Switching from Squarespace to Shopify: New Features & Who It Doesn’t Make Sense For
Episode 431: Show Notes
We have exciting news! Word on the street is that Emylee is trying something new—gasp! Because, as you may know, she isn’t stuck in her ways at all…But before she shares her news, we have to state upfront that Abagail is going to be fulfilling the role of devil’s advocate on today’s show, poking holes in Emylee’s gutsy decision to switch from Squarespace to Shopify. We’ve been using the former since 2014 and we’ve been incredibly loyal, building our entire business on this site. At one point we considered having the site customized because we thought we were getting too big for the platform, but we ended up proving that Squarespace really can work for large businesses. And we still love Squarespace!
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But then Emylee started this whole product-based business venture and it’s been a learning experience par excellence: of course, it is completely different from running a service-based business like Boss Project. So, Emylee called Abagail a few days ago and let her in on the secret: she was rebuilding her website on a new platform—Shopify. Now she’s getting messages from friends saying, “Welcome to the club! You’re doing what every e-commerce person should be doing.” In this episode, Emylee is going to walk you through the reasons for her decision, the features she’s excited about and the ones she misses, who she thinks Squarespace is right for, and more. Be sure to listen in as the two of them hash it out!
Why Emylee Started Looking At Other Options.
Ever since starting on Squarespace, Emylee knew that it probably wasn’t going to be a long-term solution for e-commerce—there comes a time when business owners start needing additional functionalities that the site does not offer. But she knew that Squarespace was far cheaper than Shopify, so that delayed the transition somewhat. She eventually upgraded to the most advanced plan that Squarespace offered because she wanted things like abandoned cart features and certain analytics. She then had to pay for shipping easy and wanted to start sending emails, but Squarespace’s email campaigns are still very basic and not as seamless as she would like. So, Emylee felt that the advanced plan with all the add-ons was really expensive for how simple it is. It gets to a point where the platform also charges you for the number of broadcasts you send and the number of subscribers you send it to, and not wanting to waste money, Emylee had to keep adjusting these numbers according to stock availability, sales, etc. This got annoying! On the other hand, Shopify has released Shopify Emails, built into its platform, thus eliminating a third-party. It’s free up to 2500 subscribers, however many broadcasts you want, and it’s only a dollar for each additional one thousand subscribers after that.
The Difference Between Squarespace and Shopify and Its Pros and Cons
There’s a lot of debate about whether it is best to get an all-in-one service or pick a suite of services. From an outside perspective, it’s easy to see the benefit of an all-in-one solution where everything is not only integrated but also part of the same system. This gives you more information to work from, and should you want to scale, having that information is super helpful. But it does not necessarily make sense for people to start with Shopify. Remember, there is a huge difference between a service and product-based business as the checkout procedures are radically different. For service-based businesses, you really don’t need more than Squarespace. We want to be careful with our advice because we don’t want you to overspend unless it is absolutely necessary. Truth is, Shopify is still pretty expensive, but even their light plan includes abandoned cart (unlike Squarespace), you can list and sell products, but you have a higher percentage of transaction fees. Ultimately, Emylee reached a tipping point where she realized that she would be spending too much on third-party services with her Squarespace account, so switching to Shopify—even on the advanced plan—would save around $300 a year. There are certain other features that Shopify has because they are an e-commerce platform whereas Squarespace is a website, blogging, and communication platform that you can also sell on.
Emylee’s Experience of Shopify Thus Far
Since Emylee is not a graphic designer, she opted for one of the Shopify templates, it cost her $160, which is a lot. But it was super easy to integrate, she didn’t have to download anything—it automatically came up in the dashboard, and it shows clearly what can be edited. The problem she is coming up against now, however, is that she wants to create a new page that is not included in the template and it seems like she would have to design and build that page herself. So, if you offer other things besides products (courses, consultations, etc.) then adding that page is not going to be as easy on Shopify as it will be on Squarespace. On the flip side, the fact that Squarespace makes it so easy for you to add a new page can become distracting if you’re one of those people who is constantly coming up with new things to offer. Right now, Emylee is trying to see whether she can simply duplicate one of the existing pages. She finds that the 24/7 Shopify support is good, though not outstanding, as she is having to wait quite a long time for a response from their side, especially regarding theme-specific inquiries. Also, their email rollout is in beta and not available to everyone, so it does not work perfectly at all times.
Examples of How Shopify Beats Squarespace In The Analytics Department.
When you go to Squarespace, you immediately see your website and then you have to navigate to the side panel to click into your analytics to view them. In other words, if you are new to the platform, you might need to scratch around a bit to find the data you are after. With Shopify, when you log into your dashboard, you can immediately see how many sales you made that day, where the traffic came from, your top-performing product, etc. All that data is in one place. Because Shopify is focused only on e-commerce, it tells you how many returning customers you have and what percentage of them have bought from you more than once—and this you can’t get from Squarespace. The Shopify dashboard also shows the top three to five customers who are most likely to buy again soon, so in that way, they appear to be a smart platform because it learns your buyers’ patterns and behavior. Conversely, on Squarespace, you have to sort of guess what people will like and buy more of. With Shopify, as long as you have “recommend products” turned on, it automatically decides, after learning your buyers’ behavior, what they are likely to buy next—and they recommend items accordingly. Another cool feature in Shopify is found under the marketing section where they offer both paid and free options for marketing; emails versus ads. There’s also a feature where, if you are connecting your Facebook, you can create a campaign inside your Shopify account—for free—and do a quick post to your Facebook. The performance of that campaign can then be tracked. This will then tell you whether that campaign is converting to sales instead of making assumptions.
Best Practices and Who Shopify Will and Won’t Work For
While there may be many who can prove us wrong, we have our opinions about who Shopify and Squarespace will work for respectively. We just want to remind you that Squarespace is constantly adding new features to their site, so this is hardly the platform you knew from a few years ago. So, before dismissing Squarespace, go explore their many awesome features and first go talk to someone who has a Squarespace site. You can, for example, run a membership site with this platform—we do with our Creative Template Shop! Just a brief side note on WordPress: it’s not that WordPress is not a good site. Their features are outstanding but in our minds, it wasn’t really created with the average user in mind. If you’re not a developer, you probably won’t know about all its capabilities anyway. You can, therefore, get more features on Shopify and Squarespace simply because it’s more user-friendly. We would 100% say that Squarespace is a better site than Shopify for the average user, and we recommend only switching to Shopify later on when you’ve reached some of your sales goals—if you are a product-person. If you don’t sell physical products, we would advise you to stick with Squarespace. Squarespace, in our opinion, is still better for digital products, services, and memberships. It is also better if you don’t have any designing background. But, here is our blanket statement for the day: We do not believe your website provider is any long-term indication of the success or failure of your business. Features will never make or break your business; cool features are a nice-to-have.
Quote This
While there may be many who can prove us wrong, we have our opinions about who Shopify and Squarespace will work for respectively.
Highlights
Why Emylee Started Looking At Other Options. [0:05:20.1]
The Difference Between Squarespace and Shopify and Its Pros and Cons. [0:08:40.1]
Emylee’s Experience of Shopify Thus Far. [0:13:00.1]
Examples of How Shopify Beats Squarespace In The Analytics Department. [0:23:13.1]
Best Practices and Who Shopify Will and Won’t Work For. [0:31:31.1]
ON TODAY’S SHOW
Abagail & Emylee
The Strategy Hour Podcast
We help overwhelmed and creative entrepreneurs break down their Oprah-sized dreams to create a functioning command center to tame the chaos of their business. Basically, we think you’re totally bomb diggity, we’re about to uplevel the shiz out of your business.
KEY TOPICS
Squarespace, Shopify, Website features, E-commerce, Product-based businesses, Services, Analytics
