In today’s world, having a professional website is the prerequisite for success in the business world. That applies to small businesses as well. Despite knowing the importance of a website, small businesses tend to ignore developing their website. The most common response is that they don’t require websites and it is something only larger businesses require. This is the wrong approach.
Irrespective of the business size or industry, a professional website is a must. When it comes to web development platforms, WordPress stands out as a reliable choice. This article discusses the top 10 reasons why WordPress is the best option for small businesses. Before we delve into the 10 reasons, let us get a quick overview of the platform itself.
What is WordPress?
It is an open-source web development platform. It originally started as a blogging platform, before venturing into web development. It has native support for a wide range of websites, including simple portfolios to large-scale eCommerce platforms. One evidence of its popularity is that around 40 – 45% of total websites use WordPress. The developers recently introduced a new release, 6.4.1, bringing innovative features and removing various bugs.
Now, let’s delve into the top reasons why WordPress is the perfect choice for small businesses.
Why Small Businesses Should Use WordPress
1. Ease of Use
The top reason most businesses and individuals prefer WordPress is the ease of use. Even if you don’t have technical knowledge or past web development experience, you can create an engaging and unique website in a matter of minutes. That’s how easy it is to use it. There is minimal coding involved. Everything is done through the WordPress visual interface. Most of the features are drag and drop, which further improves the ease of use.
2. Themes
If you don’t want to develop the website yourself or hire a WordPress development company, then simply use pre-existing themes. There are millions of templates available. Some are free while others are pay to use. Depending on your business niche, select the relevant theme and install it.
Of course, you’ll need to make some minor changes but that’s it. There is no coding, or any other work involved. With just a few clicks and edits, you have a professionally designed website. Don’t underestimate the importance of a good website design as it can make or break your reputation. So, choose a theme carefully.
3. Plugins
Plugins are like a software tool. They add new features to your website or enhance existing ones. Every website requires some plugins. For example, it is quite likely that you will want to market your business website. For that, you’ll use a plugin. WordPress has a plugin for every need, be it marketing, eCommerce, social media integration, or anything else. It certainly increases the platform’s versatility.
4. Community Support
Although it is quite unlikely that you’ll run into trouble when using WordPress, but if you do, there is no cause for worry. Why? WordPress has a large and active community that is always available to address potential issues. WordPress has an official community page as well. Apart from that, there are dedicated forums. Feel free to ask questions from some of the world’s top WordPress experts.
5. Scalability
When it comes to scalability, no platform comes close to WordPress. From a small blog to a customized eCommerce store, you can create it all on WordPress. This scalability is perfect for small businesses. They can start small, later adding new features as their business grows.
6. Multilingual Support
The below picture shows the world’s most spoken languages in 2023.
Figure 1. The most spoken languages worldwide in 2023 (by speakers in millions)
You may be wondering about this statistic’s relevance to WordPress. Well, WordPress is not inclined to the English language alone. It has native multilingual support. It allows businesses to target different countries simultaneously and increase their reach.
7. Updates
Another reason small businesses should opt for WordPress is because it gets regular updates. The developers are quick to fix potential issues and to introduce exciting new features. As a small business, it is imperative that you integrate the latest trends. Otherwise, it won’t take long for your business to become irrelevant.
8. SEO-Friendly
Search engine optimization or SEO is the process of improving your website’s ranking on Google and increasing the organic traffic. While we won’t go into the details, all you need to know is that without SEO, your website serves no real purpose. WordPress is inherently SEO-friendly. It makes optimizing your website a whole lot easier. On top of it, there are numerous SEO plugins that give you an edge over competitors using other platforms.
9. Cost Effective
We acknowledge that cost is a significant concern for every business, especially small businesses. After all, their profit margin is significantly lower than large organisations. By using free themes, small business owners can reduce the upfront development costs by a significant margin. They can even design the website themselves. Once the business grows and they have the required resources, they can ask a web development company to design a custom theme.
10. Mobile Optimisation
The below figure shows the percentage of mobile device website traffic worldwide from 1st quarter 2015 to 1st quarter 2023.
Source: Statista
As you can see, more than 58% traffic comes from mobile devices. WordPress websites are inherently responsive and mobile-friendly. In other words, it gives you an edge over others. There’s no need to develop this functionality from scratch. As WordPress is already SEO-friendly, you can easily tap into this traffic with the right marketing strategies.
Conclusion
As a leading web development company in Pakistan, we can say with full confidence that WordPress is indeed the best option for small businesses. As the discussion shows, it offers a great deal of versatility and exciting features. Of course, like any other platform, WordPress does have limitations. But these limitations are not enough to ignore its benefits. So, if you are looking to set up a website for your business, go for WordPress.
