A familiar claim, and why it doesn’t hold up
Every time I open LinkedIn there’s another post bashing WordPress, and most of them are scaremongering or simply inaccurate. I read one recently claiming a WordPress site needs 40 plugins to function, which isn’t down to WordPress at all, it’s down to a badly put together site.
Careful plugin selection, backed by custom code where it’s needed, brings that number down to a handful. I’ve written before about WordPress security, and the recent vulnerability has given a lot of people licence to sell their alternative as the safer option.
What’s really being sold instead
These posts are usually promoting proprietary systems, owned by a single company, on a monthly subscription. WordPress itself is free. Look closely at the cost of one of these platforms once you’ve added the extras you actually need, and you’re often looking at a serious monthly outlay, sometimes with a limit on how many pages you’re allowed.
You do get drag-and-drop page builders and a range of themes and colour palettes, but it’s worth considering how many other businesses are using that same theme. All of that drag-and-drop convenience adds complexity behind the scenes, and that complexity comes from extra code, which slows the site down and makes life harder for search engine crawlers.
The bigger problem is being tied to their system. They can double the subscription overnight and you either pay it or start your website again from scratch. If the company goes out of business, you’re in the same position, minus a website.
The “free” AI website trap
The other type of site often pushed on local businesses starts out very cheap, sometimes free, built by AI with no content management system behind it. That means no ability to update your own site once it’s live.
What you’re actually paying for with WordPress
You’ll pay for some premium WordPress plugins, but you get to choose which ones and switch if they stop working for you. Hosting works the same way, you’ll have a cost, but you keep the choice and, contract allowing, can move whenever you want.
That flexibility is the real difference. Custom development within WordPress gives you something a fixed-template platform never will.
WordPress isn’t a fix for every website need on its own, but built properly, it gets closer than most of the alternatives being sold on LinkedIn right now.
The comparison, in short
- Proprietary builders charge a monthly subscription that climbs once you add the extras you actually need
- Some plans cap the number of pages you’re allowed
- Everyone’s drawing from the same small set of themes and colour palettes
- Drag-and-drop tools run on extra code that can slow your site and affect how crawlers read it
- You’re locked to their system, a price rise or a company closure means starting again
- “Free” AI-built sites often come with no CMS, so you can’t update your own content
Footnote: I’m an advocate for WordPress, but years of working with it means I also know when it isn’t the right fit. I’ll always give you an honest appraisal of its suitability for your organisation and its requirements, and if it isn’t the right choice, I’ll say so and point you toward the right alternative.