- All right, so you've seen Squarespace ads everywhere.
Many big influencers on YouTube have videos
sponsored by Squarespace.
But just because something is popular
doesn't necessarily mean it's good.
So in today's video, I wanna answer the question,
can you really make a good website with Squarespace?
This video is not sponsored by Squarespace,
but it is sponsored by MarketerHire.
Get helped by expert marketers on a flexible basis.
More on that later.
I've talked before about how Squarespace
is a great DIY website builder,
but you end up with a cookie-cutter looking website.
Things like a black and white color scheme,
generic looking fonts, and the same elements used
on so many websites.
This is a great starting point
if you're new to building websites,
but you might be wondering if Squarespace
is really flexible enough for your needs.
If you wanna break out of that cookie-cutter mold
and build a beautiful brand-specific, rich looking website
that fits your brand and doesn't look black and white,
and doesn't use the default fonts,
can you really do that with Squarespace?
I'll answer the question right away,
yes you absolutely can make
beautiful looking websites in Squarespace.
Check it out, I've got some examples right here.
Here we have the Bathhouse website.
I love their use of a looping video
right here in their hero section.
It does still look a bit Squarespacey to me,
a little bit cookie-cutter,
but I can tell that they did put in the work
to start customizing it and making it their own.
Next, we have this Jones Barbecue website.
I love what they've done with the font and the buttons.
Just changing out the font,
the buttons, and the colors make this look unique.
They made it their own.
This does not even look like a Squarespace website to me.
Next, we have KeyNest.
I really like what KeyNest has done
with the call-to-action here, it's fillable.
That's something unique that I'm not used to seeing
on a Squarespace website.
They also have gone above and beyond with this hero section.
You can hover your mouse
over the different sections, it's interactive.
The page feels good.
You know, we've got the testimonial slider here.
These are elements that I'm not used to seeing
in the average Squarespace website.
And last up, we have Marcus Eriksson's site.
Marcus is a photographer.
This is a portfolio site with his work,
really, truly unique.
When I move my mouse around the pictures kind of interact
as I scroll.
It's definitely a little bit glitchy,
I think, 'cause I'm screen recording.
It was a little bit smoother earlier when I tried it out.
But I mean, as you can see,
this is just a very unique website.
If I go to About,
we have the rotating colors here on the text.
Or, even if I go to Index,
we just have this very unique wheel when I hover over stuff.
I mean, this just blows my mind with Squarespace.
So yes, you can absolutely make
a beautiful, brand-specific, rich website with Squarespace,
but for some reason that's not the norm.
Almost all the Squarespace websites I see are cookie-cutter,
they have a black, white color scheme,
they use default fonts, and it's got me wondering,
are people really just too lazy
to customize their Squarespace website?
Or is there another reason for this?
Is it difficult to customize Squarespace?
Is it practical?
Is it rocket science?
I really wanna get to the bottom of
how flexible is Squarespace for building a beautiful website
like these ones I just showed you.
The catch to Squarespace is that in order to build
these beautiful brand-specific pages,
it takes a lot of trial and error,
and what I call hacking.
Now, you're not really hacking anything,
but hacking is a term used in web design
when you have to get creative and find different workarounds
to limitations in website builders.
To give you a better feel for the Squarespace editor,
I'm gonna build a page in real time
while telling you about today's sponsor MarketerHire.
So I'm here in the Squarespace editor
and I have the MarketerHire logo.
I wish I could shrink it a little bit,
but there's no such option.
Squarespace is drag and drop,
but if I go into the little pencil icon here and Design,
it's just not having it.
I know I can make the image smaller,
but it's really difficult to find, but that's okay.
Let's just leave the logo as is,
and let's work on our first heading which is Get Helped.
That's because MarketerHire allows you to get helped
by expert marketers on a flexible basis.
You don't actually need to hire anyone.
They're gonna help you find a freelancer
who's a fit for your business.
I'm sure you're busy.
I'm sure you've got a lot going on,
and MarketerHire wants to make it easy for you
to get the help that you need.
So we got our first heading.
You know, I can drag this heading around.
It's a little bit difficult to, you know,
even if I wanna change the font
I'm not able to do that here.
I can do bold or italics,
but to actually change the font
I have to go to another section of Squarespace.
That's never quite made sense to me.
And I think that's why we're seeing a lot
of these cookie-cutter pages.
Okay, you know, let's leave this right here.
We have our second heading, which is Only the Best.
That's because MarketerHire brings on
only the world's best marketing freelancers.
They have a less than 4% acceptance rate,
which is more exclusive than Harvard.
Maybe I want to put this above the heading.
That would be goofy, yeah.
Maybe below the heading, like that.
Can space it out.
But again, like how would I resize this text box?
How would I make this smaller?
I mean, we got a spacer over here.
It's almost like Squarespace needs to be
all in on their editor.
But MarketerHire is all in.
They're gonna do whatever is necessary
to make sure that your business gets the right expertise
and the marketing help that it needs.
It's also risk-free.
There is free rematching so that way,
if you're connected with someone, you try it,
you're not feeling it, MarketerHire we'll find you
the right person for free,
and they will let you try different marketers
until you find the right one for your business.
I wanna see if I could do something more interactive
with Squarespace 'cause everything we're seeing here
is just text on a page, kind of bland.
I'm looking for one of those accordion controls.
So this is sort of like an FAQ control.
It looks like it's not working
or it's not interactive in the editor,
but maybe we'll do Steps to get started.
Step one is to identify your marketing challenge
and speak with their growth managers.
Step two is to meet your perfect marketer.
Step three is to start seeing results fast.
So definitely consider MarketerHire
if you need some extra marketing help with your business.
Thanks to MarketerHire for sponsoring today's video,
and you can try MarketerHire using my link
at marketerhire.com/craylor.
So as you can see, it's easy to build
a generic looking page in Squarespace.
And if that's what you're after,
Squarespace is gonna be right for you.
I do believe Squarespace is very beginner friendly.
It's easy to go in there, type your changes,
drags differ around,
but the level of customization available on the page editor
is very slim.
If I wanna change a font in a specific paragraph,
can't do that easily.
If I wanna change a button color
to be outside of the default colors for the website,
can't do that easily.
I can change fonts and primary colors
and other design items under the Design tab of Squarespace,
but those options are global.
So if I change the font in the Design tab,
it changes the font for the entire website.
If you want to differentiate yourself,
and I think any marketer would tell you
that your brand needs to stand out,
it needs to feel like you,
this is where Squarespace becomes difficult.
And this is where the hacks get introduced.
If I wanna change a font of a specific paragraph,
I have to actually go into the CSS section of Squarespace,
target that specific element, and use CSS code
to change the font for that one spot.
The story is the same for button styling
and just different little things within Squarespace.
Now one thing to take note of is
that the grass is not necessarily greener elsewhere.
You have some of these problems with
Wix and WordPress (button clicking)
and other popular website builders on the market.
Wix is generally better for being able to customize
everything down to the exact pixel.
You have more freedom to move a button
exactly where you want it on the page.
You can change fonts for specific paragraphs
without having to get into CSS, or code,
or hacks, or any of that.
But Wix has its own limitations,
especially with backend functionality.
If you wanna do something dynamic,
like have a little forum community within your website,
well, Wix or Squarespace,
aren't really gonna be great for that.
That's when you would need
a more powerful website builder
like WordPress. (button clicking)
But I will say WordPress is sort of built entirely on hacks.
If you install WordPress today,
you don't add any third party plugins to the mix,
WordPress is a blogging platform.
You have to start installing third party plugins,
and a theme, and all these things on top of stock WordPress
to really have a quality
drag and drop page building experience.
The grass is not necessarily greener
with other website builders.
So is Squarespace worth the hype and praise?
Well, I personally maintain that Squarespace
is the best website builder for DIY use
if you're not super tech savvy.
If you're just looking for something
where you can drag and drop elements on the page
and get a clean, minimal looking website,
Squarespace is for you.
However, if you're more of a designer,
or you have a vision for your website,
and you have certain brand colors and aesthetics
and visuals that you're looking to implement
in your website,
I would stay away from Squarespace.
I think you're gonna have better luck with Wix,
if you need a simple drag and drop editor,
that's highly customizable.
Or WordPress, if you're willing to get
over the learning curve and invest the time
to make a really powerful, rich website.
I've seen many WordPress sites that look great.
It's a very powerful website builder,
and it's not gonna have the same limitations
that Squarespace has.
So what do you think of Squarespace?
Definitely be sure to let me know in a comment down below.
And after you've built
your beautiful, amazing looking website
you definitely wanna check out MarketerHire
for your business.
Thanks to MarketerHire for sponsoring this video.
And you can try MarketerHire out at
marketerhire.com/craylor.
With that said, I will catch you guys next time.