Why I prefer WordPress
There are multiple reasons why I use and recommend WordPress over other website builders/CMS’s, and why you should have someone like myself, (I class myself as a WordPress consultant, more on that later) to do the heavy lifting, as well as having the infrastructure and services to host your site too.
First of all, WordPress is free, as in beer, as well as free as in that people can use it for whatever they want, as we have access to the source code. It also runs nearly 40% of the websites on the internet, so it is stable, in continuous production and has many developers across the world helping it become even better over time.
One big selling point is that the theme/template is separate from your content, meaning at a flick of a mouse click, you can change your site design at a moments notice! The other big selling point is that if you can use a PC, and/or use word processing software, you can update your site easily.
If I move towards other web builders like Wix or Squarespace, they are fine for when you want a website like yesterday, but moving or migrating it is a pain at best, as they want to keep you in their ecosystem. If you use WordPress from the get-go, not only is the website YOURS, you are able to move it to another hosting provide or change the domain name relatively easily. WordPress can also scale up easily if your business grows too! The only caveat to this is that there is, of course, a steep learning curve when setting up a WordPress site on your own.
Not only do you have to install it on your own, although most hosting services such as Guildford Web Services Ltd have a one-click install solution for you, so that part is easy to do, however, after that that you can choose one of the over 3900 free/premium themes, which can be daunting in itself or if that hasn’t given you a headache, but you also have over 50,000 plugins to choose from! For a beginner, unless technically inclined, it can put you off.
So, if too much choice, and the fact why there is a steep learning curve, why do I still recommend WordPress?
For starters, you can have your own theme, created by a theme developer such as myself, AND if you have someone such as myself who has deep-dived into WordPress, I know which plugins work the best to get the job done. Say you need a store with spam protection… I can find the right plugin for that fairly easily, one to help with SEO (Search engine Optimisation), I can find that too (looking at you YOAST!!). You have a YouTube channel, with different social media accounts – I can embed those into your site easily too. – This is the reason why I call myself a WordPress consultant as I will solve all the issues you may have on your WordPress site.
But here is the clever thing I can do, I can hide all those parts of WordPress that you don’t need to worry about, such as the plugin menu, and other admin menu items that are on the dashboard, so all you need to do is upload images/videos, and write your copy!
This is why I prefer WordPress, it gives ME the freedom to create a bespoke instance for my clients, that they can move their site easily if they so desire, I can also hide the complexity of WordPress easily too, and I can also teach them how to use WordPress.
