Do you need a website or a web platform?

What is a web platform?

Typically a website is a collection of static HTML pages. Most commonly built for informational purposes, not meant to interact with. In comparison, a web platform is a dynamic, interactive system designed for expansion and evolution. For the end user it still delivers a website with HTML pages, but the underlying capabilities are far more robust. Web platforms may include features such as:

• Contact forms for inquiries.
• Booking or scheduling services.
• Blogs with filtering and searching options.
• Case studies and clients' testimonials.
• Analytical events set up by marketing team to understand users interaction with the web platform.
• Chatbots powered by your company’s knowledge base.

Components of a web platform

To build a web platform you need a team of full stack engineers with multidisciplinary knowledge. The expertise required to develop and integrate components of a web platform goes beyond the skills needed to create a static website. Let's briefly walk through most of the components.

Frontend web app

Frontend web app is responsible for rendering HTML pages in a browser. It's meant to make it fast and smoothly, which is necessary for better user engagement with your pages. It usually runs on one of the most famous and proven frameworks Svelte, React, or Vue.js. These are modern, actively developed frontend platforms designed for swift and modular development. Scaling in terms of features, or hiring and team size is not an issue with these frameworks.

Backend services

It's not rare for a web platform to run backend services. They might be used to call 3rd party APIs, or even for interaction with DB. For example, you might want to add a prospect's information to your CRM if they submit a contact form. Or allow your potential customers to configure your offer and store the configuration in DB.

Content Management System (CMS)

This is the central hub for your marketing and content teams. Something what either makes them extremely productive, or move in a slow and harsh way. In a web platform, a CMS is used not only for editing content but also for controlling how it is presented to visitors. Modern CMS are powerful frameworks that enable the creation and management of various types and categories of content, including entire pages of your web platform.

Infrastructure

Even though a web platform's infrastructure is more complex than that of a static website, it remains one of the simplest components. In recent years, infrastructure resources have become heavily commoditized. Major cloud providers make it easy for users to deploy web workloads. Typically, it involves simply connecting a GitHub repository to the vendor's platform.

Analytics

A web platform is too complex to build and develop in a vacuum — you need to constantly collect feedback from users through analytical events that provide insights into their behavior. Visitors’ drop-offs, page load times and conversion rates — these are basic data points you want to collect. The more intricate example would be a drop-off rate on a contact form. If something is wrong with it, then your prospects won't be able to submit it. So you need to know the ratio of those who started the contact form but did not submit it.

Having questions? Talk to us.

Get in touch

How long does it take to build?

Typically, building a web platform takes at least one month. This involves a full-time commitment from one or two engineers and a designer. CMS is an integral part of a web platform. In case of urgent releases it can be added later incrementally, and before it is implemented all updates are added manually to the website. However the more robust and less painful (for engineers) approach is to integrate CMS along with implementation of design in the code.

Adding analytics is often one of the most predictable and routine tasks in this process. Unlike CMS this step can even be implemented after the launch, depending on your priorities, and normally should not take longer than a few days.

If you opt for a static website instead, the timeline may shrink dramatically to just a week if the design is not too rich on animations or other intricate parts. We usually recommend deploying a simple static website before launching a web platform. This is a great opportunity to inform users about the upcoming major update.

Is it difficult to maintain in the long run?

A web platform demands regular attention. Software updates, security patches (at least critical ones), and features enhancements are necessary to keep things running smoothly. You need at least one person part-time on a monthly basis to maintain a web platform.

By contrast, maintaining a traditional website is comparatively simpler, as the only moving parts are HTML files. A website is also less demanding to the expertise and skills of developers who maintain. Updates are usually done manually, or through changes in a template engine used to generate pages.

Should you build a website or a web platform?

It's a hard choice if you don't follow some formal decision framework. Follow these points to decide what you need.

Choose a website if:

• You need to publish basic information about your business.
• Your primary objective is to inform rather than interact.
• Your content or design will rarely change.

Choose a web platform if:

• You plan to interact with prospects or customers online.
• You need advanced content management features for frequent updates.
• You anticipate to scale your online capabilities over time.

If you are still hesitating, or just want to discuss details of your project — feel free to reach out!