Simple Website Builder

[AbzST64]

Hey all,

I've been tasked with setting up a website for our local village running club. Does anyone have pointers on the best/easiest website builder and i will also require a domain name.

I have had a look at godaddy, wordpress, wix etc.. are they all pretty much the same thing? I'm computer savvy but not really done anything with websites before. They obviously don't want to spend hundreds a year on it, so something simple but looks quality and price kept to a minimum.

Any information would be much appreciated.

Many thanks

[TwistingMyMelon]

I use squarespace, its great if you are good at designing and have a keen eye for what works but don't want to do code. Its not the cheapest but good value imo

Wordpress is good, some very cheap options and you can have more say on the code and plugins than squarespace, there is a bit of a learning curve at first as there are lots of flavours/options etc but if you are IT aware its fairly straightforward

Wix is ok, there is a free option (and paid option), it got on my nerves a bit (personal opinion) but was OK

Our cycling club has used Wordpress and site looks really decent and didnt cost much at all

Domain names are much for muchness, pick a recommended company and pay about £10-15 a year to renew it and then point the domain to your website. Most Domain registrars have this option in the control panel , or you can adjust the dns records

Edited by TwistingMyMelon on Thursday 3rd November 10:21

[andy-xr]

Hosting Provider
You said GoDaddy, which is kind of true, but I wouldnt use them personally. You likely get value for money, but you also risk blacklistings, things not working, people hacking the crap out of your site. There's limited support if things go wrong. But they're cheap

I'd recommend Vidahost. They're inexpensive, they have reasonably good support

CMS
You said Wordpress - I'd stick with this. But I wouldnt bother with the 1-click stuff that providers put on their site, it's a pre-wrap and it's not that good in most instances

Pre-Fab
You said Wix, they're a BluePeter setup really, your website will look like hundreds of other websites. There's a market for that, it might be for you - it's better managed than GoDaddy and has more stabilisers than setting up your own hosting and handling the CMS

Your call really. With a bit of Googline and an hour or so of your time you could be up and running with a domain name, web hosting and installing Wordpress ready to write your first post and do whatever it is you want to do

[Lexual]

For a simple website I'd say WIX, yes they offer many templates that many people may use and not change so their site may have a similar format to another, but they are fully and easily customisable so you can modify them to look completely unique.. you can start from a blank page and there are many tools to do what you want.. and easy to manage and edit once you've played with it a bit.

Also many easy add on apps and widgets to put on the site.

I have two websites with Wix, good value as well.

[jonamv8]

Wordpress. Put in a couple of hours before to familiarise yourself and then buy a responsive template. Install & Edit template.

[jammy-git]

I had a client use Wix a couple of years ago. Was OK, I found it a very frustrating experience. I've been told they've recently completely rebuild their platform and it is supposed to be a great deal better. Haven't had a chance to try it myself yet though.

[Hoofy]

The likes of Wix and Weebly are better if you don't want to get stuck in with configuring everything and just want something live with a minimum of fuss. You could have a live site that your club are happy with in under an hour if you have the text ready to pop in.

I would choose WordPress but it does take a few hours to get used to it. Anyone who uses WP regularly will probably take an hour to set things up with their choice of template. (Each one is different and it takes time to get used to them and set up the features that the template offers.)

[JulianPH]

Wix is very good and I use it a lot to design sites (from blank templates). I then hand these over to our software team to build in Wordpress, knowing it will exactly match my design concept.

For a simple website builder I don't think you can go wrong with it for your purposes.

Wordpress will take you a few hours to get your head around (as has been said) and if you were going to be regularly building website I would go this this, but if this is a one off Wix will be much quicker for you.

I recommend Fasthosts for website purchase and hosting.