Insights · 5 June 2026 · 5 min read

Wix, Squarespace or done-for-you: an honest comparison

There's a lot of noise online about whether you should build your own website or pay someone to do it. Most of it is written by people trying to sell you one or the other.

Here's a fair look at both, including the times when building it yourself is genuinely the smarter call.

What DIY builders do well

Wix and Squarespace are good tools. They're cheap, they look modern out of the box, and you can have something live in a weekend if you put your head down.

You're in full control. Want to change your hours at 9pm on a Sunday? You just do it, no emailing anyone, no waiting.

For a confident owner who likes computers and has a bit of time, that control is worth a lot.

When DIY genuinely wins

If you're time-rich, comfortable writing your own words, and you actually enjoy this kind of thing, build it yourself. You'll save money and you'll learn how it all works.

It's also the right call if you just need something basic to exist and you're not chasing a polished, competitive look. A simple DIY site beats no site every time.

We mean this. If that's you, don't pay anyone. Open a free trial this weekend and have a crack.

The hidden time cost

The software is easy. The work isn't. Writing clear copy, sizing photos, getting the layout to not look wonky on a phone, setting up the contact form, sorting the domain and email, these all eat hours.

For someone who does it every day, that's quick. For someone learning as they go after a 10-hour shift, a "weekend project" can drag on for months.

Your time has a value. A Saturday spent fighting with a header image is a Saturday you didn't spend quoting jobs or with the family. That's the real price of DIY, and it's invisible until you're in it.

The abandonment problem

This is the one nobody warns you about. Most DIY sites that fail don't fail at launch. They get 80 percent built, then life gets busy, and they sit half-finished forever.

Or they go live and never get touched again. Hours from two years ago, a phone number that's changed, a price list that's wrong. A neglected site can cost you more than no site.

If you know yourself well enough to know you won't keep it up, that's a strong reason to pay someone who will.

What done-for-you actually buys

Paying someone removes the time cost and the abandonment risk. The work gets finished, it stays maintained, and you go back to running your business. That's the whole pitch, and it's an honest one.

The trade-off is money and a bit less instant control. With a service like Sheppard Industries it is $99 a month with no setup fee and no lock-in, which is the convenience-versus-cost deal in a nutshell.

Neither choice is wrong. Pick based on your time, your confidence, and how honest you can be about whether you'll keep it going.