There are no shortcuts: The costly impact of WordPress templates for private equity websites

Using pre-made stock WordPress templates for your private equity website may seem economical, are they worth it in the long-run?

Every day it seems like there are more and more low-cost options for website creation or redesigns. The sites they offer seem impressive and smooth, with the added advantage of being inexpensive. Choosing one of these options for your private equity or investment banking firm seems budget savvy and trendy, but is it really?

Our team looks at websites every day. New to old, we see every kind of website you can imagine. But not only do we see and evaluate websites, we build them.

With this experience, we have the benefit of knowing what solutions have worked in the past and which ones tend to break quickly. Below are three problems with quick, inexpensive, templated solutions.

WordPress Templates are easy for a design firm to implement, but not so easy for clients to update.

Often the most inexpensive websites private equity companies might consider are templated ones. These sites are sold as professional designs, when only colors or the images have been altered.

Because these templates are made to look nice for consumers, rather than with the client in mind, they are created without regard to later updates. This means that the client either must continue to pay the firm for each change they require or risk breaking something.

More plug-ins = More problems

Third-party plug-ins are a convenient way for design firms to add features that you might want to include in your site, such as maps, forms, or videos. Many design firms use an average of 30 or more third-party plug-ins to develop a site.

Unfortunately, since each plug-in is created by different developers, they don’t always function very well together. This can lead to problems for your private equity website including: slow loading times which will damage your SEO results, poor user experience that drives your visitors away, and other usability obstacles.

WordPress templates and plug-ins can cause security issues.

If plug-ins and templated sites are not regularly maintained, they can pose a potential security threat to websites. Unmaintained plug-ins and templates often become obsolete because they cannot adapt to changing core CMS coding standards. When coupled with slow load times, pages are more likely to break when your team is updating content.

Our Solution

Thankfully there is a way to avoid this mess. At MVP we build our websites from the ground up. Our team spends the time necessary to discover what makes your private equity or mergers and acquisitions (M&A) firm’s culture and site requirements unique. Then we’ll work with you to create a customized solution that helps to accomplish your private equity firm’s business, marketing, and branding objectives.

We take pride in developing websites that are easy to maintain and don’t require administrators to know HTML or CSS backend languages. This means that not only will your private equity or M&A firm get a distinct look from others, but it will be simple to revise and secure. We’ll create the right user experience and design to complement your unique goals, then develop it in a way that you can easily modify.

At MVP, security is never an afterthought. On average, our developers use around five necessary plug-ins, instead of our competitors’ 30 or more. Additionally, we vet each plug-in yearly for security threats and efficiency benchmarks.

Our team works hard to maximize both user and administrator experiences. We work with you to create a backend interface that is easy for you to update and manage. In addition to making the backend extremely user friendly, we host training sessions and documentation to make the transition smooth.

Don’t settle for an inexpensive, but easy-to-break website. Our team is ready to help you take your private equity or M&A firm’s website to the next level.

Contact our team today at info@mvpdesign.com or learn more about best website practices with our free redesign checklist here.