WordPress vs. Weebly vs. Wix vs. Squarespace

What Is the Best Website Builder for SEO?

As a business owner, you’re probably in one of the following two scenarios:

• You don’t have a website but recognize the importance of one in this day and age, so you’re looking to design and build one.
• You already have a website but are looking to change to a new platform or switch hosting.

No matter the size or type of company you own, a good website is important—and this includes more than the design. You need a good platform and hosting that provides security and allows for easy SEO updates. The good news is that you have several different options. But as is often the case with multiple options, it may be overwhelming and leave you unsure where to start.

Weebly, Wix, Squarespace, and WordPress are four website builders—but which one is the best? Well, you’ll find out soon enough! I’m here to give you a quick comparison of all four so you can make a better, more informed decision.

Weebly

Weebly is an extremely convenient and user-friendly website builder—hands down its biggest advantage. Those with no website experience and who aren’t tech-savvy should be able to easily navigate Weebly. You can drag and drop content (super simple), and if you’re unsure where to start with website design, Weebly offers many pre-designed layouts for your convenience. Plus, if you change your mind, switching template designs is hassle-free.

Is Weebly good for SEO? Eh. If we were playing Duck Duck Goose (do kids still play that game at parties?) and “Goose” was the ultimate choice and most desirable website builder, Weebly is “Duck.”

• Weebly’s blog features aren’t the most up-to-date and convenient—for instance, there is no way to display related posts or the latest posts (which is a basic feature for most blogs).
• Weebly’s template options are somewhat limited and more basic, so they may be behind in terms of beautiful, custom-designed, modern websites you see frequently dominating the first page of search results.

Your best option if you want a site that is basic and simple, and you want to make updates yourself in a platform that is very user-friendly.

Wix

Though not as user-friendly as Weebly (which is probably the easiest to use out of all the options), Wix has a lot of beautiful, modern looking templates to choose from. Undoubtedly, you can build an attractive, professional website with Wix. And with drag and drop features, adding content is easy—you can pretty much put content anywhere on your site.

Is Wix good for SEO? “Duck…”

• Although more features can be a good thing (and in the Wix vs. Weebly comparison of features and tools, Wix wins), once you start adding more and more, it starts to slow down your website speed, which can have negative effects on SEO.
• Even though they have worked on advancing this, Wix is not really built to handle more complicated e-commerce needs (so if you’re an e-commerce website looking to maximize your SEO efforts, Wix is not the option for you).
• Once you choose a template, you cannot change it easily.

Your best option if creative control/ability to add content anywhere is your biggest desire.

Squarespace

Like Wix, Squarespace templates are attractive and can give you a more high-end look for your website (unfortunately, there are fewer options). As with many of the other website builders, you can easily change templates with Squarespace.

Is Squarespace good for SEO? “Duck…”

• When you choose a mobile responsive template, it’s automatically optimized for mobile devices and that’s pretty much that (you don’t have much more control over your website visitors’ mobile experience). With today’s mobile trends, this isn’t ideal.
• Using plugins to optimize for SEO (such as headers and meta data) isn’t as easy as other platforms.
• Your site can get limited in size based on the pricing plan (this was the case for one of our former clients on Squarespace).

Your best option if you want a website that will wow. Its templates are one of Squarespace’s biggest advantages.

Quick Comparisons

Design/Appearance: Wix vs. Squarespace battle: about the same; both are better in terms of professional appearance/attractive and trendy design than Weebly.

User-Friendliness/Convenience: Squarespace vs. Weebly and Wix vs. Weebly battles: Weebly. Minimalist and simple, Weebly is probably the easiest website builder to use.

SEO: They all have their pros and cons (as illustrated). But there is one more website builder I haven’t discussed yet…

WordPress

A well-known and widely used website builder, WordPress is, to be honest, pretty d*** great. Not only does it offer attractive and professional-looking templates, but it is also user-friendly (we actually give clients WordPress trainings!) and has many convenient plugins.

Is WordPress good for SEO? “Goose!” WordPress is what we usually recommend (and use).

• WordPress gives you the ability to customize things like the sidebar for conversion, sticky headers, etc. Its capabilities are nearly limitless.
• It’s simple to update your site on WordPress while also staying on top of Google’s best practices.
• It’s easy to optimize for mobile friendliness—recommended by Google, the WPtouch plugin instantly enables a mobile-friendly version of your website that passes the Google Mobile test and helps ensure your rankings don’t drop due to not having a mobile-friendly site.
• In general, WordPress is very flexible and customizable, especially with plugins.
• WordPress sites are best suited to be hosted on a WordPress managed server. Let me give you more details…

WP Engine

The main benefit of WP Engine is specific hosting for WordPress websites—it offers the ideal, most optimized environment for these sites. But that’s not all! Other benefits of WP Engine include:

• Great security, including free SSL (secure sites are more important than ever)
• Daily backups
• Faster site load times (WP Engine has a great caching system which makes their sites fast)
• Responsive staff/award-winning 24-hour customer service available (extremely convenient if problems do arise)
• Easy migration process (possibly the easiest of any hosting company)

Your best option if you want a website that is SEO-friendly and attractive, on a platform that is easy to navigate. View our website portfolio (most are WordPress sites!).

Website Design & Development from Blue Corona

You’ll probably get a few different answers when you ask different companies what the best website builder is. Here at Blue Corona, our answer is WordPress. You can’t provide a good user experience without security, fast website times, and mobile friendliness—and you get all that and more (without hassle) with WordPress. WP Engine is the cherry on top.

This is a lot of information, but with Blue Corona, you don’t have to worry about the website stuff on your own! We take care of that, so you can spend more time growing your business. And playing Duck Duck Goose with your kids.

Ready to build a new website? Get in touch with us! Do you want to make a website update? Let us give you a free analysis:

Sources:

http://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/wix-vs-weebly-which-website-builder-is-better/

http://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/wix-vs-squarespace/

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/makes-wordpress-best-platform-seo/133643/

https://wordpress.org/plugins/wptouch