5 Reasons Why Squarespace is Awesome For Small Businesses

This post was updated in August 2017.

As a small business owner and a freelancer website designer, I expect a lot from my website platform. I've blogged for years, first on Blogger, then Wordpress and finally Squarespace. I've spent countless hours learning the ropes and insider moves. It's a labour of love but one that's really worth it (to me, at least!).

In 2015, I decided that I would only design websites using Squarespace. Why? Because it's a really great website platform, particularly for creative ventures and small businesses. Over 1,000,000 customers can't be wrong either, including some of the most innovative companies in the world.

I recommend Squarespace to all my small business clients, friends, colleagues and just about anyone who will listen. Here's 5 awesome reasons why you should choose Squarespace for your small business website:

5 Reasons why Squarespace is Awesome for Small Businesses | Lilani Goonesena Squarespace is a really great website platform for creative ventures, freelancers and small businesses. Here's 5 reasons your business should be on Squarespace http://www.l…

1. Save loads of time in Squarespace

If you have your images and text ready to go, you can put together a Squarespace site in about ten minutes. No joke. 10 minutes, peeps!

Sure, you'll go back and tweak and fiddle around at your leisure but you can essentially have a fully functioning site in a very short time.

One of the best reasons for this is that every Squarespace template comes with complete demo pages. So, you don't waste time trying to figure out basics like how to create a page, much less how to make your site look like the sample template you liked so much. The structure is already laid out and you can just drop your own content in. Easy!

Another efficiency is that Squarespace provides an all-in-one package - security, updates and hosting. Designing a website from scratch consists of a long series of small steps, so any fast tracks are very appreciated. Squarespace site owners don't have to worry about comment spam, hackers, theme and plugin updates, or those infernal 401, 404 and 500 errors. Without all that rubbish to worry about, you can get on with what's important - running your business.

2. Squarespace sites are intuitive

Editing in the Squarespace is easy because you can see the changes as you make them. There's no refreshing the screen or opening a second window to see how things look if you try this or that.

It's especially useful when you're testing colours or fonts and want to look at every single option. Or when deciding on sidebars, footers, banner width and a dozen other layout issues.

3. Squarespace's effective aesthetics

One of the best things about Squarespace is that its sites look awesome. Clean, professional, and sophisticated - who doesn't want that image for their business?

All Squarespace templates are responsive so they automatically adjust image size and content to every device. And this year, in 2017, Squarespace automatically switched all of its sites to https - instant security without having to code or purchase a certificate.

Squarespace templates are all designed with different clientele in mind, from artists and photographers to restaurants, real estate agencies, jewellers and gyms. The demo sites are set up to showcase individual industries to make it super easy for businesses to envisage their own site.

Squarespace also offers cover pages - single page sites for either a temporary "coming soon" look or permanent use. Here's a temporary cover page I designed for Canberra property stylists, Sold On Styling.

4. Squarespace sites are highly customisable

One of Squarespace's big selling points is its gorgeous 'out of the box' websites. Sites can be highly customised to a whole range of styles and designs and pre-formatted page layouts also make it as easy as possible for newbie Squarespace owners to set up their sites quickly and painlessly.

There are blocks and spaces for page layouts. There are multiple gallery styles to view images and content. And if you have the skills, there are also custom CSS and developer options.

For the this site below, Mia Ruby - a specialised gems and jewellery business in Myanmar - I used several galleries as well as a slider on the homepage to showcase her gorgeous products.

5. Squarespace support

Squarespace has won awards for its customer service. Unlike Wordpress or other open-source platforms, it has a highly engaged support system.

Squarespace has an active forum, online chat option, and 24/7 email service. There are step-by-step guides and videos for just about every feature. There's support for individual templates, and if you can't find information on something, you can always contact a Squarespace support person to help figure out your specific technical issue.

Squarespace also provides extra support to web designers like me, through a community called Squarespace Circle members. Among other things, I receive a weekly newsletter detailing template and site updates, fixes and enhancements, beta testing, future releases, etc. They ask constantly for feedback and queries. They are invested in building a community of engaged, long term users, which is pretty awesome.

There you have it - 5 simple but powerful reasons that help make Squarespace a great choice for small business. And let me add one more, which is so vital for many small businesses these days...

Squarespace's solid e-commerce performance

Small businesses sales, from e-courses to homemade muesli, is a rapidly growing field with international popularity.

Squarespace is aimed towards small business e-commerce sites with 200 product lines or less. It offers all the standard e-commerce options - product listings, inventory, checkout, saved baskets, and customised client communications. There's even tax advice for US clients. Its payment system is set up with Stripe, which is similar to Paypal and though not as widespread, particularly in Asia, can be used around the world.

Squarespace commerce offers complete site customisation as well as guides for marketing, promotion and working with other platforms including Etsy and Shopify.

I've created lots of different types of small business websites in Squarespace and I think it rocks. After a few frustrated years with Wordpress, I am so glad I made the transition. I've grown my business with Squarespace; it's worked for me and it can work for you too.

This post was updated in August 2017.