- This video is sponsored by TrueName Domains.
Find the perfect domain for your brand
at the link in the description below.
Hey guys, my name is Christian Taylor.
Welcome back to Craylor Made
where I'd like to talk all things
branding, marketing, and entrepreneurship.
Many of you have asked the question, Christian,
which WordPress page builder is best for my website?
Should I use Elementor, Divi or WPBakery?
And if you're wondering if this question is worth asking,
it absolutely is.
Why, because the page builder you pick for WordPress
affects your entire WordPress experience.
That's because a third-party page builder
is sort of like a website builder within a website builder,
something that adds to the foundation of WordPress
to give you enhanced drag and drop functionality.
And the reality is it's not easy to switch
page builder plugins after you use one
to build your website so you need to choose wisely.
But which one is right for you?
We'll compare features, strengths and weaknesses,
and pricing for each page builder to answer that question.
Let's start with Elementor.
Available with both free and premium versions,
Elementor is perhaps the most popular page builder
on the market.
The free version gives you access
to the drag and drop editor
and access to over 40 basic widgets.
The pro version unlocks over 50 pro widgets
plus a theme builder, pop-up builder,
visual form builder, motion effects,
premium support, and more.
The free version of Elementor works great in combination
with free themes like Astra or Neve.
You can also utilize the Hello Elementor theme,
a free option built by the Elementor team
that allows you to build a custom site from the ground up.
When it comes to pro plan benefits,
you unlock widgets like a portfolio, gallery, forms,
price table, and other useful elements.
The theme builder allows you to craft custom headers,
footers and other theme elements
for global use on your website.
When combined with the official
Hello Elementor WordPress theme,
you really could craft your own look and feel
for your site using the free theme
in an Elementor Pro license.
In other words,
you could basically subscribe to Elementor Pro
and build a custom website without also needing
to purchase a WordPress theme,
something notable to Elementor.
I also appreciate the pop-up builder
that allows you to craft exit intent popups
for lead generation.
Elementor Pro by itself could be a sufficient solution
to build a website combined with free WordPress themes,
but you can also install Elementor on any WordPress website
and use the page builder with premium themes.
However, one huge downside to Elementor
is the pricing model.
They don't offer a lifetime license,
meaning you'll be paying an annual fee for Elementor Pro
for each website that uses it.
Thankfully, the Elementor team does offer
very reasonable bulk discounts.
One website is 49 a year, 25 websites is 1.99 a year,
and a thousand websites is 9.99 a year.
Still, some users are bothered by this pricing model
when other page builders like WPBakery
and Divi offer lifetime licenses.
Elementor says their business model cannot be sustained
without license renewal and a lifetime license works
against customers' interests
because there are less resources available
to always be adding new features and updates.
Overall, Elementor is the best
front end page builder I've tried.
It does not offer a backend option at all,
but the Elementor team has committed to making Elementor
the ultimate what you see is what you get experience.
So unlike WPBakery and Divi,
there's no option in Elementor to go to the wireframe view
or the block building view and move things around
in the backend.
You only get this what you see is what you get experience,
which is quite nice.
It's kind of like you're editing a word document.
You can just click text on the page,
highlight it and change it and drag elements around.
It's a very intuitive experience.
Elementor plays nice with most WordPress themes.
There's quite a few free themes that support it
and even paid themes that include a license to WPBakery
also includes support for Elementor
if you want to bring your own license.
Next step, let's take a look at WPBakery.
WPBakery is a page builder
that's commonly included in premium WordPress themes.
There's no free version,
though you can purchase a license for a $45 fee.
This grants access to use WPBakery on a single site,
and you'll need a license
for each additional website you build.
WPBakery shines as a backend editor first.
If you'd like to think of your website more as a collection
of building blocks that you put together,
then you load the page in a separate tab to preview it,
WPBakery is for you.
It's a totally different experience
from a what you see is what you get builder like Elementor
and it's definitely something you'll love or hate.
Now, WPBakery does have a front end editor.
It works decently, but it's not nearly as good as Elementor.
You can't simply highlight text on the page
and start editing it like you can with Elementor.
You have to click the pencil icon
and edit the elements in the pop-up prompt,
then it will update on the page when you save it.
Furthermore, drag and drop functionality
is far more glitchy than Elementor
and that applies to the backend editor as well.
I like WPBakery because I'm used to it.
I've used it in themes for years,
and there's a reason it's included in most premium themes.
A theme integration license costs only $245.
So these super themes like Salient
that includes WPBakery for everyone to use
only had to pay a $245 one time fee to do this.
To be honest, I wouldn't recommend purchasing
a license to WPBakery.
I would use it if it's included in a theme you purchased
and you liked the backend editing experience,
but it's not something I would go out of my way to purchase
for a theme that does not include it.
I've always looked at WPBakery as a page builder
to modify demo pages supplied by theme developers.
When a page is pre-built for you as a base
and you can modify it with the editor,
WPBakery is a decent experience,
but if you want to build pages from scratch,
WPBakery can be a frustrating experience.
This is when I noticed the WPBakery team
also offers a full website builder called Visual Composer.
Visual Composer is a true Elementor alternative
that is just a front end builder,
but it features modern technology
that gets away from the shortcodes that WPBakery uses
and it offers a smoother drag and drop experience
with a theme builder, pop-up builder and premium support.
It's also worth pointing out that Visual Composer
gives you that word document editing experience,
where you can just click and drag over text on the page
and start making modifications.
This is something that is not true for WPBakery.
Overall, Visual Composer is the newer,
more modern version of a front end builder,
which WPBakery lacks in.
But for whatever reason,
Visual Composer never really caught on.
This is probably due to the fact
that WPBakery is offered at a very reasonable price point
for theme developers
so that's why we see it included in so many themes.
Just like Elementor, Visual Composer has a free version
and offers premium plans starting at $49 per year.
Unlike Elementor, they offer a better value
on bulk licenses at 3.49 a year for 1000 sites.
While I do appreciate the smoothness of Visual Composer,
it's still difficult to recommend purchasing a license.
This is because unlike Elementor Pro,
Visual Composer isn't officially supported
by many WordPress themes.
You could build your website from scratch
using Visual Composer,
but you could also do that using Elementor Pro
for the same price.
There are endless tutorials and articles online
for using Elementor to build your website,
but the community and usage for Visual Composer
seems much less popular.
So overall, I wouldn't recommend purchasing a license
to WPBakery or Visual Composer,
but WPBakery is a decent page builder
if you can find a theme that includes it.
Having a superior what you see is what you get editor
for creating designs from scratch is important.
When you're building your website,
you want it to stand out and make a good impression.
You want visitors to know a lot of thought
went into the clean design of your website
and part of that process is getting the best domain
for your brand.
This brings us to today's sponsor, TrueName Domains.
Your domain should clearly describe who you are
and what you do.
It's a more significant part of your brand than ever before.
Good domains are notoriously difficult to find.
What you think is your perfect choice is already taken,
or it's not clear what your options are.
The great news is that there are new domain options
that are not only available,
but more relevant and memorable.
Most people know about .com domain names,
but there are actually hundreds of other domain extensions
that you can use that are often a better fit
for your brand and business.
A lot of these fall under the brand of TrueName domains.
TrueName domains have anti-phishing technology,
which prevents your domain name from being hacked as easily.
They're more specific, prevent compromise,
and tell people exactly what you do and what you're about.
They're also treated the same in SEL as legacy extensions.
There are TrueName extensions for brand
spanning almost any niche you can think of.
So if you're a creator, you could use a .studio.
If you're a gamer or live streamer,
you could get a .live domain.
I'm so excited to bring my community a special offer
for you to get your own domain for your project,
whether it's one you're actively working on
or something you plan to launch in the future.
My friends at Dynadot are offering 50% off
standard TrueName domains for my community.
I recently got the domain craylor.academy
to use for my newly launched online course,
which to me was a much better choice
than crayloracademy.com.
Go to the link in the description below,
or go to dynadot.deals to get the exclusive offer
of 50% off with promo code Craylor.
Simply search some of your preferred keywords
and you'll be able to browse all of the available domains.
I really want to know what the domains are that you chose.
Go ahead and share the domain or domains you got
in the comments section below so I can check it out.
Thanks to TrueName for sponsoring this video
and now let's take a look
at another page builder worth considering.
Divi by Elegant Themes
is available as an annual subscription
or a lifetime license.
Divi works on unlimited websites and includes bonuses
like a magazine theme and a pop-up builder
for email conversions.
Divi is different from the other page builders
because it's both a WordPress theme and a page builder.
You can sort of think of it
like using the Hello Elementor theme
with the Elementor page builder.
Divi is a WordPress theme
that includes many pre-made layouts to choose from,
but it's also a proprietary page builder.
It is possible to upload the Divi page builder plugin
to any WordPress theme
and I suppose it's possible to use the Divi WordPress theme
with Elementor or another page builder,
but the two are definitely made to work together.
Divi excels as a front end editor,
bringing an experience similar to Elementor.
You get that word document style editing,
where you can just click the text on the page
and start typing to add more.
The drag and drop functionality is smooth,
and you can quickly change back and forth
between the front end editor and the backend editor,
which Divi calls wireframe view.
The wireframe view is definitely inferior to WPBakery.
While the drag and drop experience works intuitively,
row columns are difficult to visualize
and elements don't give a content preview
like they do in WPBakery.
For example, you can see here
that I have four blurbs in a row,
but I don't know the contents of the blurb
until I click the settings gear.
With WPBakery, I could see a preview of element contents
to know what each item is before I edit it.
I would definitely consider Divi mainly
for the front end editor.
I think the backend editor is lacking in many areas.
Overall, Divi isn't amazing in any one particular area,
but what it does offer is value.
Purchasing a lifetime license to Divi
and being able to use the Divi theme
and page builder on unlimited websites,
including client websites is a strong value proposition.
WPBakery offers a lifetime license,
but you need a license for every website
and Elementor needs a plan size
to fit the number of websites you have.
Divi's business model is truly unique
and Elegant Themes has been around for years
with a proven reputation of providing updates,
new features and bug fixes.
The other unique thing about Divi
is the holistic approach to customer support.
Since it's both a WordPress theme and a page builder,
you'll be able to reach out to Elegant Themes for help
on just about any issue that could arise
with your WordPress site.
Elegant Themes support is some of the best I've experienced.
They have a 24/7 live chat system
available on their website,
and they're always ready to jump in and help
if you have questions or problems.
So with all of this in mind,
which page builder is right for you?
Elementor is the clear choice
if you need a free page builder
and I also think it's the best overall page builder
for front end editing.
WPBakery is a convenient option
included in many premium WordPress themes
if you don't want to think about purchasing
a page builder separately,
and it's also the best backend page builder I've tried.
Divi is a compelling value option
for creating many websites with a lifetime license.
The backend editor is lacking,
but the front end editor is not too far behind Elementor.
You're also getting a WordPress theme
and some great customer service.
If you have the time and determination,
you can definitely create an amazing website with Divi.
By the way, you might be wondering
why I didn't mention Gutenberg in this video.
Gutenberg is the official drag and drop WordPress editor
that's been under development for quite some time.
While Gutenberg is absolutely the future of WordPress
and will become more significant over time,
I don't feel like it's ready for use yet
for building a full on website.
I know some may disagree with me,
but I'd say if you're using WordPress for blogging,
Gutenberg is just fine,
but if you're building a website for your business or brand,
I would recommend using a third party page builder for now.
As for my preference,
I've stuck with WPBakery out of convenience
because I know it's a solid editor I can trust
and what I don't have to pay separately for.
I look for WordPress themes that include a license,
and I've been used to the backend editor for years.
I am intrigued by front end editing though
and I would like to explore trying Elementor
with some of my favorite themes like Salient,
which includes WPBakery to see how they work together.
So which page builder is your favorite?
Let me know in the comments below,
don't forget to get 50% off your TrueName domain
with promo code Craylor
at the link in the description below.
Be sure to hit that subscribe button and click the bell
so you don't miss when I release new videos.
And with that said, I'll catch you guys next time.