7 Reasons To Use WordPress For Your Small Business Website
April 11th, 2010
When it comes to your small business’ website, which would you choose?
A basic site and design that can run you $3000 plus, requires that you are a computer programmer to make even simple updates to your site’s content, and would have to be completely redesigned if you decide it’s looking a bit outdated?
Or one that is created using software that costs you nothing, has content in a structure that lets you easily update it yourself and has hundreds of professional templates available so if you think the look is outdated you can replace it with a new one in less than 5 minutes?
I thought so!
If you aren’t familiar with it, an introduction to WordPress is in order.
Originally a software package used primarily for blogging, WordPress has become an amazingly robust Content Management System small business owners can use to easily create professional looking websites for their businesses.
Here are 7 reasons why using WordPress for your small business’ website is such an appealing option:
1. Cost. How about free? Yep! Just go to WordPress.org and download the software at no charge (heck, you don’t even have to provide an email address!). You will need to find a web hosting company to host your WordPress website. Hosting should only set you back between $5 – $10 per month and there are a number of quality hosting companies to choose from. A lot of these hosting companies include software called Fantastico with your hosting plan which allows you to install WordPress with just a few clicks – no software download necessary.
2. Ease of Use. Using WordPress is really quite simple. Yes, especially for the technically-challenged among us, there will be a little bit of a learning curve. However, there’s no shortage of quality WordPress tutorials online to help you get up to speed quickly. Once you get the hang of things, adding content is a snap. It’s no more difficult than using a word processing program. And you don’t have to know how to write code or do anything vaguely technical in nature to maintain your site.
3. Themes. Think of a theme as a template. It will change the look and feel of your WordPress site. It can also change the behind-the-scenes workings of your site to provide additional functionality. You can choose from thousands of different themes – some are free, some you have to pay for. And if you can’t find one that quite suits your requirements, you can hire a designer to create a custom theme for your WordPress site.
With themes, it’s easy to get a clean, professional looking site without paying a lot for custom design work. And if one day you decide you don’t like the look of your site – no problem. Find a theme you like better, activate it in WordPress and you instantly have a new look and feel to your site – all without having to change the blog posts or pages on your site.
4. Plugins. Plugins are software the extend the capabilities of WordPress to do pretty much anything you want. Using plugins, you can track site visits, add social bookmarking to your site, automate backups of your site, fight spam, create contact forms, improve site security and a lot more. And, with few exceptions, the plugins are absolutely free.
5. Search Engine Love. Google (and the other search engines) love WordPress. Using WordPress can give your search engine optimization efforts a big boost. And if you take advantage of some of the SEO-related plugins available for WordPress, the searc engines will really think your site is the bee’s knees.
6. Tech Support. While WordPress itself doesn’t have a tech support crew you can call or email, don’t worry. There’s no shortage of places to turn to for help with your questions. WordPress.org has a very active forum where you can search for answers to your questions or post questions to the community. There are also plenty of other sites, blogs, message boards where you can go for advice. Or, you can hire a WordPress expert to help. Bottom line, whatevery issue you have, an answer is not far away.
7. Control. When you host your own WordPress website, you are in the driver’s seat. You can easily update content, add new pages or posts, give the site a facelift and much more without being at the mercy of a web programmer. And if you did want to hire someone to assist you in updating your website, there are plenty of qualified people around who can help.
There you have seven reasons to strongly consider WordPress to power your small business’ website. To be certain, there are definitely situations where having a custom programmed website created by a reputable, qualified professional is the way to go.
However, for the needs of most small businesses, WordPress provides a combination of functionality, flexibility and cost-effectiveness that is tough to beat.
Adam Kreitman is a Saint Louis internet marketing consultant. While he is not a designer, he got tired of seeing small business clients with overpriced, poorly designed websites so he started helping clients develop sites using WordPress. To get the word out to a larger audience he started a website which provides tips, video tutorials and resources for using WordPress for business.
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