The Best Website Builder Tools & Platforms for Your Idea

Key points of website construction

• Planning comes first, and you will get twice the result with half the effort: Before choosing a website construction tool, be sure to have a deep understanding of the target audience, competitors and your own goals.
• Select the right tool: Different website construction tools meet different needs, such as Unbounce is used to create landing pages, Webflow is used to create promotional websites, WordPress is used to blog, and Shopify is used to e-commerce , Gumroad is used to sell digital products.
• Website building without coding: Codeless platforms such as Bubble.io and Airtable provide visual drag and drop functions to facilitate the creation of interactive websites or applications.
• Code empowerment, control the global situation: Learning code can gain more control and customization capabilities. Static website generators and CMS tools provide rich website building options that can be built based on templates.
• Practice brings true knowledge: The website construction process itself helps to clarify business goals and required functions, so the best advice is to start immediately and learn while doing it.

From scratch, build an online business

Want to create an online business? Join us! The freedom to publish content or products independently allows users around the world to access it is exciting. Your website may bring fame and fortune... but where to start? This article will list the website construction tools and platforms that are best suited to your first website creativity based on use cases.

It is tempting to get started right now, but if you are trying or learning to write code, this is a great choice. But if you plan to become a content creator, product developer, or business entrepreneur, planning ahead can be of great benefit. Here are some important questions:

1. Why do you do this?
2. Who is your target audience?
3. How do you help them?
4. Who provided similar services?
5. What are the shortcomings of your competitors?

Finding your segment can be difficult and it may evolve over time, but having a general direction helps to determine your goals. It will be much easier to determine the design, content, and functionality. The next question is, What are you going to do?

Test creative website building tools

Want to sell obese pet collars with bitcoin? Or want to educate readers about tapir specimen making? You can evaluate market demand before the product is ready without investing too much time, money and energy. Social media and chat groups will help, but landing page building tools and related marketing activities will validate your creative market interests. Unbounce is an ideal landing page creation tool serving over 15,000 brands. The service creates measurable marketing campaigns to evaluate products and features before they are built. The build tool is easy to use and offers over 100 attractive templates that can be customized using drag and drop features. Building a landing page in minutes without the need for development expertise, but if you need more complex features, you can add your own CSS style and JavaScript capabilities. Completed pages can be published directly to your domain name or WordPress site.

Unbounce is a comprehensive solution that provides support, training and statistics reporting, and a free trial starting at $72 per month. Here are some similar options:

• Instapage also offers A/B testing, planned to start at $149 per month.
• Leadpages includes unlimited traffic starting at $27 per month.
• Hubspot Landing Pages offers email marketing options starting at $45 per month.

Create a promotional website

After your landing page is successful, prospects will be eager to learn more about your incredible products. A website building application can get your website online and running within a few hours and have a custom domain name. Having a design talent and some web technology knowledge can help, but most applications can be used by a desire business owner to create a professional-looking website. Website building tools usually include a variety of responsive templates, visual drag-and-drop editing, code customization, hosting, support, marketing tools, e-commerce options, usage analysis and asset management (fonts, images, videos, etc.). The best one is Webflow. It includes a complex design tool, content management system, e-commerce integration and SEO services. You can get started for free, but get more features for $12 per month. Page designers are easy to learn, but remain flexible as your knowledge and needs grow. The scalable hosting platform provides 4.1 billion page views per month.

Other options include:

• Wix is ​​a popular and powerful editor with 500 template design and customization capabilities. The basic plan starts at a few dollars a month, but you can upgrade to get more features.
• Squarespace provides smooth beginner processes, high-quality templates, search engine optimization, planning, analysis and customer portraits. Plan starts at $12 per month. Weebly is very simple, so it is perfect for beginners, with tons of templates and free plans, but may require more options for more advanced users.
• Tilda Publishing has a block editor with more than 200 templates. Free plans are available.

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Create a blog

Writing an article can promote your product, increase interest, and improve your Google rankings. There is an obvious choice:

WordPress

. WordPress is a content management system (CMS) that powers more than 40% of websites. It is easy to use and has a lot to help. (Funny fact: WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg originally used SitePoint to learn PHP and MySQL.)

You can start with the free pre-install option on WordPress.com and then upgrade to access features like custom themes and plugins for a few dollars a month. Alternatively, you can download the application from WordPress.org and install it on any host that provides PHP and MySQL support. (Many hosts offer a one-click installation process.) Hosting costs vary, you may need some development help, but you are free to configure your application in any way you choose. WordPress was originally a blogging platform, but it has gone far beyond its roots. You can find themes and plugins to enable e-commerce, membership subscriptions, social media, newsletters, event calendars, booking systems, form builders, picture galleries, video hosting, discussion forums, design templates and more. Although it dominates, other blog options are available:

Create an e-commerce website

Most of the above website construction platforms provide e-commerce functions or plug-ins. These features are enough for a small number of products, but a professional online shopping system can provide more centralized e-commerce services. This will be more practical when you sell a wider range of products. Advanced e-commerce features typically include inventory management, point-of-sale systems, shipping processes, account integration, global currency, fraud protection, sales tax reporting, and more. The most popular online solution is Shopify, which serves over 500,000 merchants. The system is easy to set up and offers a wide range of e-commerce, branding and marketing tools. Shopify can host your store, or you can embed it into an existing website.

Shopify also has a thriving app store where developers submit free and commercial themes and plugins. Plans start at $29 per month, with an additional charge of about 3% per transaction. There are many other e-commerce options, including:

Sales digital products

Most e-commerce solutions deal with digital products. However, some services specialize in subscriptions, e-books, courses, artworks, music and videos. They usually include instant settings, store pages, newsletters, file hosting, video platforms, license generation, instant delivery, affiliate links, sales tax calculations, and more. Gumroad is the most famous and popular operator. It is easy to get started, integrates easily with your own website, provides services from your own domain name, handles transactions and global sales taxes, and promotes merchandise in its own store.

Gumroad charges a 5% fee, plus a credit card or PayPal payment per transaction. The $10 per month creator program allows custom styles, HD video hosting, and reduces transaction fees to zero. Here are some alternatives:

Create an application without coding

Building an application from scratch is a slow and expensive process if you are not a developer. You have to define your ideas, communicate them to the development team, wait for completion, test the product, and then modify and iterate until your dream is realized. The no-code (or low-code) platform is designed for non-programmers. You can create software through a graphical user interface instead of a typical development environment. Spreadsheet software such as Excel, Google Sheets, and LibreOffice Calc are one of the earliest examples, and these concepts are still very popular. Modern codeless applications offer visual drag and drop capabilities that can generate interactive websites or applications in minutes. Bubble.io is a popular codeless platform that is used by almost 1 million people. It includes a comprehensive build tool where you can customize the interface, connect to data sources, integrate with other services, and expand your application on demand.

Bubble.io provides excellent help, with up to 40 collaborators working on the same project at the same time. The service offers a free plan, with premium options starting at $25 per month. Other no-code platforms:

Build your own website by yourself: Write your own code

The above solutions may achieve 90% of your goals, but there will always be custom features without ready-made solutions. Or maybe you want more control and lower costs? Learning to write software is a practical skill that you can apply to any industry. Once you sell your business for billions of dollars, you will have very sought-after expertise that can be used in the future for projects for your own or other clients. If you start from scratch, my advice is to keep it simple and move forward at your own pace. Learn some HTML and create basic content pages. Improved by adding some colors and CSS styles. Then add some JavaScript functionality if necessary. Some PHP knowledge will help you update your WordPress theme. You might consider using a static website generator. These are developer tools for building websites from templates and can be hosted anywhere. You can learn more about the advantages and disadvantages of static website generators. Popular options include Eleventy, Gatsby, Hugo, Jekyll, and Metalsmith, but the StaticGen website lists a variety of language-specific tools. You can even get the benefits of SSG by pairing them with headless CMS without sacrificing content management tools. For example, you can use Eleventy with headless WordPress.

FAQ

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