When it comes to website builders, you are spoilt for choice; technology has evolved so much since the early days of the internet that you no longer need to hire expensive developers to build your next dream website or e-commerce store.
Weebly is a perfect example of this; the website builder allows anyone with little or no experience to build a website in minutes thanks to its easy-to-use widget-based drag-and-drop website-building tools.
Weebly was founded in 2006, the same year Wix and Shopify were launched, and although Weebly may not be as popular as these two giants, believe it or not, little Weebly still packs a punch. The company was acquired by Square in 2018 and currently has over 250 million customers worldwide.
How good is Weebly?
I have worked with many website builders, including Squarespace, Wix, Elementor for WordPress, and WebFlow, to name a few. The website builders I have just name-dropped are far superior to Weebly in terms of features, but I have to say, Weebly is the easiest builder to use out of the lot, so if you are looking for something that is not complicated and easy to follow, then Weebly is a no brainer.
With Weebly, you do not have to worry about having to find a suitable web host, web hosting is part of the service. The company also takes care of all software (platform) updates and security.
Does Weebly have a free plan?
Yes, you can build a website for free without adding any payment information. You will have access to many free features, and you will also get a free Weebly subdomain.
You can also connect your own domain name on a paid plan, or you can purchase a new one directly through the Weebly interface. The company offers a free domain name with all annual plans.
What features does Weebly have?
Weebly is packed with easy-to-use features; let me highlight some of the most popular.
Drag and Drop Website Builder
Weebly’s website builder allows you to drag and drop any of the 29 ready to use content widgets on your website pages. Widgets include tools such as slideshows, maps, contact forms, newsletter forms, social media icons, images, galleries, text, titles, products, buttons and pre-made layout containers. You can also connect third-party apps to extend these tools and widgets with Weebly’s App center.
Free pre-designed themes
If you want to save time by not having to build everything from scratch, Weebly has over 40 free website themes you can choose from; you can edit and make changes to these templates to suit your needs.
E-Commerce Stores
You can sell digital and physical goods as well as services. You can extend any Weebly website to a fully-fledged e-commerce store.
With Weebly e-commerce, you are able to keep track of your inventory, connect to third-party payment gateways such as Payal and Stripe or use Square to accept payments. You can sell products with multiple variations, offer discount coupons, sell gift cards and receive customer reviews.
You can also send out abandoned cart emails, a feature that helps recover lost sales by sending a reminder email to customers who have not completed their orders on your website. Sometimes customers are distracted and forget. With abandoned cart emails, you get another attempt at convincing customers to come back and finish placing an order with you.
SEO
Weebly has its own SEO editor built in that will allow you to optimise your content by adding information such as page titles, descriptions and meta keywords.
Analytics
The built-in statistics feature will allow you to see your website’s overall performance from a nicely designed dashboard. Features include real-time statistics, visitor numbers, referral reports, top pages and best-selling products. You can also connect Google Analytics should you want to analyse things a little deeper.
Newsletter
This feature is a bonus as there is no need for you to have to use third-party newsletter services such as Mailchimp or MailerLite. You can create and send newsletters to subscribers and customers directly from Weebly; you can also keep track of newsletter delivery, read rates and click rates without additional software.
Pop-ups
Pop-ups are a great way to attract website visitors to announcements or offers. You may want to create a pop-up to increase newsletter subscribers, offer discounts or prevent minors from accessing your site by displaying an age gate.
Mobile App
Weebly has a mobile app that allows you to edit your website on the move. As well as editing, you can keep up to date with statistics, sales and newsletter signups.
Does Weebly have an email service?
Weebly does not provide email inboxes for your personal or business domain. You will need to purchase this separately from third-party companies such as Google (GSuite), Microsoft (365) or Zoho (Zoho Mail). Namecheap have a low-cost reliable alternative if you are on a tight budget.
Weebly Pricing
Weebly has a simple pricing structure and is one of the cheapest options vs its competitors. Let’s take a look at Weebly plans.
Weebly Free
With the free Weebly plan, you get 500MB of web space, which is more than enough for small websites. You get a branded domain, free SSL, and access to SEO tools and forms.
Weebly Connect – £4 per month
Weebly connect includes everything the free plan has with the addition of being able to add a custom domain name.
Weebly Pro – £9 per month
Weebly Pro is an ideal option if you want to start selling online. As well as enabling e-commerce, you also get unlimited web space, a free domain name (if you pay for the entire year upfront), a free $100 Google Adwords credit voucher, the removal of all Weebly branding, advanced statistics, site search, free SSL, Square payments and integration access to third party gateways such as Stripe and Paypal.
Weebly Business – £18 per month
Weebly Business includes everything the Weebly Pro plan has with the addition of advanced features such as inventory management, an automatic tax calculator, discount codes, gift cards, product options, customer reviews, pop-ups and advanced e-commerce statistics.
Weebly Business Plus – £28
The Weebly Business Plus plan is ideal for busier businesses who want access to premium tools such as email marketing, abandoned cart emails and real-time shipping statistics. Weebly Business Plus includes everything in the Weebly Business plan.
Weebly Pros and Cons
Weebly has survived the test of time, but it has fallen behind its competitors in a big way. There has been a lack of platform updates, and one would expect to see new features being introduced periodically, given the size of its customer base.
| Pro | Cons |
|---|---|
| Easy to use. | No complex layouts. |
| Affordable. | Lack of platform updates. |
| Secure. | Lack of free themes. |
| Loads of tools. | Outdated documentation. |
| Third-party apps integration. | Not built for blogging. |
| Mobile editing. | Lack of advanced features. |
| No web hosting is required. | Weak SEO tools. |
| E-Commerce | No email inboxes. |
| No H1 tags for page titles. |
Overall, Weebly is a decent starter-level website builder. If you are looking for a no-thrills website-building platform that comes with an array of website-building tools that are easy to use, a platform that is not expensive and a platform that has a good reputation, then Weebly should be considered as an ideal candidate for your next website.
Who is Weebly for?
- Beginners with little or no experience
- Small businesses or one-person businesses
- Small e-commerce websites
Who is Weebly not for?
- Advanced demanding users
- Large businesses
- Bloggers