Squarespace vs WordPress?: Pros and Cons
It's exciting to begin building a website until you have to start making decisions like which website hosting platform you want to use or how your brand messaging guide translates to website copy. In no time flat, your excitement turns to questions and confusion.
Will you choose Squarespace with its streamlined processes or WordPress with its more extensive customization options? Or will you go with some other builder altogether? Vapor lock has you switching between tabs like a cat chasing a laser pointer.
We know the reasons "to do" and the reasons "to don't" can seem endless and could leave you more confused than the actual process of building a website.
Never fear! We're here to help you unravel it all.
So here’s the dealio- selecting a website hosting platform involves more consideration than simply picking the best on the market because it depends on the particular demands of your business.
Whether you go with one or the other depends on your budget, objectives, and your launch timeline, among other factors. However, if you'd prefer to avoid weighing the pros and cons, we offer bespoke Squarespace website design for clients who want a beautiful, well-designed, easy-to-use website ready to go in two weeks or less.
(We also offer custom WordPress development if that’s your schtick because we’re cool like that.)
But we know you came here for the pros and cons, so let's get to it.
Seven Things to Consider When Weighing the Pros and Cons.
Before weighing the benefits and drawbacks of what we consider the two most popular CMS providers, we find it helpful to consider these seven elements of website content management system (CMS) providers and how they relate to your business needs.
Ease of use
How easy is it to use the CMS software's navigation panels?
Is there a steep learning curve involved in using the service?
Companies with multiple site administrators and contributors may desire a more straightforward CMS to simplify backend management and reduce learning curves.
SEO controls
How much room do you have to tinker with your SEO controls?
Is it possible to use plugins that give you more control over your site's SEO performance?
High-performance hosting
Does the CMS supplier have advanced caching, developer tools, or fine-tuned domain administration controls?
Do you have access to extra space or unlimited bandwidth?
How secure will your new site be?
Flexible content management tools
How flexible is the CMS software you're considering? Can you add plugins or extensions that expand your site’s functionality?
What are your formatting options?
Does adding integrations take more time, coding, and customization than you have time for or the skills to do?
Do they offer spam protection and other security features?
Is there integrated email marketing?
Scalability
Can their content management system support your company's future growth?
Can your CMS adapt alongside you?
How would it handle a surge in site visitors?
Set-Up Cost
How much will it cost to get your new website designed, up, and running?
Do you need to hire a professional?
How much do Squarespace designers charge versus WordPress designers?
What are the operating expenses for the CMS provider?
Ads
You’ll want to consider your built-in ad and plugin options.
WordPress
WordPress was created for everyone, but the open-source web content management system is notorious for its complex and intricate build-out process. With that said, 45.8 percent of websites are built and hosted using the software, so it does get the job done for a lot of different brands. The question is, is it right for you?
Pros
Flexible content management tools
With its 59,483 free community-made plugins, WordPress takes the cake for flexible content management tools. While it started as a popular place for bloggers, it’s widely used by a variety of businesses, from online publications to e-commerce websites.
High-performance hosting
If you choose to host on WordPress’s servers, you’ll receive the extra security that comes with the continuous updates they make to their software. Having said that, if you decide to self-host on WordPress, you will need to maintain your website security through upgrades on your own.
Other aspects that contribute to WordPress being a high-performance hosting site include its bandwidth- or how many visitors they can support based on the size of your site. While they offer both paid and free plans with unlimited bandwidth for your website, you can only store up to 3GB of media assets if you choose the free plan.
Standard Hosting Rates
Standard hosting rates can vary wildly depending on the type of hosting you’re looking for. Want it all in the cloud with your website stretched across servers? Cloud hosting can cost you anywhere from $200 to $1,200 a year. Dedicated hosting, on the other hand, gives you access to your very own server and full control over performance and how secure it is. For dedicated hosting, prices begin at around $1,200 a year and only go up. Keep in mind that introductory website hosting offers are usually cheaper, and after that enticing trial period is up, prices can triple.
WordPress Annual Subscription Costs
Wordpress offers four subscription plans for all sorts of users. WordPress plans offer all-inclusive managed hosting options.
Starter, $48 annually: Storage caps at 6GB with no options to upgrade.
Explorer, $96 annually: Storage caps at 13GB with no options to upgrade.
Creator, $300 annually: 50GB of included storage.
Entrepreneur, $540 annually: 50GB of included storage.
Scalability
Can WordPress keep up with your growing business? They sure can. WordPress can grow to any size you require, but only if you design it to. Having a lot of features, poorly designed code, and unnecessary add-ons may jeopardize your site's ability to handle spikes in traffic.
SEO Controls
Search engine optimization controls on WordPress are bountiful and flexible. The CMS offers countless plugins to help you get down to the nitty-gritty.
Cons
Ease of use
Your options might seem unlimited, but whatever you add to your site will need to be integrated into your code, and that takes time, skill, and maintenance.
Set-Up Costs
When setting up a WordPress site, the costs of plugins can add up, as can hiring a web designer.
Ads
If you’re a small business, you’ll want to keep in mind that unless your site has thousands of daily visitors, you won't make any serious money from WordPress ads. However, you can use different ad plug-ins like Advanced Ads, Ads by WPQUADS, or AdSanity.
Types of businesses that work well on WordPress:
Larger businesses
Businesses that expect a high volume of website visitors
Companies desiring feature-rich websites and advanced functionality
We've helped several of our customers build gorgeous WordPress sites and highly recommend it as a platform for the right business. Is WordPress the CMS for you? Get in touch, and we’ll help you create the website of your dreams.
Squarespace
Now, let's take a closer look at how Squarespace operates. Currently, the CMS is home to some 2,916,770 websites across the whole internet. That’s far fewer than WordPress , with its staggering 38,539,556 websites, but it’s nothing to sneeze at. Its easy set-up and clean design mean you can create a professional website in half the time it takes to set one up on WordPress.
Pros
Ease of use
Squarespace is a quick build. When we create sites on Squarespace, we can pull even custom designs together in two weeks or less. Squarespace also touts a super intuitive user interface that makes it easy for anyone on your team to upload content or make changes. However, some first-time users struggle with Squarespace's navigation interface and describe it as having a bit of a learning curve.
High-performance hosting
Squarespace recommends that each page on your website has a maximum size of 5 MB to keep load times at a minimum and avoid performance issues (for reference, the average website page is 3 MB). All things considered, Squarespace offers straightforward hosting, ample bandwidth, and chat assistance, making it ideal for small businesses and the like.
Set-Up Costs
Squarespace is so easy to use that you can probably build your website yourself. However, if you want that designer touch made pretty with all those nuanced details you don’t have time to learn how to do on your own, you can hire a Squarespace website builder. *cough, cough* We have an amazing in-house Squarespace designer. We really like this option for businesses who don’t want all the hassle of setting up and maintaining a WordPress site.
Plus, the cost breaks down to a monthly fee similar to what you pay for WordPress hosting but with e-commerce integrations and built-in tools ready to go. Squarespace subscriptions range from $192 annually to $588.
Built-In Basics
Some businesses just don't need all the bells and whistles. They need the basics, and they need them to be done right. Enter Squarespace's built-in basics, the aces of ease. Squarespace’s SEO controls, membership portals, and email marketing make it easier to do the things you need to, without throwing a lot of time, resources, and money into them.
And while SEO controls are limited, they are also built-in and don't require you to purchase or install an additional plugin. This ready-to-go feature makes it easy for the small business to keep their pages optimized. Built-in email marketing and membership portals also simplify your tech stack by streamlining your tools. These features really kick ass for the solopreneur doing everything without technical help.
Ads
One of the integrations that you can set up quickly on Squarespace is Google Adsense for on-page advertisements. They also have a feature that allows you to use Facebook advertisements to produce ads for your product inventory based on your site traffic and similar audiences. Both are simple but powerful ad options.
Cons
Limited search engine optimization (SEO) controls
Squarespace does not support plugins, so to maximize SEO on Squarespace, the company suggests you read through their best practices and utilize the site's built-in SEO controls. With Squarespace's built-in controls, you can edit page descriptions, SEO descriptions, and SEO site descriptions.
Limited content management tools
The simplicity of this site means scaled-back content management tools. Users have limited access to their Squarespace site's backend and thus fewer options. Although you have built-in email marketing and membership portal options, you miss out on the hyper-customizability of WordPress.
Scalability
Don’t get us wrong, Squarespace has some awesome features that let you scale your business, but if you are looking for long-term scalability and customization, this might not be the tool for you.
Types of businesses that work well on Squarespace:
Smaller websites
Small businesses
Entrepreneurs
Start-Ups
However, if you're a growing medium-sized e-commerce brand, don't let your size stop you from using Squarespace. Popular brands like Refinery 29, Glossier, and Lyft all use Squarespace.
You might have just read that and thought those are all massive brands, and their websites must be huge. While that is true, all of their sites have that minimalistic styling characteristic of Squarespace.
For example, Lyft's website is large, but the majority of Lyft's pages are straightforward, allowing the copy and simplified design to take center stage.
A quick note on Squarespace integrations:
You may get fewer integration options with Squarespace than WordPress, but what they do offer are effective and indispensable tools.
Some Squarespace integrations include:
Google Sheets
Mailchimp
Gmail
ActiveCampaign
Marketing Automation
Paths by Zapier
Flodesk
HubSpot
ConvertKit
Drip Emails
Slack
Team Chat
PayPal
Soundcloud
Flickr
Unsplash
OpenTable
Weglot
Instagram
Vimeo
FedEx
Stripe
Zola
Need a Website Building, Copywriting Co-conspirator?
As expert wordsmiths and design masterminds, we relish the challenge of telling intricate, flowing stories that capture the attention of potential leads with a handful of well-chosen words. Either way, we can leverage Squarespace to create a simple, high-converting website for you, freeing you up to concentrate on other aspects of your business. Or we can build you a hyper-customized WordPress site that meets your business's unique needs in every way.
Are you ready to build the site of your dreams?