According to PEW Research Center, over 85% of Americans are online every single day, and as a business, your first impression with those 282+ Million potential customers is your website.
With all that opportunity, you’ll want to make the best first digital impression possible.
Consumers are far more likely to assign value to a company that has a safe and high-quality website. Most importantly, they are more likely to complete purchases when they see consistent and trustworthy information across your website and all your distribution channels.
Thanks to modern website builders such as Wix, Squarespace, WordPress, and Webflow - business owners are now able to take advantage of the benefits of a high-quality website without prior coding knowledge, with relatively low maintenance, and at an affordable price.
This effectively levels the playing field between small business owners and large corporations as far as creating a desirable brand perception directly to consumers.
There are many different options for website building available, but these three options are consistently ranked as the top three most utilized website builders used today. WordPress, Wix, Webflow, and Squarespace can be used to create a high-quality website, but which website builder is best for your business?
Wix
Wix is a visual website builder that primarily uses a “drag-and-drop” method of website design. Website owners have full creative liberty to move photos, widgets, and text wherever they please with no coding knowledge required. Wix allows the use of approved third-party plugins, which allow users more options to customize their website.
Wix is ideal for those with little knowledge of programming or web design who need a highly intuitive tool to create a website on their own. As a closed-source website builder, Wix features customer support and insured security but also ultimately owns your website - making it difficult to transfer your work to other places if necessary.
Features
Over 800 highly customizable templates to use - but - the chosen template can’t be switched after the website goes live.
Easy to manage Ecommerce features that can be accessed through a mobile app.
Built-in subscription forms, event/appointment booking, pop-ups, and email marketing.
Built-in SEO tools, in addition to plugins, that offer more advanced options to rank higher in searches.
Wix plans start as low as $16 per month and can reach as high as $64 per month for their Business VIP plan.
Wix is the easiest of the three options to create a website. It is an ideal website builder for small to medium-sized businesses that do not have access to internal tech support and who want maximum creative freedom in creating their website.
Check out Laxxon Medical's new Wix site which was created and designed by 6° Media earlier this year.
Squarespace
Squarespace is a website builder that is known for its elegant and modern designs and was built with creative people in mind. Like Wix, Squarespace requires no coding knowledge to create a powerful and beautiful website.
This platform performs at its best for creators who want to feature large photos, videos, or text files at their optimum viewing potential. The drag-and-drop options work through pre-established blocks within templates, so there is less creative freedom for creators in this regard.
Squarespace is also a closed-source builder and owns all rights to websites created within their application.
Features
Unlimited bandwidth and storage, starting on a basic plan.
No transaction fees for eCommerce, ideal for small inventories or digital products.
Offers Google Analytics as a standard feature with any plan.
Highly responsive and effective customer support options, available 24/7 to help with any issues.
Squarespace offers a free 14-day trial period, with plans starting at $16 per month and can cost up to $65 per month for their Ecommerce Advanced plan.
Squarespace is ideal for entrepreneurs who can take advantage of the unlimited storage and want to showcase their designs with the highest quality portfolio possible. There is a slightly higher learning curve for Squarespace than Wix, but no coding knowledge is required, and it is a manageable solo project.
WordPress
WordPress is the most unique of the three options and is the most popular “website builder” on the market - with 37% of websites created with WordPress. Although millions of websites are built on this foundation, WordPress is technically a Content Management System (CMS) with features that can be added to customize a website.
WordPress primarily uses “Blocks” or widgets that can be customized to build the layout of your website. As an open-source builder, there are unlimited options and possibilities for ways to personalize your website. But, with this freedom, there is also an increased security risk and a much higher learning curve. Although no coding knowledge is necessary to use this tool, coding knowledge greatly increases what WordPress websites can do and allows for unlimited innovation.
There are two options for WordPress available for download:
WordPress.com - is a paid option with customer support, more security, and a slightly easier-to-use user interface. It is a hosting solution and support team for your WordPress website.
WordPress.org - is the free option you use to create, optimize, change and update your website. It is open-source software trusted by developers everywhere, does not include hosting, and is widely used.
Features of WordPress.org
Unlimited options for customization with thousands of free and paid templates, plug-ins, and widgets that can be downloaded from WordPress itself or browser sites.
Adaptable, all work done can be changed or moved at any time to any hosting service.
Full ownership - the final product belongs directly to the creator, allowing full freedom.
SEO-friendly and can help a website reach the highest possible results on search engines.
WordPress (when using WordPress.org) is free to use, payments just go towards hosting or utilizing premium plugins, themes, applications, or widgets.
WordPress is ideal for larger businesses or any business with tech resources available as it has a steep learning curve and will require time, skill, and effort to utilize properly. WordPress is the best long-term solution as it has the most options available for customization and can do anything that a company may need while allowing the company to maintain full ownership of its website. For businesses looking to scale - WordPress would be the best option.
Webflow
Webflow has been used by well over 3.5 million designers to create, scale, and collaborate on amazing websites that look beautiful and function flawlessly. Webflow makes building websites easy so that you and your team can focus on what they do best and spend less time messing around with website creation and design.
You’re probably curious about what Webflow is and what sets it apart from its competition. Webflow is an in-browser design tool that will give you the ability to build, design, and launch a responsive and attractive website visually. The easiest way to imagine Webflow is as an all-in-one design platform that will allow you or your team to transition from an idea to a finished product.
Webflow Features
Below are just some of the features which set Webflow apart from its competition:
The code and visual design aspects of Webflow aren’t separated.
When you create something in the visual editor, it’s powered by CSS, HTML, and JavaScript.
You have the ability to reuse CSS classes.
Once you define a class, you can that class for any elements which should have similar styling or as a jumping-off point for different variations.
It offers a variety of different affordable plans starting from free all the way up to $39/month for their business plans.
They offer extras such as the ability to connect a custom domain, host your HTML site, or utilize the Webflow CMS.
Webflow has four pricing plans with a custom option available upon request. They include Starter, Basic, CMS, and Business. Webflow’s most popular option is its CMS plan which includes a custom domain, 2,000 CMS items, 1,000 monthly submissions, 200 GB bandwidth, and three guest editors.
Which website builder should you use?
This depends on the capabilities of your team and the resources available to use in website design. In order to level the playing field between your business and large corporations, you will need to invest money, time, and human resources into creating a great digital first impression.
About 6° Media If you want to create a digital culture for your company that wins over customers' hearts, 6° Media is here to help. Our skilled marketing experts can foster your business's continuous growth at scale, on-budget.