6 REASONS WHY I SWITCHED TO SQUARESPACE
Your website platform can make a huge difference to your business growth and productivity. Finding the right one for you can sometimes take some trial and error, as it did in my case. But if you’re starting out or are not happy with your current platform, read this article to save yourself some hassle and time.
For the past couple of years I’ve been a WordPress user. I went with that route when I started my new business because I was told by many entrepreneurs it was the most customizable website platform.
Prior to that, I had a website with WIX for my previous business. I’m mentioning this because that pretty much left a bad taste in my mouth for drag and drop builders. I found it super limiting in customization and there were a lot of things I just wasn’t able to do the way I wanted. This really frustrated me, so after I switched to my new business, I wanted to make sure my new website platform was capable of doing exactly what I wanted.
After doing extensive research, everything was pointing me towards WordPress, so I went with it. It was a huge learning curve at first but I’m the kind of person that likes to do it all myself when it comes to website building. The main reason for that is because I change my mind A LOT. I often like to change my design, layout etc. So I always wanted to be able to easily and quickly make changes whenever I felt like it, without waiting for a designer and paying for it each time.
However, after using it for about two years, I have to say I’ve gone through a lot of FRUSTRATION. I finally admitted to myself that there has to be a better way. I did more research and came across a lot of articles detailing why people made the switch from WordPress to Squarespace. Plus a good friend of mine had already been using it for a while and had nothing but good things to say about it. I signed up for their free trial and I have to say, I was instantly HOOKED! So I will detail out the reasons why I made the switch below and hopefully this will help you make your own decision if you’re in the same predicament as I was.
1. SPEED
For starters, WordPress is super slow! Whenever I needed to create a new page or make a small update, it took so long! And no matter how many different cache-clearing plugins I tried, it didn’t make a difference in the speed. This was also not good for my website visitors because the pages never opened as fast and as smoothly as they did on most other sites. This was the major source of frustration for me.
When I started switching my website content over to Squarespace, I could not believe how fast it was! I was amazed at the time I was saving. Plus you can preview your pages instantly whereas, in WordPress, you have to wait for the changes to refresh in a new page each time. With Squarespace, you get to see the changes in the preview mode as you make them, right then and there.
2. EASE OF USE
With WordPress, some things are very difficult to achieve and take a long time to figure out. Anytime you want something custom-made, you gotta go through all those forums, post your questions and hope that someone answers you. Many times nobody does.
Not only that, but anytime you need something new done, you have to install yet another plugin. For me, it always seemed like I had to have a gazillion plugins for my site to work properly. And guess what? The more plugins you have, the more they slow down the overall website speed.
With Squarespace, everything you need is included in an easy drag-and-drop builder. Whether you need a newsletter block, a contact form, a payment button or a product page, it’s all there. You don’t need to worry about installing a separate plugin for each one of those things. So simple.
3. LESS HASSLE
Speaking of those plugins that you need to install, they all need to be updated constantly. Almost every day some of the plugins have updates. And if you don’t update them right away, your website is in danger of getting hacked! What a pain.
You don’t need to worry about any of that nonsense with Squarespace because they take care of all necessary updates for you. Plus your website is secure. If anything ever happens to your website, Squarespace will fix it. With WordPress, if anything happens, you’re on your own.
4. BETTER SEO
A while ago someone decided to spread a rumor that Squarespace SEO isn’t good (probably a WordPress designer 😜). But that’s simply not true, at all. It’s a myth, people!
The truth is that SEO ranking signals are constantly changing. The biggest game-changers in ranking higher on Google search are things like how often you blog, how valuable your content is, how well your site is optimized, using backlinks, and so on.
And as Anthony Caselena, founder and CEO of Squarespace put it:
"Squarespace is engineered to work properly without a sea of plugins, and you should not take the lack of a plugin for this to mean that we didn't actually just build it right from the start. We actually scan the top installed WordPress plugins regularly and ensure we simply do all of that in our core."
5. BETTER FOCUS
When you don’t have to worry about constant plugin updates, taking forever to make changes or security of your site, you have more time to focus on actually growing your business. Seriously, you become more productive.
Now you can clearly focus on writing new blog posts, creating content and growing your audience. In other words, you have more time for those money-making activities. It’s so easy to get caught up in busywork, but not really move forward. However, when you have the right tools you need for your business, such as a faster and easier website platform, you’re less likely to waste a lot of time on minute details. Instead, you can spend your time productively, making progress in the growth of your business.
6. SUPPORT
And finally, you get way better technical support if you need it (which you will, trust me) with Squarespace. As I mentioned before, with WordPress you kind of have to hope that your question gets answered by another user because it’s an open-source platform that you’re not paying for. This means that a lot of the time, you’re left with no solution, which leads to further frustration.
On the other hand, Squarespace comes with full technical support from professional staff. Plus, if you really want to do something custom that their templates may not include, you still have the option to ask questions in their forum. I found that many of my questions had already been answered there and I was able to find some custom CSS codes for certain functions.
In conclusion, I am very happy that I made the switch and I honestly wish I had done it sooner. Squarespace makes it super easy to launch and edit your site. You get a clean, modern and professional-looking site in a breeze. Even though I was skeptical at first about being able to customize it, I was very pleasantly surprised at how many options there were.