Why I Use and Love Squarespace
When I started out in Web Design, the only platform I knew was WordPress. I had a personal blog on WordPress for 10 years. My mother (who is in her 80s) has been a WordPress designer for over 15 years. My first few clients already had WordPress websites that I helped them update. I had not even considered other platforms.
Just a couple of months after informally hanging out my shingle (I didn’t even have my own website yet), I got a referral for a client who needed her Squarespace website updated. For some reason (fate?) this lovely woman I had never met agreed to trust me with her website even though I had NEVER used Squarespace. And for some reason (destiny?) I decided to take on the challenge! (Deborah is a psychic so maybe she just knew it would all work out!)
I immediately fell in love with Squarespace. It was so easy to learn the platform and the overall experience was much simpler than WordPress. It felt lighter and more fun to work in Squarespace and everything was just beautiful - the login screen, the templates, and even the back-end user interface.
After just ONE Squarespace website, I decided to specialize and stick with only Squarespace for new clients. When I had to go back and help my WordPress clients it felt like returning to the dark ages. Now I won’t go back! I moved my personal blog to Substack in 2021 and haven’t looked at WordPress since.
Here are the things I love about Squarespace and why I think it’s a great platform for solo business owners and small businesses, whether you DIY or hire a designer to help you.
It’s Very Easy to Get Started on Squarespace
The WordPress world is complex with a lot of moving parts. You need to find a hosting platform, install the WordPress program, select a theme/builder and install (and manage) lots of plug-ins to get a website up and going. The back end (where you update your website) is clunky and not intuitive. Even for someone who prides themselves on being quite tech savvy!
Compared to WordPress, Squarespace is like having a website “easy button”. You select a subscription plan, optionally pick a template to start, and you are ready to roll. You even get a free 14-day trial before you have to hand over any cash.
Squarespace is known for its beautiful, modern templates you can use for free out-of-the box and they even have a tool to help you build a starting layout yourself (which is pretty easy!)
The Squarespace templates used to be more constricting, and you had to make sure you picked the right one up front to get all of the features you need, but by the time I started using Squarespace (7.1) all of the templates offered the same features, so they are just a visual layout starting point. Underneath they are all the same, so no stress about picking the wrong one!
If you are willing to pay a bit more, you can purchase a premium template that will give you a bigger head start on design that is more specific to your business and more training to help you get up and running quickly. (Read about my favorite premium Squarespace templates and why I think they are a great place to start!)
Squarespace Requires no Technical Maintenance and Has Great Support
WordPress websites require you to log in to your website MULTIPLE TIMES A WEEK to update plugins. That used to drive me BANANAS. They also have no centralized support, so you have to sift through their user forums and rely on Google. Or in my case, sometimes call your mom for help! (But most people don’t have a mom who is a web designer!)
Once your Squarespace website is up and going, you don’t have to touch it unless you want to update it. Security and technical updates all happen behind the scenes, so your website is always safe and secure with no plug-ins that have to be regularly updated. I have never heard of anyone hacking into a Squarespace website but I have seen it happen with WordPress (FYI).
Occasionally Squarespace will update something that impacts all Squarespace websites, or the entire platform will go down (briefly). This does not happen often, but because Squarespace is managing the main website code, they have to fix it, not you.
If you add your own custom code to your website, Squarespace can make changes that impact that code. This would be the same on any website platform. If your designer implemented that custom code for you, they will likely help you if things go awry!
Squarespace also has amazing support. They have 24/7 email support and a live chat available from 4am to 8pm Eastern Time. I’ve always gotten speedy and helpful support from Squarespace.
There is also a great Squarespace user forum where generous Squarespace designers spend a lot of time answering questions. You have to be a Squarespace user to access the forum so not just anyone can weigh in! (This is not so for WordPress which is an open source free for all.)
Squarespace Has Lots of Business Tools Built Right In
I don’t know about you, but I like to keep things SIMPLE and the FEWER logins and programs I have to keep track of the better.
With Squarespace you can purchase your domain, manage your website, get a professional email address, send out newsletters , schedule appointments, create online courses, sell products, and even send invoices all from your Squarespace account.
There are additional fees for these tools, and you can choose to use other programs if you want to (Squarespace plays well with most other programs), but if you want to, you can manage all of those things in ONE PLACE, one login, one look and feel, one support hotline.
Squarespace Websites are “Easy” to Build and Update
I have to put “easy” in quotes because if you don’t build websites all day, there is no platform that will feel super easy to use. You will have to invest some time to learn Squarespace, but it’s a zillion times easier than learning WordPress, and is known for being one of the easiest website builders out there.
The latest Squarespace editing experience, Fluid Engine, provides much more flexibility for design options without code than the previous “classic editor”. This flexibility comes with a bit more complexity (it’s easier to mess things up than it used to be) but Squarespace is designed as a do-it-yourself platform and it’s hard to create a really horrible looking Squarespace website.
Even if you hire someone to build your Squarespace website for you, you can likely make updates on your own. Most designers will train you as part of their web design service because they want to enable you to maintain your own website. (Squarespace designers don’t typically want to take your money for ongoing maintenance. Although some will!)
My clients do often come back for help if they want to completely overhaul their website, need new pages, or want to add new functionality. But they can add their own blog posts, send out emails, tweak words, and update images without any help from me (with my awesome training videos!) And I would argue that they COULD figure it all out on their own if they wanted to spend more time.
You can also do lots of things with code on Squarespace to make your website look EVEN cooler. You don’t have to, but you can. (I like options!)
The Squarespace Community is Awesome
One of the reasons it’s fun to build Squarespace websites is because there is a huge community of Squarespace designers to connect with, and they are really great people. I already mentioned the user forum where Squarespace experts actively answer user questions.
There are lots of free summits, webinars, and ask-me-anything sessions you can attend, and the community genuinely wants to help, not just make money and sell you something! (Although I have also purchased many, helpful Squarespace courses.)
If you are a Squarespace designer there are even more resources available in the Squarespace Circle community (which you can join as soon as you have three paid websites under your belt). There is a Circle forum, early access to new features, monthly education, and an annual in-person conference every year.
This designer community is great for all Squarespace users because it means if you hire a designer, they have a big support network, which helps YOU. These designers are also actively working with Squarespace to continue to make the product even better.
How Does Squarespace Compare to Other Website Platforms?
I have made it pretty clear that I prefer Squarespace to WordPress. If you want to build a website on your own or least maintain it on your own, you are probably not even considering WordPress (or you really shouldn’t be).
I haven’t used any other platforms but here is a quick round up of what I have learned from the internet (and my designer network) about some other popular platforms for solopreneurs and small businesses. I am biased so take it with a grain of salt and do some googling on your own, too!
Wix – this is a popular website builder, I think, because you can use it for free! The downside of free (there is always a downside to free) is that you have Wix branding and ads on your website. This is a no go in my opinion for a professional website. Apparently Wix has less structure than Squarespace so you can really go wild with your layouts, but that is not necessarily a good thing if you don’t know what you are doing. I don’t know anyone who uses Wix and I can’t find a single article recommending it over Squarespace.
Canva – you can build a very simple one-page website in Canva. And if that is all you need, and you are already a Canva pro user, this could work for a simple starter website. They have lots of templates you can use. You can’t add SEO features (to make your website more easily found on Google) and it might not look great on mobile but it’s free (if you already have a pro subscription). If not, just pay for Squarespace!
Showit – this is a platform lots of designers use. It is supposedly user-friendly and highly customizable with lots of design freedom (not always good for beginners, as I mentioned). Showit does not have blogging (or ecommerce) built in. If you want to blog you have to connect to WordPress and to sell products you have to use Shopify. Not sure why you would go down this path. It seems to be a popular option for photographers.
Shopify – if you need a big online store selling physical products with multiple inventory locations or internationally outside of the US and Europe, Shopify might be a better choice for you than Squarespace. Here is a post that compares Squarespace and Shopify for ecommerce.
The Net-Net
Squarespace is one of the easiest website platforms to use and is known for making beautiful, functional websites. Most solopreneurs and small businesses don’t need complex websites with lots of custom functionality. They just need modern, professional looking websites to tell people who they are, collect email addresses, blog every now and then, set up appointments, and maybe sell some courses or products. Squarespace does this all very well. There is certainly no need for a complex web platform like WordPress.
You can keep it simple and have everything you need out of the box or add in some customization to make your website a little cooler and more fun. Either way you will get a stable, secure website that you can likely build and maintain on your own (if you want to) and a big community of people you can lean on for support!
For a solopreneur or small business, Squarespace is a no brainer!
