For the last 10 days, I’ve spent around 60 to 70 hours building a programmatic SEO directory using Wordpress and Geodirectory.
The domain is ComicBookStores.co, and I'll be releasing a full buildout video this week.
p.s. still adding final touches with search filter and page links.
When I wasn't building in WordPress this week, I was using AI coding tools, like v0, to build and compare the two workflows. These tools are fast. They’re impressive. And they give you a working MVP way quicker than traditional setups.
So it begs the question: What’s the better path forward? Should I just build with AI, or does WordPress still make sense?
At the end of the day, it's hard to see where AI coding doesn't win in the speed category. But with speed, you miss out on a lot of foundational knowledge that came with tweaking my WP sites.
But both work to build an MVP.
And the truth is, if you're dragging your feet longer than a week to decide, the problem probably isn't the tech stack (just being honest).
With that said, here are the pros and cons of using Wordpress (when compared with AI coding tools).
Wordpress Pros:
- The CMS is just better from an admin perspective. You can technically prompt a CMS into existence with AI tools, but WordPress has one that’s super customizable and gives you full control. And when you need to make a really specific change down the line, that level of control lets you work quick.
- The plugin Marketplace is massive. This is a double-edged sword, because there’s a plugin for almost anything, yet a lot of basic things (i.e. resizing & importing images) can be done with a single prompt with AI tools. A lot of plugins are free too.
- WP sites make indexing super easy. You never need to worry about if your WP site will be indexed by search engines or not. SSR an issue for lovable? I don't even think about this for my WP sites.
- Tons of communities and video tutorials out there. There are YouTube videos, tutorials, forums, and guides for pretty much everything. There's 153k people in an Elementor Facebook Group alone, where you can ask and receive feedback on challenges you're running into.
- Structured data and sitemaps are built-in or made simple. It’s nice to have things like schema, robots.txt, and sitemap generation handled for you.
- WP is scalable in a copy-paste kind of way. You can take the exact same site structure and functionality and spin up a new WordPress site with minor tweaks. That’s great if you’re testing new niches or trying to build a portfolio of sites. You can do this with AI tools too, but from a non-coder's POV, it’ll take a bit more technical work.
Wordpress Cons:
- It takes longer to set up. Pretty straight forward. You have to install a theme, find the right plugins, configure them, and get your styling right. Even basic things like bulk uploading data or tweaking front-end layouts can take way longer than you’d expect.
- Plugins can take time to learn and have their quirks. Every plugin has its own settings, its own structure, and its own way of importing or exporting data. Some are easy. Some require a steeper learning curve. Minus one for workflow speed.
- Design takes more effort. Getting a WordPress site to look modern and smooth takes time. You have full control, but you'll have to turn more knobs to open that door.
- Price & cost to start are higher. It's really hard to beat a $50/mo techstack with AI coding tools and Supabase that pretty much lets you create anything. Premium plugins on WP can get pricey and there's no easy way around simple fixed at times.
So, why in the world would you learn Wordpress from scratch in 2025?
Reason #1: To be as close to the project possible.
Wordpress forces you to slow down and think.
People hate slow now. But what comes with this is foundational knowledge on what the hell SEO even is from an on-page perspective.
When you prompt an AI tool to create an "SEO optimized site", do you actually know what's being implemented?
If not, then it's nice to have full control in an environment where you learn the fundamentals with full control.
Reason #2: You want "easier" problems to solve & understand
With AI coding tools, you're still going to run in to broken pages, content hallucinations, and bugs.
For non-coders, this usually means just hitting the "Try and fix it button" and crossing your fingers, or prompting better.
With WP, again, it takes more time, but the problem solving is more linear.
Most WP problems are just finding the right plugin that solves the issue, or toggling a feature within the settings of a plugin.
Main takeway
If I woke up today and started from zero knowledge about WP and AI coding tools, and I just wanted to create a simple directory like comicbookstores.co, then I'd probably jump straight to v0, lovable or bolt.
That's only if my goal is to turn my monetize my directories.
If my goal is to learn SEO and create an SEO consulting side-business, SEO agency, link building agency, or just transfer SEO knowledge to another business I own, I'd probably use Wordpress.
Just my thoughts!
Keep building,
Frey
