Hey there, fellow non-designers! Micki right here, and I wish to share my expertise utilizing Squarespace to create my private web site.
Confessions of a Non-Designer
Let’s be actual: I’m not a pure designer. I can admire lovely design, however creating one thing beautiful myself? That’s an completely totally different story. I actually have the design abilities of a potato, and this has adopted me by varied facets of life, together with the web sites I’ve tried to construct.
I’ve all the time admired fantastically designed web sites, however as somebody who doesn’t think about herself a pure designer, I’ve struggled to create visually beautiful websites myself. It’s not that I can’t acknowledge good design after I see it; I merely don’t have the innate capability to craft one thing lovely from scratch.
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Past Website Struggles
Charles and I’ve constructed dozens of internet sites over time together with ones for ourselves, a number of for firms and some for family and friends. Some of our hottest embody this web site TheBarefootNomad, our recipe bathroom TheParentSpot, plus a number of web sites devoted to serving to vacationers select the right journey insurance coverage (which we’ve since bought or shut down).
Despite our greatest efforts and numerous hours invested, none of those web sites turned out as fantastically as we had envisioned. Any design enhancements we tried to make have been met with frustration and felt like an uphill battle. The drawback has by no means been technical for us, extra of imaginative and prescient.
Discovering Squarespace
After our previous web site struggles, I noticed that having the fitting instruments may simply make an enormous distinction. That’s why I made a decision to present Squarespace a strive for my private web site, MickiKosman.com. I needed an area to share my journey as a journey author, entrepreneur, and storyteller, plus a spot to attach with my viewers in a inventive {and professional} approach.
What is Squarespace, Anyway?
So, you’ve possible heard of Squarespace, however what precisely is it?
In a nutshell, it’s an all-in-one platform for constructing web sites. It comes with a bunch of options like skilled templates, a drag-and-drop editor, a content material administration system, running a blog instruments, web optimization stuff, e-commerce choices, and web site internet hosting. Basically, it’s has a number of the issues that you must create a stunning web site, multi functional place.
Getting Started with Blueprint AI
Signing up for Squarespace was easy. I began with the free 14-day trial and performed round with the Blueprint AI design characteristic. It provided some useful design solutions primarily based on my web site targets.
What actually impressed me was Squarespace’s library of customizable templates. There have been loads of enticing designs to select from.
Customizing My Website
Customizing my web site with Squarespace was a comparatively easy course of. The drag-and-drop interface and varied options made it straightforward to personalize the design while not having coding abilities. I may add, take away, and rearrange components on the web page with only a few clicks.
Finding the Right Images
One factor that may be time-consuming when constructing a web site is discovering the right photographs.
Squarespace helped with that by providing a choice of inventory photographs along with the flexibility to add my very own images. I used my very own images, however having inventory images readily available may undoubtedly save time and trouble!
The End Result
Within a few hours, I had a web site that I used to be proud of. Squarespace allowed me, a non-designer, to create a web site that was each visually interesting and practical. The built-in options like cell optimization, web optimization instruments, and social media integration weren’t as obvious when designing it however as a web site proprietor, are all extraordinarily useful.
Templates That Look Pretty Darn Good
One factor that stood out to me about Squarespace was the templates. I’ve bought to confess, they’re fairly straightforward on the eyes. They’ve bought this clear, skilled vibe happening.
And the cool half is, you may simply decide one in every of their templates, toss in your personal images and textual content, and your web site will look fairly polished. No design abilities wanted!
Another good factor in regards to the templates is that they’re responsive. That means they robotically regulate to look good on totally different gadgets, like tablets and telephones. It’s helpful as a result of extra folks browse the net on their cell gadgets as of late than laptops and desktops mixed.
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I used this attractive Waverly template to create my web site. You can see a demo of the Waverly template I used right here at Squarespace. You can customise kinds, add options of templates (and extra) if you begin a trial.
Customization Options
When it involves styling your web site, Squarespace has an honest variety of choices. You can mess around with the fonts (which is nice should you’re choosy about typography like me), colours, sizes, button kinds, and all types of different design components. And you are able to do all of this with out touching any code, which is a aid for individuals who aren’t precisely tech wizards.
But, should you do occur to know your approach round code, Squarespace does have a Custom CSS part the place you may add your personal coding magic.
Want to browse some attractive designs? Get some inspiration from a few of the finest
designs on the internet at their design showcase right here.
Built-in Features
One factor to notice about Squarespace is that every little thing is baked proper into the platform. You don’t should go trying to find plugins or extensions. It’s handy, nonetheless it additionally means you’re restricted to the options they provide.
That being mentioned, Squarespace does have a fairly good choice of options, particularly for bloggers and small companies. You can simply add issues like a weblog, contact kind, electronic mail signup, picture galleries, occasion calendar, social media buttons, and even a purchasing cart for promoting merchandise or digital downloads.
Let’s Talk Money
Now, let’s discuss pricing. Squarespace provides a free 14-day trial, so you may take a look at the waters and see if it’s the fitting match for you. After that, you may select from 4 totally different plans: Basic, Core, Plus, or Advanced.
If you’re in Canada like me, you may see these plans labeled as Personal, Business, Commerce Basic, and Commerce Advanced, which I imagine is just the outdated branding for a similar packages provided within the USA.
The Basic plan begins at simply $16 USD per 30 days should you go for annual billing, or $23 USD per 30 days should you want to pay month-to-month. As your enterprise grows, you may improve to higher-tier plans that supply much more options and instruments that can assist you succeed on-line.
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The Bottom Line
So, is Squarespace the be-all, end-all of web site builders? It has its strengths, just like the enticing templates and built-in options, nevertheless it may not be the right match for everybody if you’d like excessive flexibility or demand very out-of-the-box designs.
If you’re searching for a platform that’s straightforward to make use of and provides you a professional-looking web site with no ton of trouble, Squarespace is certainly price testing.
But hey, that’s simply my two cents primarily based alone expertise. Your mileage might range!
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