Which Website Builder is Right For You?

Host Your Portfolio or Your Business Website on the Right Platform 🖥️

I got asked a question this week by a Founder about where to host his business website and my answer was…

Which website builder should I use? — Founder 🤔

“It depends on your use case.” — Sera 😁

Today, let’s talk about your options when it comes to website providers and which one makes the most sense for you.

---

Before we get into that,

Cohort 3 of Growth Design is coming in January so make sure you save your spot now if you’d like to join. The last 2 cohorts were completely sold out. 🤩

P.S. I saved 5 spots for supporters of the newsletter at 30% off.

The Website Builder For You

You basically have 3 options:

Squarespace

Framer

Webflow

Some may say 4 and include Wix but I don’t. Disclaimer, I haven’t used Wix in a while but when I did try it, I preferred Squarespace.

So the use cases I come across are either:

1. Founders building a website for their product/service

OR

2. Designers building a portfolio

In my mind, the distinction between uses cases (goals, customization, integrations, etc.) is the most important criteria in addition to your technical ability.

1. SquareSpace

You are time-strapped, cash-strapped, and/or not technical

Overview

If you are completely new to UX / Product Design or you’re a bootstrapping founder without technical abilities, you may chose to opt for Squarespace. This could also be an easy option for someone who’s a freelancer and wants to do quick and easy integrations like calendars, bookings, or payments.

The reason I typically recommend SquareSpace to new designers is you are already so cognitively overloaded with learning design 101 and you typically have a tight timeline + pressures to find a job offer quickly. Squarespace makes it easy for you to focus on the quality of your case studies rather than building a complex website. Save that for later. 😉

Note: I don’t bring up Squarespace under cash-strapped because it’s cheaper but because you probably don’t have the ability to hire a freelance specialist in Webflow or Framer. For Squarespace, you can do it yourself.

Features

Squarespace is a simple set up and offers templates, start from scratch, or build with AI. For example, above is an image of a site built with AI in 5 minutes, the user makes a few simple selections on preference and you can customize options like color, font, and images after the fact. Squarespace does offer e-commerce, which is not really the point of this article, but in case you’re a Founder focused on ecommerce, check out Shopify.

Squarespace makes it easy to start booking appointments or selling products/services immediately. You can hire an expert directly from the site, however I think that’s really unnecessary. 😆 They have a wide range of templates available to get started (shown below). The latest new feature is the ability to invoice.

P.S. The hiring market is more competitive now so if you want a more custom website with that extra craft oomph, then try the next option Framer. 👇🏽

2. Framer

You are at least a little technical