When it comes to the most popular content management system in the world, people immediately think of WordPress. However, it is not the only choice. You can build your website using the Squarespace platform. The Squarespace Overview will help you arrive at radical knowledge about this platform.
Table of Contents
Overview
Squarespace is a professional provider of website builders and hosting services that can help you build your website with a beautiful interface full of basic features. Squarespace provides users with many great design options and up-to-date templates.
Different from Magento or Woocommerce, Squarespace facilitates various types of businesses creating comprehensive websites with a drag-and-drop interface.
Squarespace’s Competitor and its Market Share
Founded in 2014 by Anthony Casalena, Squarespace has earned great achievements. During the last 3 years, the company has had a constant growth of annual revenue Squarespace’s revenue has grown by 59.33% since 2018. Plus, the firm gained $621.15 million in 2020, which increased 28.14% over the previous year. You can have a clearer look at the following chart.
Currently, on the market, Squarespace ranks as the third most popular hosted website provider. The live websites of Squarespace reached 2,856,925 and the number of live stores is 198,539.
As the chart below illustrates, you can figure out the market share of Squarespace and its competitors. Some direct rivals of Squarespace are Wix, Shopify, and Weebly.
How Does Squarespace Work?
Select a template
To start building a web with Squarespace, you should access Squarespace.com and click the “Get Started” button.
Then find and choose a template that best suits your needs. You can source from Squarespace’s recommendations for more convenience, such as templates for businesses, shops, and restaurants, or portfolios for photographers, designers, and other creatives.
Try free trial
After choosing a template, you are able to design your own website by clicking the “Get started with this design” button.
You will then go through the account creation step which will prompt you to create a free account by entering your last name, first name, email address, and password. Next, Squarespace will show a video tutorial about the basics of using the service.
When you access your account, your template will appear as sample content. At the bottom left, you can choose to create a page exactly like the template or drag and drop the content, and image blocks to adjust to your preference. Besides, you can customize fonts, colors, and animation with the help of the design panel tool.
When you’re done with the design, you can preview your “product” by clicking the “eye” icon in the upper left corner.
Get a free domain name
To make your website work, you will need a domain. Once the site looks good enough, you can hit the “Upgrade now” button and get a free domain name from Squarespace depending on one of the following plans: standard, unlimited, or business. Each plan offers a friendly mobile interface and 24/7 support.
Squarespace Pricing
Squarespace is currently offering four pricing plans ranging from $12 to $40 per month charged annually. All annual paid plans come with unlimited storage and bandwidth. In addition, customers will also be allowed to customize freely and have SSL Security.
The two cheapest pricing plans start at $12 and $18 per month including Personal Plan and Business Plan which provide complete features to build a full-fledged website. In contrast to other platforms, which tend to restrict the features on their starter plan, Squarespace’s Personal plan comes with unlimited storage and bandwidth.
Meanwhile, with the higher pricing plans, you will have premium features to start selling online with an eCommerce store. Squarespace gives users access to all the features to set up an online shop. Those features include posting unlimited products, printing product codes, managing point-of-sale activities, and selling on social platforms.
Squarespace Highlight Features
Squarespace supports a wide range of features for personal websites as well as eCommerce websites building, such as Blogging modules, SEO-friendly structure, Inventory management, Order management, and many more.
Some outstanding features that can be praised for their incredible benefits include:
Content management system (CMS) features
These features of Squarespace meet the demand of many customers. Once used, you would find it simple to create new content and edit the old. Besides, users also have the ability to publish their content without much technical knowledge, making this website builder perfect for beginners.
Multiple language mode
Squarespace allows you to create a website in many different languages to serve the needs of users. You should be able to create a set of pages in another language. You are even able to create a homepage that will link to the website in a different language format, for visitors to have an entry to the preferred language site.
To set up the language of your website, you can refer to the provider’s guidance when embarking on your site creation.
Squarespace Scheduling
Squarespace Scheduling was recently improved and updated by the provider. It is a new integration tool that empowers you to stay informed about appointments within the platform. It also enables you to share those appointments with others and your clients can make their own appointments as well.
Integration
Unlike Shopify, which has a ginormous application supermarket. Squarespace encourages its users to have their systems integrate with other platforms for better customization. However, they come with a paid subscription. Here are some additional applications you can implement on the platform:
- Social sites: Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Dropbox, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr
- Domains and email: G Suite, Namecheap, GoDaddy
- Marketing: Amazon, Google Ads, Facebook Pixel
- Commerce: PayPal, Stripe, Square, FedEx, UPS, USPS
- CMR apps: HubSpot CRM, Airtable, ActiveCampaign, HoneyBook, Mailchimp, LeadMaster, and more.
What Are the Pros and Cons of Squarespace?
To give you an overview of Squarespace, this part delivers its strengths and limitations.
| Pros | Cons |
| Attractive templates The templates available on Squarespace are notably more attractive than those that are offered on other free website builders. | Limited payment method Squarespace only allows customers to have Paypal and Stripe as payment gateways which is a difficulty for many users. |
| Reasonable Price With a clear pricing plan only pay at least $12/ month and no transaction fees charge (if you use the eCommerce plan). It is an ideal point to work with Squarespace. | Not many add-ons application The platform doesn’t offer many advanced add-ons applications compared to its competitors. Instead, you have to implement an Integration process. |
| Great customer support You would always get an instant response when contacting the support center via email and live chat. | |
| Easy approach No coding skill is needed to get started building your own Website by using Squarespace. | |
| Impressive data analysis tools Standard data tracking, reporting, and marketing tools are available for you to analyze data and get a better target for your business’s prospects. |
Squarespace is Best Suitable With
Squarespace defines itself as a platform that can be used by anyone. But from an objective view of the writers, there are some segments that more belong in flatform rather than others.
As being said in the introduction, Squarespace is a hosted website builder platform that will limit customization. When it comes to large-scale companies, it would be challenging for editing, upgrading the current websites with more functionalities. However, it is worth recommending for small to medium businesses.
Plus, thanks to intuitive, eye-catching, and modern provided templates. Squarespace is best suited with consumers who have high artistic needs such as photographers, artists, designers, and anyone who wants to show off their work online.
Final Words
Generally, Squarespace is a powerful website builder with high-quality features and some of the best template designs. It’s also a comprehensive tool that offers e-commerce features as well as website tools. But to publish a website, you would find out that Overall, Squarespace is a good choice for anyone who wants a beautiful, full-featured website without coding skills.
We hope the Squarespace overview gives you useful information.
