I hate custom WordPress template developers!!!
Yes – I HATE, HATE, HATE custom WordPress Template developers who know enough PHP to be scary but not enough to know how to future proof their template.
What I HATE is the Indi-Wordpress Template Developer who most likely is a weekend warrior or is just really good at graphics. Their website’s normally are great to look at initially, but from an SEO standpoint stink and from a test of time… fail to upgrade to new versions of WordPress and WordPress Plugin’s gracefully.
It is RARE that I come across a custom WordPress website that isn’t all CooKoo. Throw SEO into the mix and people wonder why we are expensive. For instance I have the team look at the code and try to figure out what the previous coder was doing. Then we have to spend time figuring out fixes and work-arounds.
Once we get the website fixed for the moment, we can move forward with our main objective of SEO and visitor conversion. Quite frankly if the visitors we bring you don’t convert… what was the point. Many SEO firms promises and bring the website visitors. We also are concerned about visitor conversion along with SEO.
WordPress Template and Browsers
At this time we also test the website in the top 10 browsers. Yikes! Mistakes are pretty awful at this point. This is when we know that your previous WordPress Template Developer only viewed the website in their favorite Internet browser. We care about the user experience. It is a MAJOR part of the conversion of traffic from browsing to a sale. Who wants to buy from a website that looks awful to them and maybe a little untrustworthy due to being behind the times.
Yes, some websites have a pop-up the “helpfully” suggests another browser. But unless your browser is several years out of date, that is a a pretty lame and rude response to a potential customer. Nothing like telling a customer right off that they don’t meet up to your standards. Shocking that the potential customer went elsewhere and don’t convert into a purchase.
WordPress Template Upgrades
There is a reason why website developers and website developers who specialize in SEO prefer to just use a template from a developer who just focuses on the template. The focused developer has the time and resources to work on upgrades and bugs where the Indi only builds the website to work with the current WordPress version and plugin’s.
I know PHP, CSS and Java really well
Don’t get me wrong. Many Customized WordPress Templates are wonderful. And many Custom WordPress Templates are often beautiful and creative.
However the majority of custom WordPress Templates I have been contracted to do after-development SEO on are total C*ap. Yes they look good, but much like a home that had a previous owner who fancied themselves a Mr. Fix-it and was more a 1 trick pony. Unless the custom WordPress theme developer is a real PHP developer and not a weekend warrior I am going to run into “What The…. Holy Smokes… WHY DID THEY DO THAT????”.
Lazy Website Developer Moves – just a few of my personal favorites recently.
- Main navigation lacking sub-menu functionality. Good luck adding pages to the navigation of the website!
- Leaving behind several similar named templates without out naming them the date & revision. Thanks for making us guess which one is operational.
- Front page is one of several templates. It calls a script that is completely un-editable by any future WordPress updates. This means that the front page most likely has to have the database worked on directly as the WordPress installation cannot make the changes.
- Poor use of CSS – Very redundant code – CSS is for compressing similar features
- Adding H1 Tags to everything.
- Further being lazy and naming all the CSS H1 tags the same thing
To Tell or Just Go With a New Website
At this point I have probably mentioned a few issues to the client. Then I get to the umpteenth issue and it becomes a keep wasting time fixing mistakes of toss the site onto a template that is capable of keeping up with WordPress and WordPress Plugin updates. It is now an uncomfortable conversation about transferring the website to something more compatible. Which after paying $$$ to the initial developer can be a hard reality for the client.
I have always prided myself on telling clients the truth no matter how difficult it might be. And often the truth ends up costing ELC more because I don’t believe in charging clients over the quote unless it is a mess we cannot unravel in a reasonable amount of time. Even then we will work with our clients to work with the original developer on accountability.
However there will always be those times when it is just easier and cheaper all around to allow ELC to transfer the website to a new website template. When we do so you can be assured that if you keep ELC on as your SEO and Webmaster your website will be fully up to date with all the major Internet browsers.
What Do You Do
Well, if you are working with ELC SEO Internet this is what we specialize in so we will discuss your options and pro’s and con’s. If Not, give us a call. We can help you understand what your website needs.
Are you a WordPress Developer?
Contact Us. We are one of the best SEO specialist firm’s in the Midwest / Chicago area. We can SEO your code for your clients.