Why Squarespace is a great platform for small businesses and freelancers!

If you've been to my website, you've probably noticed that I'm a die-hard Squarespace fan.

That's not to say that I've never used other platforms. Wordpress, Shopify, Showit, Weebly, Wix I've tried it all and each platform has its pros and cons.

Here are a few reasons why I prefer Squarespace over these other platforms. Maybe you'll end up with a good idea of what Squarespace is capable of and whether it's the right solution for you.

Industry-leading templates

Squarespace templates are designed and built with best practices for user interface and user experience, known as UI/UX. This means that form and function are built right in. Responsive web design (RWD) is also automatically built in, meaning that your website will work on any device and on any screen. The size and content look equally good on all devices.

The templates feature a thoughtful, minimalist design and appealing visual graphics with just enough text to get your message across and grab visitors' attention.

You might be wondering if your website will look "like Squarespace". Maybe, yes and no. Your website can be as unique as your business and the look depends on how much you change the template. The templates serve as a starting point and are fully customizable. All templates have the same basic code and functionality. So you can start with a completely blank page if you wish.

User friendliness

This is a very important point if you want to design your website yourself or at least make changes to it. This is where Squarespace wins this round by far over other platforms.

Squarespace is easy to use and that's why I love using it for my clients and recommend it to all small business owners.

Squarespace has been specifically designed to allow users without programming skills to work with it. Everything is kept intuitive and really simple and the platform offers the user all the necessary tools to work with, but not too many options that would be overwhelming.

You can add a blog and a store with just a few clicks. The backend is super lean and you don't have to use any code.

As a small business owner, the ability to make changes and updates to your website is an incredible advantage. Hiring a web designer to make changes every time can be very costly and a waste of time.

Security

Security is super important if you want to protect your website from hackers and bugs.

Squarespace is a "closed source" platform. This means that the only people who can access the platform or add functions are the technicians and developers at Squarespace headquarters.

Why is this important? Everything you use on Squarespace is completely secure and is built into the platform for your best advantage by the platform developers themselves. Everything you need to create a great website is already built in. You don't need to download any extras or plugins. Everything is included in a nice, secure package, free from hackers and evil spirits.

Squarespace takes care of all the updates and security, so you literally don't have to do anything. And low maintenance is the best kind of maintenance when you're running a small business!

In comparison, other platforms are "open source" such as WordPress, which means that any developer can create plugins and add-ons that can easily breach the security of your website.

The downside of one of these "open source" sites in terms of security is that they are very high maintenance. You have to constantly make sure that everything you download to your site is trustworthy, which is often not the case! You have to make sure yourself that everything is regularly updated and secure. If you forget to update anything, you leave yourself vulnerable to hackers and viruses that aim to destroy your website.

For a large company that has a developer available around the clock, this is not a big problem. But most small companies don't have that luxury!

Customer support

One thing I absolutely love about Squarespace is the free support team.

Squarespace has a great team dedicated to answering questions about their platform and supporting users. I'm a big fan of their live chat feature, but the email support is great too. The support team is very quick to respond and super helpful.

Squarespace also has a huge free library of articles on exactly how to use everything. If there's a feature in Squarespace, there's bound to be a detailed article on how to use it. Even I still refer to this library sometimes and often send clients useful articles to read.

Squarespace can offer this great service and these great tutorials because they are responsible for the entire platform and know exactly how everything works.

Many other platforms do not offer this kind of support, especially Wordpress has no support function at all.

These are some of the reasons why I love Squarespace for small business owners and freelancers!

Squarespace offers a 14-day trial period. Just try it out, play with the existing templates and see for yourself how great it is!

If you're convinced by Squarespace, but just don't have the time to figure out everything to make the website look the way you want it to, feel free to book a consultation with me.