This month Keiran Reid from Freeparking (a
New Zealand web host) has been good enough to create a guest post on his view of Weebly versus Wordpress for us. 543 creates all our websites in Weebly, so it's great to have this impartial view - and we add our extra thoughts at the end of this blog.
Introduction:
At their core, Weebly and WordPress are both Content Management Systems or CMS’s which let non-technical users edit websites. Both exist in the same basic niche, in that they allow you to create or edit a website, blog or e-commerce store. They both present a range of features to users and have various strengths and weaknesses that we will explore in this article.
Ease of use:
​Weebly
As a cloud hosted service through Weebly Inc, getting started entails getting access to an account by either signing in with your username & password, or signing up with a Weebly Cloud provider like 543 Design. The drag and drop interface makes it extremely easy for non-technical website owners to add or edit content, the idea is that you shouldn’t need to touch any code for most changes.
Pros:
Cons:
WordPress
Provided as open-source (free) software, WordPress can be installed into any standard web host service. It has been around longer than Weebly and it is known for being the tool of choice when it comes to blogging and eCommerce.
Pros:
Cons:
Plugins and integrations:
Weebly:
When you make a website in Weebly, there is an admin backend area. It includes a long list of built-in tools and functionality like an online store, contact form, blogs, maps, images etc. You don’t have to install any Plugins to get a good level of functionality. Weebly manages the entire platform for you, so day-to-day plugin security management and the website unexpectedly breaking are less of a concern.
Pros:
Cons:
WordPress:
​WordPress is an open source website builder, as an open system, there is a lot more freedom for third parties to contribute and extend the system, when they have been doing for years by providing both free and paid “Plugins”. Using the right plugin can add a useful your website’s functionality, but a poorly built plugin can have negative implications for your website’s performance and security.
Pros:
Cons:
Ecommerce:
Weebly
The Weebly Ecommerce platform is designed to make it quick and easy to setup an online shop. It is a great Ecommerce solution for small businesses that need to build a simple online store with a few handy features.
Pros:
Cons:
WordPress:
WordPress, by way of the WooCommerce plugin, is a popular choice for building an Ecommerce website. It is used by many organizations from small one person shops all the way up to large enterprises.
Pros:
Cons:
Conclusion:
Weebly is a perfect solution for making small websites quickly, whereas WordPress excels at blogging and eCommerce. With a simplified page editor, and tech support on-call when needed Weebly is a great choice for small businesses who need a great website. In comparison, WordPress can be a good choice if you have a larger project that needs advanced customization.
Both Weebly and WordPress are able to have custom themes developed by a professional web developer. There can also be several other complexities involved in actually getting a website live which may mean you need to seek assistance or get a professional web developer.
From day one, 543 Design made the conscious decision to design in Weebly rather than WordPress. That has given us a unique perspective, and we definitely think that for most small businesses, Weebly is the way to go. In a nutshell:
Weebly really is a fantastic platform and we love working in it. For a really complex build, sometimes we do suggest other platforms, but for 95% of clients out there, it's the ideal fit.
Get in touch with us if you'd like to get us to build your site, or try giving it a crack yourself direct with Weebly.
If you do decide to use WordPress, please get in touch with us and we can recommend a WordPress designer we trust. A big thanks to Keiran from Freeparking (a sister company to our domain provider Discount Domains) - if you have a WordPress site and are looking for a New Zealand web host - either of those companies would be a great place to start looking. Alternatively, if you want to stay in the 543 eco system, we can also offer you
DIY domains and hosting solutions for WordPress and other sites here.