Wix

Wix Review – Is This the Website Builder to Beat Them All?

Wix is one of the best know website builders on the planet, particularly over the past few years. One of the reasons why they were able to boost their popularity so much was because they have been key players in some huge marketing efforts. The popular #StartStunning Super Bowl 50 campaign, for instance, was seen by people all over the world. It is also for this reason that Wix is now listed as the biggest company of its kind in the world, hosting more than 80 million websites all over the world.

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Wix comes with some truly stunning visuals, which are perfect for artists like photographers and musicians, and also for all kinds of online stores, restaurants, and small businesses. All Wix websites are fully mobile optimized, and they also offer the Wix App Market for further customization options. You can also sign up for a free Wix account, for as long as you want, but this doesn’t come with any professional features. If you want to go that step further, you have five different premium plans to choose from, although their VIP plan is only available in this country.

The fact that Wix is commercially successful is undeniable. However, is this because they are good marketers or because their website builder is actually of excellent quality? Let’s take a look at the ins and outs of Wix to find out.

What I Liked about Wix

• You can sign up to a free for life package that gives you some really easy to use, stunning templates for your website. Most other platforms do not offer templates of this kind for free accounts.
• You can choose from more than 500 different templates, which are all freely accessible. Whatever kind of look that you want to create for your site, you’re guaranteed to find something that fits.
• Additional features, such as testimonials, reservation tools, contests, newsletters, and live support, can all be added to your website.
• The Wix App Market is super cool and all their apps integrate easily with various popular websites. This enables you to add some really cool special features to your site, creating something that works for you.

What I Didn’t Like about Wix

• With over 500 templates and a range of design options to choose from, it is easy to become a bit overwhelmed, or to create something that is clustered, too busy, or generally unappealing. However, give it time and you will start to get the hang of what works. Sometimes, being given full design freedom makes most people starting on their first website to take it a little bit too far.
• If you want to see your site stats, you have to add Google Analytics to your site, and this is a paid for feature.
• There is almost no automatic mobile design, although the sites are all optimized.
• The ecommerce options are a bit limited, particularly because there is no automatic mobile design.
• You can’t really switch between templates if you happen to change your mind on your designs.
• Unfortunately, it is not possible to sell digital downloads such as apps, ebooks or mp3s through Wix.

Features of Wix

Wix comes with a number of very important features. For business, they offer:

• The Wix contact form
• Google Maps
• SEO tools
• Beautiful stock images
• A search bar
• Get subscribers features
• ShoutOut email marketing
• Wix Contacts
• Customer reviews
• Ways to list your business hours
• The Wix blog
• A custom domain name

Furthermore, they ensure that you are able to manage everything online through additional features, including:

• Wix bookings
• Restaurant reservations
• The Wix hotel booking system
• Contact management and CRM (customer relationship management)

They also offer features that enable you to drive traffic to your website, including:

• Getting your site listed
• Web stats
• Ad campaigns
• SEO analytics
• Google AdSense
• Marketing campaigns

Wix also enables you to provide a great customer experience through features, such as:

• Easy customer contact
• Live chat
• A form builder
• The ability to send text messages

Furthermore, they enable you to grow your social media presence by:

• Including social media icons
• Having a Twitter feed
• Having a Facebook Like popup
• Having a YouTube Subscribe button
• Listing social media feeds
• Full social media management
• Having a Like button
• Including Skype call and chat
• Including a LinkedIn Follow
• Hosting a community forum

Lastly, they enable you to start selling online through:

• The Wix stores
• Shopify
• The Etsy shop
• A digital store
• The ability to offer coupons
• Including holiday badges

Wix Templates

As stated, you have over 500 different templates to choose from, and new ones are added regularly. To make it at least marginally easier to find what you need, Wix has created more than 70 different categories. These include things, such as portfolios, business, and blogs. These categories are really good and will enable you to find what you need quite quickly. Plus, they come with some niche options as well, such as fashion blogs, online clothing stores, restauranteurs, and illustrators. As soon as you have picked the template that you like, all you have to do is drag and drop your personal images, text and other content to where you want it.

You can also decide to start with a completely blank page and create something that is totally unique. Because this does take a little bit of in-depth knowledge about website design, Wix has also created a number of one page templates that you can use. These enable you to publish your site straight away, and then add different pages as you go along. In fact, you can even add a ‘Coming Soon’ page anywhere on your site, so people will know that something will be coming.

All templates come with a feedback feature, which means that you can show your website off to people you trust without the site going live and being visible to everybody. Having a second opinion on what something looks like is really beneficial and the way Wix allows you to do this means that you don’t run the risk of already building a negative reputation just because something didn’t look perfect to begin with.

The only downside to the Wix templates is that you are stuck with the one you choose. Switching to a different one at a later stage is not possible. This is something that is quite unique to Wix, and a pretty big stumbling block for many people.

Wix App Market

The Wix App Market is one of the most extensive app markets in site builders across the world. They are one of the few that do allow third party apps. Hence, you have hundreds to choose from and adding them to your site is very easy. Some of the more popular ones include the live chat software, the newsletter tool, and online booking budgets. It is very easy to integrate these apps into your own website. However, because they are third party apps, if there is a problem with them, they get removed, or otherwise shut down, you have nobody to complain to.

Wix eCommerce

There are a number of very strong ecommerce tools made available to you through Wix. These include financial management, traffic generation, communication tools, and site analytics. If you choose an ecommerce plan through Wix, you can start making money in almost no time at all. Product pages are very easy to create and you can add videos or photographs of your items, as well as being able to sort them into collections. It is also easy to set up coupon codes and shopping cards. Plus, Wix offers a lot of different payment options, which is quite unique when compared to other website builders.

Ecommerce packages start from $16 per month and goes up from there. This is a very affordable price compared to its competitors. Furthermore, if your site isn’t really an ecommerce business, but you do want to be able to sell things, you can simply add a ‘Buy Now’ button, which is linked to PayPal, meaning you can still sell stuff. You just don’t get the specific functionalities that an ecommerce plan would offer you.

Wix Prices

Wix is known to offer some fantastic options and tools at no cost whatsoever. However, they also offer a number of paid options. The difference between paid options and the free packages is that you get more bandwidth and website storage, access to a range of specialized features, the ability to link to a personalized domain, and the removal of Wix ads.

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The packages that are available include:

• Connect Domain, which is the most basic plan at $4.08 per month, providing you with no yearly savings. It has no ad vouchers, comes with 500MB in storage and 1GB wider bandwidth.
• The Combo, which is excellent for personal use, at $9.75 per month, providing you with 30% yearly savings. It doesn’t come with ad vouchers, but it does have 3GB or storage and 2gb of wider bandwidth.
• The Unlimited, which is perfect for freelance workers and entrepreneurs at $12.92 per month, providing you with 45% yearly savings. It comes with $300 in ad vouchers, 10GB of storage and unlimited wider bandwidth.
• The eCommerce, which is best for small businesses at $16.58 per month, providing you with 35% in year savings. It comes with $300 in ad vouchers, 20GB of storage, and 10GB of wider bandwidth.
• The VIP, which is only available in this country and is perfect for first priority support. It costs $24.92 per month, giving you 35% of yearly savings. It also comes with $300 in ad vouchers, 20GB in storage, and unlimited wider bandwidth.

The Unlimited plan is by far the most popular paid for option, giving you the best value for money.

Wix Support

Wix is committed to offering excellent customer support, and they have a range of options available. Their help center should be your first port of call, where step-by-step tutorials are provided. Anyone can access the help center, and it is also the only help available to those who choose the free package.

If you have paid for package, you will also be able to access the Premium Wix Customer Service. This means that you can go to the Support Forum and submit a ticket that will be picked up by an expert representative. They will then answer whatever question you may have and help you resolve the situation. It usually takes a few days for this process to be completed.

Those on the VIP plan have the most support of all. Their options include:

• Instant response if they place a ticket in the Support Forum.
• A priority call back service.
• A professional review of their website, which means an expert will provide their input in terms of how to change the website to make it even better.

The Final Verdict on Wix

Wix has a fantastic user interface that makes it one of the most intuitive website builders around today. It can take you as little as five minutes to get started on building your own personal website, and you don’t have to have any real knowledge in order to do this. Best of all, you don’t have to enter any credit card details or agree to any terms and conditions to get to this point. All you have to do is fill in an email address, and that is really rare in the world of internet today.

Wix gives you a well-organized, clean, easy to use platform, even if you choose the free package. The editor, which is simple drag and drop, can literally be used by anybody. Simply pick a template, manipulate some of the elements, drag and drop what you want on it, and you’re good to go. If you have no coding knowledge whatsoever, you can still use this site to create professional looking sites. In fact, you should also be able to use the image editing tools, which have been designed to be very user friendly.

The paid for plans are even better, of course, providing you with fantastic tools to set up an ecommerce store or other type of business or portfolios.

Is Wix perfect? Absolutely not, but nothing is in this world. I personally feel that Wix is as close to perfect as they get, however. If you want to build a website without having to break the bank, and without needing a degree in computer technology, then this is the site for you.