Ask a Marketer: Should I build a WordPress or Squarespace site for my young company?

This is Ask a Marketer by Sean Sutherland, who can help you figure out how to make the most of your marketing budget and time. As the chief marketing officer for Kapowza, a Baltimore-based creative agency, he’s seen it all. Here, he’ll share his hard-won advice from over a decade in the industry.

Q: Should I build a WordPress or Squarespace site?

A: There’s a lot of site builders out there, but likely the two we’re asked about most of the time are WordPress and Squarespace. While they both do some exceptional things, and have both come a long way from when they first started out, there’s a clear way to know which platform is best for you to build on.

Honestly, a lot of it depends on where you’re at as a company, first and foremost.

Squarespace is a fantastic tool which allows you to quickly spin up all sorts of websites through an extensive, customizable template that is perfect for ecommerce, a blog, or an infinity scrolling brochure website. These are great if you’re building an MVP, are just getting started in business, or really just need to do some basic stuff on your site.

WordPress, on the other hand, is almost synonymous with the word website. What started as a humble blogging platform expanded to do all sorts of things that the founders probably never imagined it being able to do. Through the proliferation of customization tools brought on by plugins, WordPress websites can handle a ton of stuff that a Squarespace one can’t.

When choosing between the two, consider this:

• What sort of actions do I want users to be able to take on this page?
• How much information do I really need to load on this site?
• How will I maintain it and how often am I going to need to change it?

An early-stage company, there’s no shame in opting for a Squarespace site. If you’re more of an established player in your space, and have the in-house development or partner available to build out some more robust functionality, take a look at WordPress.

Remember, a site is only as good as the people behind it. Build only what you need to make sure your audience has a smooth experience.

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