It’s been a while now since I became a WordPress customer and I can say that it has thoroughly been a seamless experience as far as adjusting to the platform.
I like it so much that I’m essentially just going to talk shit about its competitors right now. Not that I know them very well, but that I know WordPress is the best option/bang for your buck.
So just before starting to write this I did a bit, like really just a bit, of research, and found that my gut instinct about this topic was completely right!
The other platforms are not as good and do not nearly offer as much, or have the potential that the WordPress platform has.
The Basic free version
Generally speaking if you are using the free version of either Wix, Squarespace, or WordPress it’s a tie. You do not get very much. And on the internet, just like everywhere else, you get what you pay for.
These free websites come with site branding ads that are very intrusive and don’t come with a personalized domain. If you don’t know what that is, that means your .com will look more like wix.com.
Okay so all three previously mentioned website builders are pretty much tied in this regard.
It’s when you start talking turkey (payment plans) that things get interesting.
Wix
Basic Plan
The first plan they offer essentially only allows you to connect a domain (personalizing your free blog a bit) at 5 dollars American a month.
With this plan you’ll only get 1 GB of Bandwidth so if you actually want to have any amount of traffic on your site that would be strenuous. Additionally, you get 500 MB of storage which is essentially nothing.
To put that into perspective, you would have a very hard time posting high quality photos to your site and forget about anything video based.
But alas, you get for what you pay for (going to be a recurring theme during this blog).
Personal Plan
For double the price of the first plan you essentially get double. 2 GB of Bandwidth, 3 GB of Storage, you can connect your personalized domain, you get support, free domain, remove the Wix ads and something called a customized Favicon (I have no idea what this is because I do not use the platform).
Pretty good bang for your buck, if you consider that at half that price you almost get nothing.
Entrepreneurs and Freelancer Plan
This one is a big step up and is their most popular for good reason.
For 14 dollars American a month, you get
- unlimited Bandwidth
- 10 GB of storage
- free support
- removal of the Wix ads
- $ 300 ad vouchers
- form builder app
- site booster app
eCommerce Plan
For 17 dollars American a month, you get almost the exact same thing as the previous plan but you get an online store and 20 GB of storage. How good that store is I cannot say since there is no demo function on their registration site.
VIP Plan
At 25 dollars American a month you should hope this plan really rocks, but it does not.
It is exactly the same as the eCommerce plan but you get priority response and VIP support, whatever that means.
SquareSpace
At first glance I was like “oh dear god, I’ve made such a mistake…” When I viewed their pricing because there is a huge list of features they offer for their 4 plans. Like an enormous list of features.
Then I took a closer look, and you know what? I got feature fucked.
They were things you would expect your website to have and also the newbies aren’t going to know what they are. They typically all come with WordPress anyway, so I calmed myself down and continued my investigation.
Personal Plan
I won’t go to in-depth into their features since the list is so ungodly long, but I will say that I am impressed to see that for their first tier of plan you get a free customer domain, unlimited bandwidth and storage and 2 contributors.
Pretty good for 12 bucks a month (it didn’t say whether CAD of USD).
So right off the bat kind of impressed.
Business/Basic Commerce/Advanced Commerce Plans
I grouped the rest together because they are just so similar but just vary in price.
You see this is where SquareSpace got greedy.
The plans go up from 18 – 40 dollars per month, but offer very little in differentiation from another. Once again the features they list are too numerous to go into so I won’t but it’s hurting my brain.
One positive thing about all three of these plans is that you get unlimited contributors so they would indeed be good for running businesses of all sizes.
WordPress
Yay finally onto my fave!
So I personally have had every plan but the eCommerce plan from WordPress so I can tell you a little bit about each of them from my personal experience.
Premium Plan
I started out with this plan and it was great. You get a free domain for a year, 13 GB of Storage, and more (including no WordPress ads, Google Analytics integration).
It worked for me for a while when I decided I would jump up a plan because I needed to add plugins to my site to make it what I want.
Business Plan
And this is where I must make the difficult sell. You see the price jump went from 10 dollars CAD a month to 33.
I know that is a steep jump but with that increase you get 200GB of space and can add the ever valuable plugin to your site.
The importance of plugins
There are plugins (which are essentially tools) that allow you to do anything you want.
Want a store on your website? You got one.
Want to work on your site’s SEO? You can do that too
Need to be able to work on your marketing as you go? Yup, they got you!
The point is that you won’t be painted into a corner with your site once it is up and running. For instance I just installed the Woo commerce plugin and the Printful plugin and began selling my own personalized apparel, super easy.
I also use Yoast SEO (plugin) so I have guidelines to follow when I’m writing for better search results.
I cannot stress enough how important it is to have plugins on your site and how great they are.
It is my opinion WordPress is the best platform and this plan is the best bang for your buck, getting you, the consumer, most for your dollar.
Because all those things SquareSpace said they offered in their plans, WordPress also offers in spades, they just weren’t trying to fuck us with that fact on their site.
WordPress is friendly and approachable by contrast.
eCommerce Plan
I’m not going to say much about this choice since it is very expensive and is only really good for a large eCommerce business that operates in more than 60 countries. It costs almost 60 dollars CAD a month.
It also integrates with shipping couriers to simplify your processes and such.
This plan is slightly out of my league at the moment but perhaps sometime in the future it won’t be.
Final Thoughts
I hope you found this rundown informative and that you are able to better make your decisions vis-a-vis your brand new website.
I however, will die a WordPress customer. I simply love how you can extend the platform with the thousands of plugins offered and how it really does everything you could ever have hoped for.
If you have reasons not to like WordPress, Wix, or SquareSpace please leave it in the comments and let’s get a discussion going.
Or you could always Tweet at me on Twitter at @Bonobo_Boys.