You have decided you need a website for your small business. So, which website builder should you choose? You have narrowed it down to WordPress and Wix. In this article, you will be able to see the pros and cons of both WordPress and Wix so you will be able to make an educated decision as to what will work for you and your company’s website.
WordPress Pros and Cons
Pros
- A free website builder that can be upgraded to secure hosting
- More than 55,000 plugins to customize your website to your needs
- Great plugins for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) capabilities
- eCommerce compatible and growable
- Self-Hosting or Managed Hosting capabilities
- Thousands of themes to set up your perfect design
- Frequent updates to maintain top-level security
One of the biggest pros of using the WordPress site builder is that the free version gives you control over your design and decision as to self-hosting or hosting with them. They also offer over 55,000 plugins to change and add on to your website to making it match your company’s voice perfectly. WordPress also gives you one of the top line SEO abilities, making it easy to set up your site and become visible after you launch to the world. Connecting your eCommerce store is also easy with WordPress because of its affiliation with WooCommerce and an easy plugin that allows you to connect your store and have your customers ready to shop on launch day. One final pro for the WordPress site builder is continual updates for added security.
Cons
- Vulnerabilities because of their open source platform
- Frequent updates that take time to acclimate
- Takes time to learn the platform unless you have coding knowledge
- Custom layouts can be challenging to implement
As good as WordPress is at what they do, there are still a few cons to be mentioned. Choosing the self-hosted version will require a good deal of knowledge to achieve your specific goals. While advances are being made in this issue with each new update, there are still times when designing your website can be overwhelming. This issue is eliminated though by choosing the proper WordPress managing team. Because they know the language, you can achieve everything you want with ease. Another issue with WordPress is vulnerabilities due to its open-source platform. This issue is an easy fix though with antimalware plugins or following the security recommendations of your managing team. This issue is also less troublesome with the WordPress secure hosting option. One final drawback with WordPress is that it is a bit harder to learn than some WordPress competitors. However, this too can be remedied with your managing team or through the many tutorials that are available to help you succeed.
Wix Pros and Cons
Pros
- User-friendly and easy to use drag and drop features
- A multitude of easy install themes to choose from
- Easy to install and use widgets for navigation
- Updates and maintenance handled by Wix
- Mobile friendly
Just like WordPress, Wix has quite a few pros to recommend it. The Wix site builder has a user-friendly easy to use, drop and drag builder, making setting up your website a bit easier. They also have hundreds of themes to choose from to make your website design match your company’s voice. Their easy install widgets make adding additional page features easy and quick to implement. Because Wix is not only your website builder but your hosting company as well they take care of all maintenance and updates for you. Wix is also very mobile friendly, which makes it easy to view your website no matter your device.
Cons
- Does not support self-hosting
- Cannot change themes once your website has been published
- Limited SEO capabilities
Just, like WordPress, Wix has room for improvement. Some of their flaws include the lack of a self-hosting option, which takes away a bit of your control. Should you choose to go with another hosting company, you would have to start over and rebuild your site. Another drawback with Wix is that you cannot change themes once you have published your website. That means once your website is live, you cannot change your theme to something that works better with your overall plan. The final flaw in choosing Wix is that of SEO. Because Wix implements its own codes into virtually everything, the unique code is harder to find by popular search engines. This coding makes it harder to draw new visitors to your site.
Which is Better
Deciding which website builder is better will be a personal choice. Wix would be a good choice for a website that does not envision expansion in the future or has an informative nature. WordPress is more compatible with Blog websites and eCommerce stores. Ultimately you will need to weigh your choices to find the right one for your needs.