The differences between Custom Websites and content management systems

Key Takeaways

• Compared to page builders like WordPress, custom websites have the potential to load up to ten times faster. Most visitors will leave your website if it takes longer than three seconds to load, costing you customers.
• Google indexes your website depending on how effectively it functions on mobile devices, and page builder mobile sites are typically not as optimized, quick, well-built, or 100% responsive, which could hurt your search ranks.
• Our websites are designed with mobile in mind from the beginning, not just after. The speed of your website on Google will improve as a result, giving users a better experience overall.
• WordPress must be updated frequently to fix security weaknesses that hackers can use to infiltrate your website. WordPress is famously recognized for its vulnerabilities. Due to their simplicity and lack of hackable access points, hand-made static sites are virtually impermeable and cannot be readily infiltrated.

Website Categorization

Static and dynamic websites are the two main categories in web creation. A static site is a website that simply uses HTML, CSS, and JavaScript as its primary programming languages. There are no databases, features, data manipulation capabilities, or other sophisticated things. Just the page as it was created is being displayed. Everything you see on a website is coded in one of these three languages, and in many situations, that's all you need. A static site loads instantly because your browser reads and builds the website's source code. The identical content is loaded by every user.

Wallaby Designs is proud to provide high-end dynamic and static websites to meet your needs. Our standard website package is 100% static, whereas our blogger and e-commerce packages are a mixture of dynamic and static. The dynamic pages allow for content updates such as new blog content or product updates, but this is not necessary for all pages. Furthermore, our websites are built following modern practices to minimize load and optimize performance. Notice how fast this page loaded compared to many other websites you may have visited? Chances are, you can tell the difference.

Speed of Hand Coded Versus WordPress 

Consumers don't like to wait around for websites to load. In fact, Google started using page speed as one of its ranking elements for desktop and mobile because it is so crucial to the user experience. The key justification for integrating speed in its algorithm was that statistics indicated users spent less time on websites that loaded slowly. A Website Builder Expert survey from 2021 found that 1 in 4 visitors leave a website that takes longer than 4 seconds to load.

WordPress Speed

The influence on load time of a WordPress site requiring PHP and a database is a drawback. Your server must run the PHP code and retrieve data from your database each time a visitor comes to your website in order to show them the right information. This can lengthen load times and cause delays because it uses more server resources than an HTML site.

Static Website Speed

PHP execution or database queries are not necessary for static websites to load. This implies that static sites are quicker than WordPress sites right out of the box, especially if the code is optimized.

A static HTML site can be optimized in a number of ways to make it load quickly. Included in these actions are removing extraneous white space, removing comment sections, frequently caching your site's content, minimizing the number of inline scripts, minifying and compressing images, employing lazy loading for photos, and more.

increased site speed and mobile-first programming

Page builders are not capable of performing mobile first programming. In accordance with this design pattern, developers should begin writing code for mobile devices first before moving on to tablet and desktop screens as they proceed along the file. CSS files are scanned by the browser from top to bottom to determine how the page should be organized and decorated. If we start by writing desktop code at the top of the page, the browser will read it first and load it, then it will continue to the bottom of the page to check for rules for various screen sizes and load those designs, altering the desktop content to fit into mobile. 

When viewing a website on a mobile device, if the mobile code is located at the bottom of the CSS file, the browser must first load the desktop code before checking the screen size requirement and confirming that the page is mobile-friendly. Then, everything from the desktop must be disassembled and crammed onto the screen of a mobile device. Time and resources are wasted on this.

Why hire someone to create a website when I can create one myself using a CMS?

Wix and WordPress, among other content management systems, promote the idea that anyone can create a website at no cost. This appeals greatly to small businesses who lack the funding to engage developers to create one for them, but can often produce clunky, cookie cutter themed websites. To stand out from the competition, we strongly suggest finding someone to create a completely custom website for you, especially if you want to have worries about page speed, loading times, security, converting more clients, and Google rankings handled in a website. 

The cost of web development might vary based on its scope. Most US based web developers will charge between $100-250 per hour. Depending on intricacy, it can cost anywhere from $1800 to $5,000 to have a developer build a simple custom website. The more features you need, the longer it will take the developer to create your site and the more expensive it can become. 

Understandably, In order to cut costs by doing it yourself, it is only natural to be drawn to page builders. Nothing is incorrect about this way of thinking and nobody can fault you for it, but if you want to advance your business, or the performance of it, consider having a custom website created. Let us build you something that will perform significantly better and surpass the competitors. Wallaby Designs will always be upfront about estimated costs and, because we want your repeat business, will work hard to stick to the development budget set during our website planning.

Some web designers create unique WordPress sites, and they do a good job and are passionate about what they do. We are not implying that WordPress website developers are con artists or produce subpar goods, they still have their benefits and are fine for many use cases. For example, WordPress is fantastic for users who want to edit their own material, create an online store, a blog they can write and edit themselves (we also offer this with our blogger package), create custom applications, or manipulate data, or do anything else that requires a database.

There's a good chance that WordPress is used by some of your rivals as well. Some developers or companies charge thousands of dollars to create these straightforward WordPress sites that could have been made static, and many of them are simply pump-and-dump template installations that they give to you without any maintenance. Therefore, it will be challenging to find a reputable developer or agency, but the effort will be well worth it. Just take your time to separate the undesirables from the desirables.

A Website is an Investment

When it comes to website development, there are two types of clients: Owners of businesses, and entrepreneurs. Considering a website as an expense rather than an investment is one of the biggest mistakes business owners can make. Entrepreneurs are aware that when they spend money on their company, it is an investment, rather than an expense, and they are able to defend the cost of their expenditures by pointing to the benefits they would receive in return. You might pay a developer $3000 to create a static website for you as an example.

It may seem like a lot, but if your website is more attractive and functional, you may be able to retain clients who might have abandoned it because it took too long to load or looked terrible, making you appear unreliable. You get what you pay for with websites since they are an investment. If you want something thrown together that appears generic or outdated, this might cause people to avoid you. If you want a cheap site, you can anticipate cheap outcomes. If you want it done right, let us help!