With so many website builders out there, how do you decide which one to use for your small business? I've narrowed my preferred website platforms down to three...
Which Website Platform is Right for You?
If you’ve been wondering which website platform you should use for your small business website, you are not alone. I toiled over it and even changed platforms a few times.
It wasn’t that long ago that Wordpress was considered the only option for business websites. As builders emerged on the scene they lagged in speed, SEO, and other features. But these days there are almost too many great options to choose from, which makes it hard for overthinkers, like me to decide.
Over the years I’ve built in Wordpress (in it’s natural state), Elementor, Divi, Wix, Wix Studio, Squarespace, Shopfiy and Showit. I’ve tinkered with Webflow, Weebly, and Duda. I’ve also seen beautiful websites built on all of these platforms.
In my business, I’ve narrowed down my favorites to Wix (Wix Studio), Showit, and Elementor on Wordpress. I'll walk through what I like and don't like about each one. Here we go!
1. Wix and Wix Studio
When I was looking for the right platform to build my first business website on, I didn’t consider Wix. I had some experience with it having maintained a website for a doctor who had built on it, but I barely did much with it. I had the impression that it was unsophisticated or not up to par. A “real” website would be built on something else. I tinkered with Squarespace but wasn’t loving it, Showit was fun but more expensive, and Wordpress was a bear. Then out of nowhere in the same week, two different people mentioned they had built websites on Wix and were very happy with it. So I gave it a try and I liked it. It was so easy to get up and running and I enjoyed designing on it. Now, it’s not perfect but it’s a great option for small businesses and nonprofits, especially if you are going the DIY route.
Wix has rolled out another platform geared at designers and agencies called Wix Studio. It gives you more design control and throws in features like animations and more ‘artsy’ templates. It feels more sophisticated to design on while giving you the same business features of the regular Wix platform, like booking, payment integrations, etc. Wix Studio subscriptions are more expensive than Wix, just FYI. I'll be referring to regular Wix in my observations below.
What I like about Wix
Lots of templates and inspiration
Wix leads the pack in free templates. They’ve created several for nearly every industry out there so if you have certain needs there’s likely a template that will be a great fit. You can also try multiple templates before choosing one. If you saw my Wix dashboard you’d be flabbergasted because I have no less than 25 ‘tinkering’ templates in there. I have to see how something actually looks before I decide if I’m going to use it. I love how I can do that in Wix. Once I decide which one I like, I assign my subscription to it and hit ‘publish’
Easy to start a website
It really is a DIYers dream - select your template, fill in your content, buy a subscription and hit publish. Wix guides you through every step, even SEO, connecting social channels and setting up your blog. The dashboard is not complicated, in my opinion, but also offers a lot of customization capability. A win-win.
Easy to blog
Wix has a blog feature that allows you to set up post templates and easily customize them. Blogging is important for providing useful content for customers and readers and also improves SEO. Wix provides SEO customization options in the blog platform and once you publish you can easily post to your social channels or integrate into an email marketing campaign (if you have the email module). You can customize each post with photos, gifs, videos and even AI assistance if you don't know where to start.
Great for Teams
Wix allows you to add users with varying permissions to your website. If you don’t want to be the one updating blog posts or content add a team member! You can add your bookkeeper/finance person so they can make payments, add your content person to update the blog, or just add a backup in case you go on vacation or get sick. If you hire someone (like moi) to build your Wix website, you can give them access to be able to make updates for you while you maintain ultimate control of the site.
Free Domain
Typically when you buy subscriptions with Wix they throw in a free domain for the first year. If you already have your domain this doesn’t mean much, but you could be like me and use it to purchase a related domain just in case! If you are brand new to business this saves you a little money the first year and makes it easy to connect to your website.
Easy to integrate forms, email, or other features
One you must have on your website is a way for people to get in touch with you, or sign upp for your email list. Wix makes it easy to create forms, and for you to actually get the forms and respond to them! I love the Wix app that lets me view and respond to form submissions on my phone and I also have them forwarded to my email inbox in case I miss it on the app.
Lots of apps and integrations available
Wix is a great all-in-one plaftform. Some apps and features do require an additional cost, but it can be worth it depending on your business needs. For example, we know that email marketing is important for client acquisition and retention. You can use Convert Kit (now just Kit) Mailchimp or other software, or for ease you can use the Wix email marketing module. The same goes for booking and payment, scheduling, and other important business features. You can have a subscription to Honeybook or Dubsado, or manage everything in Wix. I love that Wix makes it easy and literally puts it all at your fingertips.
SEO and Google Guidance
You want your website to be found by Google, but Google doesn't always make that easy on its platform. Search Engine Optimization is important to getting found on Google, and Wix has a built in assistant the helps you. It makes suggestions for meta descriptions, alt text, and title tags for each page. But it also runs you through a number of steps to optimize and index your site for Google. This plays a huge part in making sure you show up in search results! I love that Wix has this feature built in and I don’t have to go to another platform to access it.
You don’t have to worry about security or updates
A huge complaint with Wordpress is having the maintain hosting, updates, and security. You don't worry about hosting and security with Wix because they are maintaining it on your behalf. It's part of the reason you pay a subscription, but to me, oh so worth it.
Image library
While I always recommend branded photos and imagery, sometimes we just don’t have the photos we need for our business websites. Wix has a built in, free stock image library that includes photos, icons, graphics, and even video. I have used the library a number of times for subtle background imagery or placeholders when I didn’t have custom photos.
Wix App
I mentioned the app before but I really do find it useful. I know what’s going on with my site by looking at analytics or form submissions on the app. If you have a members only area, you can manage that and communicate with members from the app. They even allow you to create an app and brand it to your business!
E-commerce
If you’re selling physical products or digital downloads you can sell them on a Wix website. They have a number of features to help keep you organized like product libraries and templates plus you can setup payment software on the site. Again, the keyword is easy. You can easily do a website on Wix. Shopify has its perks but is not as easy to edit, in my opinion, as Wix.
What I don’t like about Wix
Can’t change templates easily
Meaning you can’t transfer content to a new template, you’d have to rebuild it. You also cannot transfer sites built on Wix to the Wix Studio platform. This is a biggie I wish they’d change. I like being able to change the look of a site by importing a template.
Cost
Payment plans are more expensive than hosting a Wordpress website. Both Wix and Wix Studio offer tiered pricing depending on the capabilities you need. Wix does offer a free platform but you cannot connect it to your domain, which looks unprofessional in my opinion. So pony up the money even if you do the lowest tier so you can connect to your domain. On a good note, they often run 50% off sales so if you pay annually you could snag a pretty significant discount.
Lack of content options and variety
Wix lags in the readily-available content blocks in my opinion. If you want more options or a better look you really just need to design the block yourself. I also don’t like how some of your global styles don’t innately appear when you insert a template page or block. You have to manually change them to match, which I find annoying.
Easy to make it non-responsive
Even though it’s drag and drop you do have to watch where you’re dropping... Wix Studio does a better job of helping your grid lines stay responsive, but Wix does not. You have design freedom in that you can put a picture anywhere, but it may or may not move in the mobile view. Once you learn the ins and outs of the grid lines it makes it easier but if it’s your first time designing in Wix this can be an issue.
Final Thoughts on Wix
Wix is a great option for both DIYers and businesses that hire pros. I love building on Wix and I feel more connected to my business and customers because I can check so many things easily either from the desktop or on the app like analytics, messages, and even post blogs. I love that I can create bookings and connect payment, and if I wanted to could even run email marketing through Wix (for added cost of course.) It makes it so easy to do business and I don’t dread posting blogs or updating things. Wix Studio speaks to my designer’s heart and allows me to be super creative, too!
My Vote: Best All-In-One Option and Best DIY Option
2. Showit
Showit came on the scene a few years ago aimed at helping photographers build beautiful websites that really showcased their art. It has since expanded to anyone but the emphasis remains on creative professionals or designers that was creative freedom. The pros at Showit liken it to designing in Adobe Illustrator, which I love but if you don’t have a design background it can be overwhelming and a larger learning curve. I would definitely recommend hiring a pro to design a Showit website to save you time and frustration!
What I like about Showit
Drag and Drop
You can move items around anywhere on the screen, which as a designer is something I love to do. There is something about the Showit platform that just makes it fun to design. It feels fancy and fun!
Easy to set up global styles
Once you decide on your fonts and colors it’s easy to set and forget. It's also easy to upload fonts that are not in the system library.
Mobile control
This comes with a pro and a con, but the pro is I like being able to have full control over the mobile site. You are able to move elements around, or hide elements easily that you don't want included on the mobile site.
Easy to import template or parts of a template
You definitely want to start from a template if you’re not sure exactly what you want to create. I find a completely blank screen can be overwhelming. But what I love about Showit is that you can easily import blocks or pages from any free template in the library (or any that you’ve purchased) and mix and match.
Great customer service
You can really tell that Showit cares about its product and customers. Any time I’ve had a question I’ve reached out via email or chat and gotten a quick response from a real person. They are friendly, personable, and helpful.
SEO
Showit makes it easy to update meta descriptions and title tags for SEO, which as I've already said is important for helping you show up in google results.
Blog setup
Showit uses Wordpress for blogging, which is hailed as a win because of Wordpress’s SEO capability. However it’s not intuitive to setup if you’re not familiar with Wordpress. Have no fear, Showit will set it up for you! They do the heavy lifting and you just sit back and relax (or work on writing that content!)
What I don’t like about Showit
Cost
Showit offers tiered pricing which I think is fair and valuable, it’s just that I don’t love the idea of paying hundreds of dollars every year for the subscription. I gladly pay it to not have to worry with hosting, security, and maintenance, however. Out of my three options it's the most expensive but for many people I still think it's worth the cost.
Editing mobile and desktop separately
I think they’re working to make this easier but you have to pay close attention to the mobile and desktop views. When you design on desktop it kinda jumbles everything up on the mobile view. This took me a bit to get used to but once I did I got a lot faster. It’s nice that you have complete control over each view, but it can be cumbersome.
Overwhelm
If you don’t have a design background you could get easily overwhelmed. Sometimes having all the design freedom you could ask for is too much! If you like to tinker and are not on a time crunch it's no problem but if you're tying to create something quickly and don't have much experience in Illustrator or Showit, it could be overwhelming.
Lack of many free templates
There are free templates to choose from in Showit, but they are are on more of the basic side. To get the really great looking templates or one laid out with more sections, you’ll have to pony up money. They provide some templates for purchase in the shop and there are several amazing designers out there who sell templates for hundreds of dollars. Now, would that $800 be worth it if I saw template that had all the pieces I was looking for and all I had to do was swap in my content, absolutely. Time is money. But money is money too so it’s all in your preference and your budget!
Not intuitive to do certain things
There’s definitely a learning curve to designing on Showit but there are a lot of designers who’ve blogged or put out videos on how to do things. And the internal Showit support library is really good at explaining things. I’ve never had an issue figuring out how to do things, but I have had to go and find directions or a tutorial!
Blog is through wordpress
The blog being through Wordpress is also a pro and con. They say wordpress is the best platform for blogging, so that’s a pro. But the con is it’s stinkin’ wordpress. You’ll have to learn that backend but once you do you should be able to blog relatively easily. Again, the pro is that Showit will set it up for you so definitely take advantage of that.
Ecommerce is limited
Showit integrates with the light Shopify tier, meaning one with limited listing options, so it’s not the best platform if you have a lot of e-commerce items. You’d want to build on Shopify or Wix for heavy e-commerce capability.
Final Thoughts on Showit
I love Showit and recommend it to any business, minus heavy e-commerce ones. It doesn’t have the all-in-one capability of Wix but easily integrates with things like Calendly, Shopify, and other business tools. If you want the power of Wordpress blogging but don’t want your full site on Wordpress, Showit is the way to go. I have yet to see anyone who was disappointed they built a site on Showit!
My Vote: Most Beautiful Templates
3. Wordpress
Let me begin with a caveat. I have a love-hate relationship with Wordpress. Most of the hate stems from the fact that it’s Wordpress and I just don’t love Wordpress. I know, I know. It’s the granddaddy of website platforms and open source and blabeedeeblah. But it’s too clunky. It’s difficult to do things and there are so many settings and boxes to check. If I build on Wordpress I use the page builder plugin Elementor. It makes it more lovable because instead of blindly inserting blocks of content you can see what you’re doing. And while it still relies on a grid you can somewhat drag and drop, although you won’t have the creative freedom like you do on Wix and Showit. I’ve tried Divi and my brain prefers the Elementor ecosystem.
What I like about Wordpress/Elementor
Variety of templates, content blocks and pages to choose from in Elementor - Elementor is a free plugin but you get more when you pay for Elementor Pro. More templates, content blocks, widgets and animations. It’s easy to mix and match elements from templates, which is something I really like.
Lower cost
Again there is a free option meaning all you’d have to pay is hosting and security, and Elementor has even starting offering that although I haven’t used it. But if you choose to purchase the Pro plugin it’s only around $60 a year, which is a lot less than Wix or Showit.
Lots of resources to help you figure out how to do things
Like Showit, there are a ton of designers who put out content on how to do things in Elementor, and the Elementor support section has a lot of content. They provide free videos to help you from start to finish, and aim to make them easy to understand.
Content can be moved to new templates without having to rebuild
This is definitely a pro for Wordpress. You can import a new template without having to change content. Of course it may change the way some of the content looks but usually a little tweaking does the trick.
What I don’t like about Wordpress/Elementor
Hosting, maintenance and security
You must, must, must pay for good hosting and make sure you continually update plugins and security. You cannot just set it and forget with Wordpress. If you do, it’s only a matter of time until your site gets hacked. I use and recommend Siteground or Flywheel. Once you pay for these things the cost will be closer to what you’d pay on Wix or Showit, but you want your site hosted by a reputable company and if you’re not going to go in weekly or at least monthly, you want to pay someone to update and keep an eye on the site.
Plugins
Why do you even need plugins? Because Wordpress is not an all-in-one ecosystem. It’s like building a website at Ikea, you have to walk down dozens of aisles to find the ones you want. Now, that can be good because you have ultimate customization, but it can also be a pain and a huge time suck trying to find the right plugins that are also trustworthy or reputable. Not all plugins are free, either, so you have to factor that cost into your budget.
Updates can break a site
Yep, updates to PHP, plugins, or themes can sometimes work against each other and break your site causing you to go down the rabbit trail. I once spent hours trying to figure out something on a client’s site and ultimately relied on Flywheel to help fix it (love you Flywheel!)
Vulnerability
Plugins can be prone to hacking and malware. I feel like I’ve already said this, but plugins can be an issue. They’re great when they’re working but they also provide gateway for bad people to get into your site. Saw this happen recently and it was not fun.
Final thoughts on Wordpress:
Wordpress is a great option for any business but I wouldn’t recommend DIYing a Wordpress site. Can it be done? Sure. There are lots of tutorials out there but I think it’s frustrating and overwhelming. You absolutely must pay for good hosting and security and make sure it’s updated. Even though I can build on Wordpress, I prefer to create the design and layout then outsource the build to a subcontractor because it just doesn’t make me happy!
My Vote: Most Popular Platform and Endless Customization Options
If you've made it to the end of this novella, let me be the first to say muchas gracias and I hope it was helpful. At the end of the day, the best website platform is one that you will use. DO you want to create or maintain it yourself? Go with Wix or Showit. Do you want to hand it off to someone else to create and maintain, any of them will do. Good luck!