Many business owners struggle to decide which website platform to use, especially when there are so many options out there these days. Finding the platform that will be the best fit for your business is a challenge.
To help you out, we’ve narrowed it down to Squarespace and Showit for you to choose between. With years of experience working with clients in multiple industries, these platforms have proven to be the best for multiple reasons–which we’ll explain in this post!
Let’s break down the pros and cons of both Squarespace and Showit so you can pick the platform that’s right for you.
The Benefits of Squarespace
Squarespace has been branded as a great alternative to platforms like WordPress and Wix–and we certainly agree that it is. One of the best parts about Squarespace is that it’s an all-in-one platform. You’ll be able to take care of email marketing, blogging, e-commerce, lead capturing, and appointment scheduling–all in your Squarespace account.
The platform offers professional templates to help build out your website with no coding required! You can integrate social media accounts and e-commerce tools, or you can use Squarespace’s e-commerce plan. Squarespace is very user-friendly, which means it’s a breeze to make changes or edits to your site, increase website SEO, or monitor the built-in traffic analytics.
Squarespace’s easy-to-use features mean there isn’t a big learning curve. Squarespace even recently released a new content editing functionality called Fluid Engine, which allows users to create more complex designs. But if you do have difficulties, Squarespace offers an amazing support policy so you can get help. They also have active forums where you can get your questions answered. Plus, Squarespace offers webinars and workshops to address any issues you might run into.
The Downside of Squarespace
Although Squarespace is easy to work with, it comes with some design limitations. The platform is very template-based, which means there’s not a lot of wiggle room when you want to fully customize your website–unless you add some code. That said, with the Fluid Engine update, you have more flexibility when designing your layout. But while Squarespace irons out any issues with the update, you still might need to rely on code for certain customizations.
It’s also hard to deal with bulk product editing, and you won’t be able to bulk edit each product separately. There isn’t a media library, so there’s no easy way to edit photos besides going back to a specific image on your site and editing it from there. Another consideration is less efficient SEO. Since Squarespace websites are built with templates, they require a lot of backend code. This causes slow page load speeds, especially on mobile, which hurts your overall SEO.
The Benefits of Showit
Showit offers full design flexibility for you to create a completely custom website. You have unlimited design options and full creative freedom without a single line of code. Plus, the platform is optimized for both mobile and desktop views, and you’ll be able to design a completely different layout for mobile devices.
Showit integrates seamlessly with WordPress, which is super convenient if you need to transfer an existing blog. There are built-in SEO features as well, and it’s easy to add titles and headings, alt text, and meta descriptions.
Like Squarespace, Showit also offers incredible support. They have top-notch customer care for their subscribers. They can be messaged directly from the help center, and they reply within 1-2 hours during normal business hours. If you can’t tell, we’re a big fan of Showit–especially for service providers!
The Downside of Showit
Unfortunately, Showit isn’t an all-in-one platform. It doesn’t offer email marketing, e-commerce, blogging or other included services that you can get on Squarespace. For e-commerce, you’ll need to integrate Shopify, Woocommerce, or Thrivecart. If you want a blog, you’ll need to update it to integrate WordPress. And you’ll still need to have an external account for email marketing as well.
Although you have tons of creative freedom over your website, you’ll need to design the mobile view separately, which might be a disadvantage if you don’t need or want the customization. This adds a bit more work to the process since you’ll essentially design the website on desktop, then design it again on mobile. Another thing to think about is the lack of built-in analytics on Showit. If understanding and analyzing your traffic is one of your priorities, you’ll need to integrate Google Analytics to see that data.
Considerations for e-Commerce businesses
For businesses that offer more than 200 products, you should consider building your website on Shopify. Shopify is the best in the game for e-commerce, and it’s the easiest platform to integrate the apps you need to run a fully functional business. It also includes powerful marketing and SEO tools, making it highly effective for large-scale product-based businesses.
How to Decide Which Platform is Better for You
Choosing a platform comes down to your unique business needs and goals. Consider both your current business needs and what functionalities you might need in the future.
If you’re trying to highlight your work in an appealing way and need more design capabilities, Showit might be for you. If you need to run a day-to-day business, having an all-in-one platform on Squarespace–even with some design limitations–might be the better option.
Both platforms are good options, it just depends on what capabilities you’re looking for. But if you want extra support to create the perfect website for your business, get in touch! We’re offering Website in a Week services so you can get your website up and running in just one week. Even on a condensed timeline, we work with you intentionally and strategically to deliver a design that reflects your brand and vision.
Comments +