Custom vs Pre-Made Magento themes

Custom vs pre-made Magento themes.

A website’s theme is probably one of the biggest questions companies ask themselves when creating a new site. If it is ever overlooked by business owners, then one must ask themselves “Should I really be in charge?” A theme must be representative of your brand image, your target market and most importantly your professionalism. Quite often businesses use colours which are far off their brand colours, and this is bad! As well as being aesthetically displeasing, it creates a sense of unprofessional-ism. I’ve put together a list of advantages/disadvantages of having custom vs pre-made Magento themes. Here they are: 

Pre-made Magento themes:

Now, there are some pretty obvious advantages of using ready-made Magento themes, the list is as follows:

Advantages:                                                                                                                                  

• Low or no cost – This one is pretty obvious, it’s usually cheap or costs nothing at all!
• Time efficient – There’s no waiting for it to be ready, simply download and use it.
• Customizable – Any self-respecting pre-made Magento theme should be customizable. For example by default a theme comes in green, but it allows you to change to whatever colour suits your business.

It may seem like having a ready-made theme will save you money, but when factoring in loss of potential sales, in the long term it may just leave you worse off. The drawbacks are as follows:

Disadvantages:

• The theme may not be optimised for conversions – Some free themes may have been designed with well thought out conversion rate optimisation, however it usually comes down to your business specifically. It’s all good having a theme which is suited to your industry, however a layout that works for a competitor, may not work great for you.
• Losing the competitive edge – You may lose the competitive edge when your pre-made theme doesn’t support some of Magento’s new updates. Magento are constantly working to improve and you may miss out on new features because your current theme may not support it. All while your competitors are sitting on a leather chair stroking a cat and laughing evilly at you. Well maybe not exactly how I described it, but something similar to that!

Custom Magento themes:

Custom made themes have some great advantages which can really positively impact your business. Here are just a few out of many benefits:

Advantages:                                     

• A theme that really fits – Like Cinderella’s glass slipper, a custom Magento theme is built to be a perfect fit for companies, especially when trying to build a strong, corporate identity.
• Support at hand – If you choose a good company to create your tailored Magento theme, they’ll be there once a Magento update comes out to help fix any issues that arise (like us). It can often be difficult for some companies to wrap their head around Magento concepts, that’s why it’s best to leave it with the experts!
• Unique features – As mentioned earlier in this article, with a Custom Magento theme you’ll be able to take advantage of great new features as they roll out. Working with a good Magento agency means you’ll be able to benefit from their expertise, which is something the free alternative can’t offer you.

I’d state the disadvantages, but it would mainly just be the opposite of point 1) and 2) the pre-made theme’s advantages so I’d just be repeating myself.

Overall, I believe if you’re looking to build up a brand image as well as remaining professional, your best option is getting a custom Magento theme. Although it’s not as cheap as its alternative, it may help bring in more sales in the future, making it a worthy investment. If you’re looking to build a custom Magento theme, we’d be delighted to take on your project! We’ve done many custom themes before with highly satisfied clients. Call us on 0121 285 1100 or simply e-mail Sehreen at Sehreen@wow-zone.com