Whether you’re just starting a new business or your existing website needs an overhaul, choosing a website builder is tough. After all, your website basically IS your business: it’s the first and sometimes only interaction potential customers will have with you before they decide to buy.
That means you need to pick the right platform to create your site. The right website builder will be easy to use, have all the features your audience is expecting, and strike the balance between beautiful and effective.
There are plenty of options out there: WordPress (which hosts a whopping ~30% of the ENTIRE WORLD’s websites!), Squarespace, Wix, Shopify… the list goes on.
But there’s one website builder in particular that checks all the boxes and more. Sure, we may be a little biased considering our entire business is based on it, but you just can’t argue with the features and functionality it offers.
In case you haven’t already guessed, that website builder is HubSpot.
How does HubSpot compare to other popular web builders?
HubSpot vs. WordPress
WordPress started way back when as a blogging platform and has since grown to the most popular content management system (CMS) on the market. As an open-source platform, you can take advantage of the millions of themes and plug-ins created by business owners and website developers around the world.
HubSpot is also a CMS, which means it’s designed to handle every aspect of marketing and content creation. It’s built with marketers in mind, offering an incredibly wide range of templates and integrations, all crafted by their expert internal team.
HubSpot vs. Squarespace
Squarespace also advertises itself as a CMS, but in reality, it’s a stripped-down version at best. While they do offer an intuitive website builder and the ability to create a small online store, their other marketing features are quite limited. Squarespace is best for small businesses who need a simple, eye-catching website without additional features.
HubSpot, on the other hand, still has drag-and-drop templates and beautiful themes to choose from, while also giving you SEO capability, better blogging, and more.
HubSpot vs. Wix
Unlike these other builders, Wix is NOT a CMS: it is simply a website designer. It’s meant to get users up and running quickly, with free templates and free hosting capabilities. This makes Wix a great option if you need a simple website quickly, but it probably won’t serve your best interests in the long-run.
HubSpot really shines compared to Wix because of its ability to integrate your website with all other aspects of your business. A holistic approach to marketing will help you better understand your customers and use this knowledge to impress them every time they interact with you.
HubSpot vs. Shopify
Shopify is a bit different again: its main focus is as an ecommerce platform. Users are focused on building their online store when they use this platform; the rest of the website is often not as important. The ease of setting up storefronts, nudging customers through the buying process, and managing your store’s backend is Shopify’s best feature.
The good news is that HubSpot is working hard to support ecommerce businesses, too. The launch of their new Payments tool makes it even easier to sell products and services online without sacrificing the rest of your website or your marketing efforts.
5 Reasons HubSpot is the Best Web Builder
1. Features, features, and more features
Want to embed a calendar for users to book their own meetings? Integrate your website with another tool or platform? Personalize your homepage so it looks different depending on the customers’ location, language, stage in the sales cycle, or knowledge of your business?
HubSpot can do all that and a whole lot more! There are countless tools and modules you can drag-and-drop into your website design, with more being added every month. Integrations are constantly being added too, so your website can speak to the other tools your company uses… even other web platforms like Shopify.
Platforms like WordPress and Squarespace might offer some of these features, but you’d be hard-pressed to find one with as many diverse options as HubSpot.
2. True design flexibility
Are you a small business owner with no idea how to navigate a website’s back-end? Or maybe you’re a web designer by trade with years of experience creating websites. Believe it or not, HubSpot is the perfect fit for either group!
While pretty much every platform offers some web templates and themes, HubSpot gives you the most options and the most flexibility.
You can choose from their library of templates organized by industry, company size, and so much more. Seek out inspiration from others just like you, and then add whatever you need to speak to your unique audience! Templates can be used just as they are or modified with drag-and-drop modules OR code editing.
And for the web designers in the room, building your website from scratch is just as intuitive and straightforward.
3. It’s holistic
HubSpot is built by marketers for marketers. It’s never been a simple website designer, email marketing platform, or CRM: it’s designed to do it all.
When you build your website on HubSpot, you can tie it into everything else you do: your other marketing efforts, your sales, and even customer service and operations. This means that everything comes from one source of truth. Your team will always have access to the latest and greatest customer info and analytics, and they’ll never waste time repeating manual tasks on multiple platforms.
It’s easy to create automated email campaigns targeting website users, share content to social media, and more. Above all, this creates a better experience for your customers and makes it easy for you and your team to turn them into loyal advocates.
4. Powerful content hosting
HubSpot boasts one of the best platforms to create and host your content. If you plan on creating a blog to attract new customers or need landing pages that will convert users like never before, HubSpot should be your go-to choice.
Aside from the countless resources available to help you build a better blog, HubSpot makes it easy to structure your content in a way that makes sense for you and your brand. You can customize the design of individual blogs and the blog listing page. It’s easy to add Call to Action buttons and other modules to speak to your audience.
Perhaps HubSpot’s biggest content advantage? All SEO tools are built in. Easily add meta descriptions, page titles, and more while also accessing live recommendations on how to improve your content for increased search visibility.
This is a big contrast to other platforms: WordPress requires you to install plug-ins for SEO capability, and you might need to turn to another platform entirely if you use Wix.
5. Security and support
By default, your new HubSpot website will come with a standard SSL certificate and 24/7 security and threat monitoring. Their large internal team is always on the lookout for vulnerabilities and are constantly making changes to protect you, your customers, and their information.
Each of the other web platforms comes with its own security protocols. WordPress, for example, is an open-source platform, which means maintaining the security of your site and its plug-ins is solely your responsibility. If you let something lapse, you may be the target of hackers (and as the most popular website platform, many hackers target WordPress websites intentionally).
HubSpot also has an incredible support team AND an Academy of courses to help you learn everything you need to know. Depending on your plan, you can use email, live chat, or phone calls to access an expert who can answer your questions or solve a problem.
And with thousands of users across the world, the HubSpot Community is always available as a back-up plan.
Is HubSpot right for your website?
No matter what you sell, who you sell to, or where you sell it, there’s a good chance HubSpot’s website builder is the right choice for your business.
With more features than you could possibly imagine, superior design and content abilities, and the benefit of tying into your existing business framework, HubSpot outshines WordPress, Squarespace, Wix, Shopify, and most other web design platforms.
The only potential hang-up is cost: many web builders are cheaper than HubSpot. But with a free plan available to get you started, HubSpot is accessible to just about anyone!
Are you ready to get started on a new HubSpot website? Need help switching your existing site over from another platform? Get in touch with our team of expert HubSpot developers and designers today.
