cost, and is already finished. Custom website designs are unique to your company, and you collaborate with the designers for the finished product. Here are six ways they provide you with a better value than a premade theme.

1. Created to Your Specification

Web designers develop a design based on your exact specifications. If you use a premade theme, you have to work within the limitations set by that template. The custom design includes the best practices for your industry, important features used by the most competitive companies in your market segment, and quality coding.

2. Supports Your Current and Future Business Goals

Your website does a better job at supporting your current and future business goals when the full design revolves around them. For example, if you want to focus on growth, you would have elements designed to encourage more traffic to your website, build an email list, and develop a loyal following.

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3. Unique to Your Website

You wouldn't use the same brand identity as another company, so why would you use a site design that everyone else could put into place? Customers could experience confusion if a competitor has the same or a similar template. A custom design is only used on your site, which allows you to reinforce your distinctive brand.

4. Built for Scaling

Many premade templates lack the foundation for growing with your business. You don't want to go through a complete website design in the middle of a growth spurt. Custom web designs are coded to handle high traffic as your company expands. Experienced custom designs also use best practices to help you with search engine optimization and a quality user experience. You only have one chance to win over a new visitor to your site before they click their way to a competitor, so you want to ensure that it's working correctly.

PRO TIP: If constant growth is one of your priorities, a custom website design is also beneficial for growth-driven design (GDD). GDD methodology encourages continual website updates based off of user experience data and metrics. A template may limit your ability for custom updates based upon user data.

5. Ongoing Support

Premade themes have limited post-sales support. In many cases, the designers offering these templates are focused on volume. You wouldn't be able to depend on their help if your business website fails to deploy correctly or has design errors. When your company reputation depends on a strong web presence, you can't take that risk. Custom designers provide ongoing support for your changing needs. Feature additions, security improvements, and other updates keep your website adapting to the times.

6. Quality Assurance

Premade themes don't get tested on your company's equipment or your web host. They might work great for the designer's set up, but you could run into hard-to-troubleshoot problems. Custom web developers can develop and deploy the website in your working environment to discover potential complications. They can also connect directly with your IT team or web host to work through these issues before you want to take the website live.

Custom web designs require a larger upfront investment, but the benefits you receive are well worth it compared to a premade template.

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