Why Should You Bother With Custom?
We'll dive into why custom is the better solution, why large companies always choose custom, and why it doesn't cost as much as you think it does.
The difference between large and small businesses
After being in the industry for several years, building mobile apps, websites, and web apps for large and small companies alike, we’ve seen technologies come and go, as well as evolve and change. A difference we’ve noticed between large and small companies is that when large companies want something software related (especially customer/client facing), they get it custom made. Small companies want to find an existing software or platform that does most of what they need, pay the subsription tier that lets them put their logo on it, and then call it a day (while also looking for other platforms that do the things the one they pay for doesn’t).
This difference is because large companies know something that small companies don’t. When you go custom, everything is fine-tuned, good-looking, fast, scalable, mobile-friendly, you own the data - the list goes on and on.
Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Yeah, that’s because the large companies can afford custom. I’m a small business, I don’t have millions of dollars for that.” You might be right - you probably don’t have millions of dollars. But I’m telling you, you don’t need that much money. Odds are, you don’t need custom software built for your company to have a client portal, or for clients to schedule an appointment. You certainly can, and probably should as a small business, find platforms that do these things for you. But, as a small business, what you can do is have a custom website, and more often than not, you can even integrate these platforms into your website. This allows your business to really stand out, feel premium, and give your clients a cohesive and enjoyable experience.
A typical small business move
The most custom thing a small business usually does is their business website. But, custom is often used very loosely here. Either you, your business partner, or your kid who’s better at technology than you built your website using a “no-code solution” like WordPress, WebFlow, Framer, Wix, SquareSpace, or something similiar. Or, you hired some other business or person to use one of those same platforms that you would use to build it.
You may be happy to see your logo, services, and maybe even your own picture on the “About Us” page. But this isn’t really custom, and it’s far from ideal.
Usually, some random template that’s either free or costs money is used that gets 80% of the point across, and then someone will slap several extensions on your website (that you may or may not have to pay for) to be able to add designs, forms, etc., to your site to make it appear custom and get that remaining 20% done.
But, there’s a huge flaw with this approach, and there’s nothing you can really do once it’s built. The problem is that your website is built on one of these platforms. These platforms may be good for the random side hustle you saw in a TikTok video and wanted to try for a week. But, for serious businessses, and especially for the one thing that you’ll most likely make custom, this is a terrible choice.
Why is it so terrible? There are many reasons, but the main ones are:
- The amount of bloat your website has
- Lack of control
- Your dependency of your online presence on another company
- You don’t have real “customizability”
- Difficult integrations
- So, so many more reasons
I don’t get it, why are those bad?
None of these reasons may fire off a neuron in your brain, and that’s okay. After all, you might not understand any of it, you or someone you know/hired spent time designing and building it, and now you have a real website you can go look at that has your color theme, fonts, and images. But, these issues are most often like a bad cancer - you don’t know it’s a problem until you find it, and by then, it’s too late. All you can do is throw money at it and pray for the best.
Bloat
What is bloat? Bloat is all the extra files, code, images, data, etc., that your website sends to someone trying to view it that goes unused. This is a huge problem because bloat can really slow down a website, and all of these no-code “custom” solutions are riddled with it.
Since one of the biggest reasons people click out of a website is because of how slow it loads, bloat needs to be kept to an absolute minimum, which is impossible when you use these no-code solutions, and it gets worse the older your website gets and the more extensions that are added.
Lack of Control
Lack of control is actually really depressing. These no-code solutions have third-party libraries where people can create some extension, feature, design element, etc., and put it up on their store for you to pay for and use (only on that specific no-code solution, though, and usually per website). Sometimes there will be free trials or free tiers of a paid one that does the bare minimum you need. But, usually you’ll have to pay a fee that may or may not be another recurring monthly fee.
Using these libraries adds bloat, increases the likelihood of your website breaking (because when you use 10 different extenions made by different people that all do different things to the same website, you’re going to run into issues), and cost you so much more.
It’s especially horrible when you have to pay for a design or functionality which, when building a website from scratch, is easy and free to make, but you’re charged tens, or hundreds (or more!) of dollars a month to use.
You need to take control of your website and your wallet. Don’t spend extra money per month so you can have an image carousel. It’s entirely not necessary.
Dependency
Most of these no-code solutions, like Wix, WebFlow, SquareSpace, GoDaddy, etc., require you to host your website you built with their building tool on their own platforms and services. This means that if these companies were to disappear, then your website will disappear with it. You are fully dependent on them for literally everything.
With solutions like WordPress, you do have more flexibility with where you can host your website, but your options are still very limited, especially because the host needs to be compatible with WordPress.
When you go custom, your website’s code is compiled down into a bunch of different files, and those files can be hosted from seemingly endless places, including by your own self if you wanted; and, it’s a lot cheaper. And if your hosting provider disappears, it doesn’t matter. All you have to do is take your files and go to a new hosting provider.
As a small business, you want to minimize your dependencies, and have better control over your website, who has access to it, where it’s hosted from, and many more things which are either only possible, cheaper, or easier with custom code.
Lack of Customizability
I’ve touched on this a little bit already, but I want to go a bit deeper into it. When you use a no-code solution, you’re stuck using their… well, solutions. Whether they have a third-party store where people can create and sell features, templates, etc., that work for that specific no-code solution, you’re typically unable to use external libraries. You have a severe lack of options, and the good ones cost money.
When you are creating a custom website, you have entire creative freedom. Think of anything that is possible on a website, and you can do it. From sleek animations, to 3D, to video games, to smooth transitions, to gradients, to fonts, to full design applications, and so much more, you can put almost anything on a website, and make it look almost any way. You don’t have anywhere near this liberty with no-code solutions.
You might be saying: “Well, that’s cool, but I don’t need things to be THAT creative.” And you’re right. You don’t need, nor even want some art project or full blown software service as a website. But the difference between the 500th copy/paste template someone sees and a new, fresh, fast website that catches the eye will lead to much higher conversions.
And I haven’t even started talking about the things that are under the hood and you don’t see. Things like A/B testing, user analytics, heat maps, etc. are much more fine-tuned and detailed for custom solutions. You’re easily able to track almost everything, test layouts and copy, have different envrionments, and more.
There is just so much extra customizability when you have a custom website (that’s kinda the point, isn’t it?).
Difficult Integrations
Let’s say you use some service that allows customers or clients to make appointments, pay a bill, upload documents, or something else. When you go with a no-code solution, you have to hope that the service you use has an integration for your no-code solution. Otherwise, you may have to pay for a third party that has built the integration, meaning more money. Sometimes, if neither of the above exists, a no-code solution may let you write actual code for you to manually write some sort of integration into your platform. But, then you’re writing code, which you probably don’t know how to do in the first place.
When going custom, if the service you use has a developer API, then it can seamlessly be integrated. And if it doesn’t, then the service can just be embedded in the page. Not only is it easier to integrate a service or platform, you can also customize the look and feel of that service to make it match your site perfectly.
But what about the cost?
Like we said earlier, going custom doesn’t cost millions of dollars when you’re building something small like a business website. As custom software takes more time and requires more skill, the cost will often times be higher than using a no-code solution. But, odds are, your website will not be the next FaceBook, TikTok, or Instagram - a massive project that will take several months to design, develop, test, and have constant ongoing maintenance and feature work. Your website will be a few, to maybe tens of pages, with an integration or two of a third party service.
So, even if the upfront cost to go custom may be a bit higher than a no-code solution, it’ll likely cost you way less in the long run when factoring in all the templates, extensions, and services you’ll be tacking on in monthly or yearly subscriptions. Plus, when you consider the higher conversion rates, better analytics, custom design, faster load times, and more, you’ll be selling way more, not only making more money, but also making money faster - so, in a way, the higher price pays for itself and then some.
Obviously, regardless of custom solutions or not, giving any sort of estimate on the actual cost is almost impossible since prices vary greatly depending on the number of pages, integrations, level of customizability, etc., that your website or software requires.
But, you’ve read enough about why custom solutions are almost always the way to go.
Are you ready to give your business an edge up?
By now, you are well-versed in the disadvantages of a no-code or non-custom solution. If you reach out to us, we can dicuss your needs and talk about next steps for you to get the seamless, lightning-fast, custom experience that both your business and your clients deserve.
