How Squarespace Helped Me Construct a Lovely Web site With Ease
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 gorgeous myself? That’s an completely completely different story. I actually have the design expertise of a potato, and this has adopted me by means of varied features of life, together with the web sites I’ve tried to construct.
I’ve all the time admired superbly designed web sites, however as somebody who doesn’t take into account herself a pure designer, I’ve struggled to create visually gorgeous 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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Previous Web site Struggles
Charles and I’ve constructed dozens of internet sites over time together with ones for ourselves, a number of for corporations and some for family and friends. A few of our hottest embrace this web site TheBarefootNomad, our recipe bathroom TheParentSpot, plus a number of web sites devoted to serving to vacationers select the correct journey insurance coverage (which we’ve since bought or shut down).
Regardless of our greatest efforts and numerous hours invested, none of those web sites turned out as superbly as we had envisioned. Any design enhancements we tried to make had been met with frustration and felt like an uphill battle. The issue has by no means been technical for us, extra of imaginative and prescient.
Discovering Squarespace
After our previous web site struggles, I spotted that having the proper instruments would possibly simply make an enormous distinction. That’s why I made a decision to offer Squarespace a strive for my private web site, MickiKosman.com. I wished an area to share my journey as a journey author, entrepreneur, and storyteller, plus a spot to attach with my viewers in a artistic {and professional} approach.
What’s Squarespace, Anyway?
So, you’ve probably 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, search engine optimization stuff, e-commerce choices, and web site internet hosting. Mainly, it’s has lots of the issues you have to create a stunning web site, multi functional place.
Getting Began 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 supplied some useful design options based mostly on my web site targets.
What actually impressed me was Squarespace’s library of customizable templates. There have been loads of engaging designs to select from.
Customizing My Web site
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 without having coding expertise. I might add, take away, and rearrange components on the web page with just some clicks.
Discovering the Proper Photographs
One factor that may be time-consuming when constructing an internet site is discovering the proper 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 available might positively save time and problem!
The Finish Outcome
Inside a few hours, I had an internet site that I used to be pleased with. Squarespace allowed me, a non-designer, to create a web site that was each visually interesting and purposeful. The built-in options like cellular optimization, search engine optimization instruments, and social media integration weren’t as obvious when designing it however as an internet site proprietor, are all extraordinarily useful.
Templates That Look Fairly Darn Good
One factor that stood out to me about Squarespace was the templates. I’ve acquired to confess, they’re fairly straightforward on the eyes. They’ve acquired this clear, skilled vibe occurring.
And the cool half is, you may simply decide one among their templates, toss in your individual images and textual content, and your web site will look fairly polished. No design expertise wanted!
One other good factor concerning the templates is that they’re responsive. Which means they routinely regulate to look good on completely different gadgets, like tablets and telephones. It’s helpful as a result of extra folks browse the online on their cellular gadgets lately than laptops and desktops mixed.
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I used this beautiful Waverly template to create my web site. You’ll be able to see a demo of the Waverly template I used here at Squarespace. You’ll be able to customise types, add options of templates (and extra) whenever you begin a trial.
Customization Choices
With regards to styling your web site, Squarespace has a good variety of choices. You’ll be able to mess around with the fonts (which is nice if you happen to’re choosy about typography like me), colours, sizes, button types, and all types of different design components. And you are able to do all of this with out touching any code, which is a reduction for many who aren’t precisely tech wizards.
However, if you happen to do occur to know your approach round code, Squarespace does have a Customized CSS part the place you may add your individual coding magic.
Need to browse some beautiful designs? Get some inspiration from a number of the finest
designs on the internet at their design showcase here.
Constructed-in Options
One factor to notice about Squarespace is that the whole lot is baked proper into the platform. You don’t must go looking for plugins or extensions. It’s handy, nevertheless 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’ll be able to simply add issues like a weblog, contact type, e mail signup, picture galleries, occasion calendar, social media buttons, and even a procuring cart for promoting merchandise or digital downloads.
Let’s Speak Cash
Now, let’s speak about pricing. Squarespace gives a free 14-day trial, so you may check the waters and see if it’s the proper match for you. After that, you may select from 4 completely different plans: Primary, Core, Plus, or Superior.
In case you’re in Canada like me, you would possibly see these plans labeled as Private, Enterprise, Commerce Primary, and Commerce Superior, which I imagine is solely the outdated branding for a similar packages supplied within the USA.
The Primary plan begins at simply $16 USD per thirty days if you happen to go for annual billing, or $23 USD per thirty days if you happen to favor to pay month-to-month. As your corporation 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 Backside Line
So, is Squarespace the be-all, end-all of web site builders? It has its strengths, just like the engaging templates and built-in options, but it surely may not be the proper match for everybody if you need excessive flexibility or demand very out-of-the-box designs.
In case you’re in search of a platform that’s straightforward to make use of and provides you a professional-looking web site and not using a ton of problem, Squarespace is unquestionably value trying out.
However hey, that’s simply my two cents based mostly by myself expertise. Your mileage might fluctuate!
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