If you’re a business owner and your business sells offline only, you may be missing an excellent opportunity to revamp your profits and take your business to the next level. Serious business owners know there’s more to make by integrating eCommerce into their businesses. They need to create business websites to connect with their customers and sell products online. But then comes one major challenge. Out of the many website building options, which should you choose for your business?
Luckily, this article has narrowed down to two giant website builders – Shopify vs Squarespace – to get you started. When you take a glance at these two website builders, you might end up thinking they’re pretty much the same. But they are not. You need to look at them from a bird’s eye view to scrutinize everything and decide which is best.
Shopify is a better choice for businesses selling high-end products and with a huge bankroll. Large enterprises require powerful eCommerce tools, and this is what they get from Shopify. On the other hand, Squarespace is an ideal website builder for small businesses. It has dazzling templates but less advanced eCommerce tools than Shopify. However, Squarespace is more affordable, so if your business is small, it should be the best choice for you.
The Best Choice Between Shopify and Squarespace
It all depends on the type of online store you have. Before you make a decision, you need to clarify what your business goal is, the customers you’re targeting, the products you’re selling, and the size of your budget. Knowing all these beforehand will help you choose the right builder. Let’s examine the merits and demerits to help you narrow it down to the best choice.
Shopify
Shopify was founded in 2004 as an eCommerce platform and is believed to be the best website builder for serious sellers.
Pros
- Best overall eCommerce website builder
- Can sell across multi-channels
- A wide range of payment options
- It’s easy to set up
- Accepts selling with eBay and Amazon
- Loads faster
Cons
- Charges transaction fee for alternative payment
- Monthly costs add up quickly with third-party apps.
Squarespace
It first started as a blogging platform in 2004 but added an eCommerce feature in 2013. If you’re a creative enthusiast, Squarespace has sleek templates for website design to help you come up with beautiful designs. It’s also a better choice for small businesses.
Pros
- Plenty of designer templates
- Easy to use
- Ideal for small businesses
- Easy to set up
Cons
- Few payment options
- Hard to upsell and cross-sell
- It doesn’t have eBay and Amazon sync
The Contrast Between Shopify and Squarespace
Sales Features and Payment Options
Picking the right sales tool will be a vital decision depending on the products you’re selling. Shopify will help you install a Digital Download app to sell your products or services. Squarespace has a slight edge since all the sales tools can allow you to sell any product. On payment options, Shopify will enable payments to be made on all major payment options. Squarespace underperforms here since it accepts PayPal, Stripe, and Apple Pay as its only payment gateways.
Template Designs and Visuals
Your business structure and design must also play a part in attracting more customers. Squarespace boasts of its wide range of beautiful templates that are easy to use. You can customize your website to give it a modern look with explicit themes. Shopify has only ten free templates and over 50 premium templates you have to pay for. Shopify, unlike Squarespace, limits you to the choices of designs you’d want for your business. With Squarespace, you can edit the visuals using their drag-and-drop option to create a stunning website.
Ease of Use
Selling products and services online is quite demanding, unlike selling offline. If you can’t build your website and manage it, you may end up hating the idea of selling online. But with eCommerce website builders, you can easily navigate through your website. The only thing left is to decide which is easier to use for your business.
Shopify is the top-rated eCommerce builder, but its user interface is quite complicated. This makes it difficult and time-consuming to set up pages and products. On the other hand, Squarespace is slower. But with its elegant features and precise information, you can navigate through it quickly. It is easy to design pages and manage content using Squarespace.
Customer Support Services
When conducting your online business, the chances are that you’ll have issues along the way. That’s why you need to pick an eCommerce website builder that has a dedicated support group. Shopify offers a better customer support service than Squarespace. With Shopify, you can reach out to them via phone, email, and live chats 24/7. Customer support at Squarespace is limited. You can only reach out to them via email and live chat from Monday to Friday.
Conclusion
Several factors will influence your go-to website builder. One of them that’s most crucial is the type of business you are having. Shopify is ideal for large companies that need advanced platforms. It’s also the top-rated eCommerce website builder. If you decide to go with Shopify, it’s always a good idea to consult the best Shopify web designers, in order to make sure you are going in the right direction. On the other hand, if your business is small and doesn’t need an advanced option, Squarespace can be your best eCommerce builder. It’s affordable and will give you a beautiful outlook that’ll attract more customers.
