Which Website Builder package is right for me?
All four of our Website Builder packages are bundled with a variety of useful features such as SSL certificates that provide a secure connection and email address, plus a great selection of professional templates that will make your website stand out from the crowd. What’s more, each page will allow you to create a website that looks fantastic on both mobiles and tablets.
But what sets each package apart from the others and how do you know which one is best for you? In this article we’ll explore the main features of each package and discuss which type of website they’ll be best for.
Info: As your website grows over time it may be necessary to upgrade the Website Builder package to get more pages, but don’t worry – the upgrade process is seamless and won’t cause any disruption to the existing website.
Website Builder Starter
The Starter package is a fully featured website editor that offers a great introduction to the world of web design. It allows you to build a website of five pages, which is more than enough for a fleshed out website that promotes your business. Here’s an example of a typical five page website structure:
Page One: Home. An attractive image to entice the customer’s attention, a catchy slogan and a short bit of text to introduce the business or project, with prominent links to the other pages.
Page Two: About. More information about yourself or your business, talking about your experience and expertise, and what sets you apart from your competitors.
Page Three: Services. An explanation of exactly which services you can offer to customers and how you can help them.
Page Four: Gallery. Some pictures of what you do and work you’ve completed, showcasing to customers just what you can complete for them.
Page Five: Contact. A page that displays your contact details and has a form that customers can fill out to get in touch with you.
This five page website structure should be more than sufficient for any small business that wants a web presence or to promote a new project that is just getting off the ground.
Tip: If you want a simple promotional website with five pages or less, then the Starter package is ideal.
Website Builder Professional
The Professional package offers a number of improvements over the Starter package that allow you to create more advanced websites and have greater control over who exactly can access them. It also supports an unlimited number of pages, which gives you the flexibility to create a large website that is only limited by your imagination!
Here’s a summary of the key features:
Blog: Provide a regular stream of content to keep your customers coming back for more. “How to”, “Tips and Tricks”, “Did you Know?” – anything that is interesting to you and your customers can easily be added as a blog post at any time.
Password Protected Pages: Add a password to a page so that only people who know it can access the page. Perhaps a trade price list for wholesalers, a file download page, or more specific information you want to only be made available to certain customers.
Per Device Editing: More specific control over which content is displayed to people using mobile devices. Perhaps you have a large video file, or a slideshow of high resolution images, on one of your pages. Those using mobiles may be on limited bandwidth data connections so you can set the video or the slideshow to only display on desktop computers.
Personalisation: Create a custom experience for each website visitor. Use geolocation to offer specific pop-ups to people based on their location. For example, if they’re viewing the website whilst being close to your shop, why not display a pop-up inviting them in? Or for first-time website visitors, you could display a “Welcome” message.
Multi-Language: If you have international customers you can offer them a website in their own language. A language selector in the top corner will allow them to choose their country and will then display the website in that language.
Backups: Get peace of mind with automatic website backups whenever a major change is made. That way, if you make a change you didn’t mean to, or one that has unintended effects, you can easily restore the website back to how it was. You can also create a manual backup at any time.
As you can see, all these bells and whistles are ideal for creating more advanced websites that cater to different types of customer. Rather than the “one size fits all” website of the Starter package, the Professional package really allows you to fine-tune, personalise and develop the website.
Tip: If you want an advanced website with more than five pages and lots of customisation features then the Professional package is for you.
Online Shopping
In a world of global pandemics and the inexorable rise of online shopping, there is no better way of promoting your product to the wider world than an online shop.
Both of our Website Builder shop packages allow you to sell products online, and they each come bundled with an impressive amount of payment gateways. Will they be paying you by Paypal, with the money coming directly into your own Paypal account, or will they be using a credit card through a company like Worldpay? This is really down to your own personal preference as a vendor, but you can be assured that Website Builder supports all of the well-known payment gateways, including some lesser-known specialised ones for specific countries.
Let’s take a look at the differences between the two Shop packages and work out which one might be best for you.
Professional Shop
Number of Products: The Professional Shop supports 100 products, which can all be categorised as you like. For example – a “Toys” category, a “Games” category or a “Food” category. Each product allows you to enter its name, description, price and product code, as well as add a selection of images which the customer will be able to scroll through when they’re viewing the product.
Digital Products: Perhaps you don’t sell physical goods but instead offer digital products, such as e-tickets or PDF files. The Professional Shop package allows you to upload a digital product up to 100MB in size. Once the customer purchases it then a download link is automatically emailed to them. A digital product is counted as part of the 100 product limit.
An online shop can easily be bolted onto existing Website Builder packages with no loss of content or disruption to the existing website.
Tip: If you plan to sell either physical or digital products online then the Professional Shop will be perfect for you.
Premium Shop
To take your customers’ online shopping experience to the next level upgrade to the Premium Shop package, which offers a number of useful extra features.
Product Variations: You can offer alternate versions of the same product, selectable via a useful drop-down menu. For example, you might want to sell the same shirt in various different sizes or colours. Your customers can select the particular variation they want and you can choose to display a different product image to match what has been chosen.
Create even more Products: Premium Shop allows a whopping 2500 products to be created. If you’re worried about manually creating that many products then don’t worry! There is a useful CSV Upload feature which will allow you to easily add all the products in from a specially formatted spreadsheet.
Marketing Tools: Also included are a suite of marketing tools, allowing you to maximise on possible sales opportunities. This includes visibility of customers who have created an order but not completed the payment process, allowing you to get in contact with them to follow up the sales lead.
Tip: If you need more than 100 products, or want to add different variations for your products, then Premium Shop is the way to go.
Info: Remember…. you can always upgrade your package, so if in doubt choose the smaller one. The upgrade process is seamless and won’t cause any disruption to the existing website.