Why Business websites should avoid using free WordPress themes?

Business websites mean business wherein you get sales and leads or calls for enquiring about your business product or service. Businesses are known to leverage websites for this sole purpose only and hence one should consider having an impactful and great website which looks both modern as well as unique in nature.

Also as they say first impression is the last impression so you got to get your first impression correct.

Now there are several ways of getting yourself a business website and certainly one of them comes down to having a WordPress based business website and hence the consideration comes to a free WordPress theme since you want to also keep your budget in check and no one wants to spend more when they can get it for lesser amount.

Hence one should consider certainly the following points when you consider a free theme for building up your business website:

a. First Impression: As they say first impression is your last impression. Hence having a unique and modern site is important. Not necessarily a free WP theme would have a nice design. Although many authors have started building up free ones also as nice but then there might be too many users using the same design which we are going to discuss in next point. Hence you should consider if you want to have something which everyone possess or want to have something of your own like a custom made website.

b. Similar design and Copyright material: Free ones are obviously going to be similar design and also sometimes have copyrighted material belonging to others. You may not understand this initially but we have seen many users getting threat calls from several image sourcing companies and scripting companies because the free theme author used some of their copyrighted material and forgot to mention this on the theme. Of course then you pay more that you paid initially while using this free theme. Hence only download GPL compliant themes and read the FAQs properly before using such themes.

c. Restrictive features and functionality: Of course free ones won't have all the features and functionality you can imagine of. If you can live with that and just want a simple business website then its fine as well. But for additional features and functionality and to have a full fledged website its better to consider the premium themes rather than the free ones for this purpose.

d. Might not be fully responsive: WordPress themes which are free might not be fully responsive as they won't be tested as such with several devices and several browser resolutions. Hence there is no guarantee your site will look the best it can on all devices. Of course this makes your impression bad on your customers and visitors. If your site doesn't look good then it reflects on you as well as your business too.

e. Plugin compatibility: Plugins are known to add several additional functionality like an additional video slider or a gallery or contact forms or even SEO plugins. If the free theme you use isn't compatible with the plugin of your choice then you are stuck and need either help of a developer or the original free theme author who might charge you. Hence the initial cost saving goes in for a toss in this case and this is a factor you should consider thinking before using a free theme.

f. Bloated Codes: Free ones are known to have bloated codes as they are free and made in hurry and can have copied codes from here and there known to have issues later on with either plugins or updated version of WordPress. They are also not tested for security conditions and can lead to malware and hack too.

g. Footer links: Footer links have rather free themes based on WordPress author links and doesn't have links of your website which also is another problem and you might not want to showcase someone else's name instead of yours on your business website. If the footer link is prominently placed then its going to be more bad for you than good.

Conclusion: Hope the above points help a business site owner with his decision of whether to use a free WordPress theme or not as per the viable situations and conditions prevailing at that time.