Want an awesome website but not sure where to start? Well, you’ve come to the right place!

I’m a huge fan of Showit and this website platform is a solid choice. You’re given a significant amount of control over your website design without needing to know an ounce of code or deal with a bulky and confusing backend. Ahhh-mazing right? 

If you’re here reading this post, you’re probably trying to decide if this platform is right for you and your needs. In that case, let’s try to figure that out here.

What is Showit?

As the company says, “It’s the 1 design app that will revolutionize your WordPress blog. 

Showit is a drag-and-drop website builder that was created for photographers and creative professionals. Of course, even if you’re not a creative, you can also utilize the site because it’s soooo easy to use! It’s also great for Graphic & Web Designers, Wedding & Event Planners, Hair Stylists, Restaurants, Tattoo Artists, Personal Trainers, Massage Therapists, Makeup Artists, Fitness Studios/Gyms, Bakers, Bloggers, Realtors, the list goes on. Basically, anyone that wants a beautiful and easy to edit website will appreciate Showit. 

Showit is a ‘standalone’ WYSIWYG website builder (think the likes of Squarespace or Wix). That means it doesn’t require another website platform like WordPress in order to work. Websites are designed within the Showit app, which can be accessed using the Google Chrome browser. There’s no software or anything for you to download. Just easy access on the web and the UI (user interface) has a very similar feel to Adobe products like Lightroom, Photoshop and InDesign if you’re familiar with them. You’ll choose a monthly or annual subscription that fits your needs. With that, you’ll get access to their builder and they will host your website and setup your WordPress blog (again, comparable to Squarespace and Wix… but waaay better). 

For a long time, WordPress has dominated the internet. Over 1/3rd of all websites are built using the WordPress platform. There’s just one problem, although WordPress gives you a lot of freedom and the ability to edit your site, it is not the easiest thing to use without some technical savvy. Don’t get me wrong, WordPress is amazing, but it may be too much for a beginner or someone that doesn’t want to constantly monitor their site to run periodic security updates, which may break your site. In those cases, you have to spend time troubleshooting the issue(s) and restoring a backup. I fall into the latter category. Although I loved and used WordPress for years, I finally made the switch to Showit. I won’t bore you with the details here, but if you’re interested you can read my blog post: Why I Switched My Website from WordPress to Showit.  

Showit provides an easy way to get your site and WordPress blog looking exactly the way you want it to look without having to learn a line of code. Even if you’re already familiar with coding, it means no more late nights googling PHP, HTML, and CSS issues.

All you do is build your site and blog templates in Showit and connect it to your WordPress account (if you blog). If you don’t have a blog, then all you’d have to do is build your Showit site. With the ease of use, you’ll save money on having to hire someone to make simple edits to your site because you’ll be able to do it yourself! If you’re not comfortable building your site from the ground up, you can purchase a template or hire someone to help with the initial build and then go along your merry way. Trust me, I’ve done this for clients. Afterwards, I provide a walkthrough and documentation on how to edit their site and they’ve been extremely happy with this arrangement. If they need more assistance, then they simply shoot me a message or refer to the many help docs that are provided on their site. That’s why Showit and WordPress are a fantastic combination. You get the best of both worlds: The easily customizable Showit website app and powerful WordPress blog.

The Investment

How much is it?

Showit has different monthly and annual pricing tiers to fit your needs. There are many free designs that come with your Showit subscription and web hosting is included. If you want to invest in one of the paid templates, it is a one time fee. You can also choose to hire a designer for template customization or custom designs. 

Want to try before you buy? No problem! Showit offers a free 15 day trial with no commitment so you can make sure you are comfortable with the platform and answer any questions that come up.

Why Showit is awesome

Easy to use

With Showit, you can create a completely custom website without having to learn code or hiring someone. It’s perfect for the DIY type of person and the UI is similar to the Adobe suite. It’s unparalleled in terms of design freedom. Do whatever you want because with Showit you’re not forced to place content where they decide. You get to do what works best for you. So, explore until you get it just right.

Mobile Friendly

One of the many awesome things about Showit is that the mobile view is built into the designer. You can toggle between desktop and mobile views to completely customize each user experience. Having a mobile friendly site is important in Google rankings and user satisfaction. Think about it, a lot of your viewers are looking at your site on their phones or tablets and it’s important that it looks just as great as it does on your desktop computer. 

Great for SEO

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and is a marketing concept of driving your website to the top of search results for search engines. With Showit, all the text, images, or content that you include in your site is automatically put into an HTML file (the standardized system for tagging text, graphics, fonts, color, or hyperlinks) that allows search engines to locate all your content. There are easily accessible SEO settings for each of your pages and each Showit subscription includes the use of the Yoast Plugin, one of the highest rated SEO plugins available on WordPress for your blog.

WordPress Blog Integration

Either you or your designer can create a WordPress theme for your blog out of your design in the Showit platform. This theme will then be automatically applied to all your blog posts. Easy peasy, right?

Free Migration & Support

One of the reasons why many people never make the switch to WordPress or any other platform is because it can be intimidating. However, this isn’t the case with Showit because they will migrate your blog and launch your site for you. This means less headaches and more celebrating! 

Free and Automatic Backups

Showit’s software uses Amazon’s S3 storage platform for a secure & redundant system.  As Amazon’s website states; “It is designed to deliver 99.999999999% durability, and stores data for millions of applications used by market leaders in every industry” to help ensure that your files are always secure from a server failure.

Your Designs

While Designing

While you work inside of the Showit application, automatic snapshots are taken every 10 minutes as changes are detected.  These snapshots are saved for 7 days. The Showit team can be contacted if for any reason you need to revert to one of those automatic saves. Site snapshots do not include media files (see below for media storage).

Published Designs

A new snapshot is taken every time you Publish in Showit.  Older publishes are also stored for backup purposes.

Your Media/Photos in Showit

All files uploaded to the Showit Media library are stored across Amazon’s S3 network which includes automatic redundancy in case a server fails. 

Your Blog

The Showit blog platform is powered by WP Engine, a leading managed WordPress hosting company that powers many of the top WordPress powered sites online. Your blog posts, pages, and media are all automatically backed up every day and stored for 30 days. All backups are stored on a different server. If you experience any trouble on your blog the team is there to assist.

Online Help Docs & User Groups

Getting started is a pretty straightforward process thanks to Showit’s extensive library of tutorials, which are complete with step-by-step instructions, photos, and/or videos. If you’re ever stumped, you can also reach out to them directly through their chat function in your dashboard. Their team is always responsive and super helpful.

The Showit community is awesome. Fellow Showiteers are more than willing to help when you have an issue. In addition, there are over 5k people in the Facebook groups, which makes finding the answer to your issues really easy, because most likely someone else has already asked it.

WP Engine & Amazon Hosting

When you invest in a Showit website, your hosting is included in your monthly service. What’s amazing about this is if there is a problem with the platform, you can rest easy knowing that Showit is already on the case.

With many other hosting platforms, if your website happens to go down because of your host server, you have to contact with them directly and all of the work lands on you to try and explain the problem. I’ve had many frantic calls and texts from clients regarding websites that were down. With Showit, they have a support team that’s constantly working on this so your site is safe, secure, and shows up properly. Talk about a relief!

You Can Setup a Store

If you offer online products then you can setup shop with Shopify. Shopify offers a Lite subscription that allows you to place buy buttons on your website using embed codes. This enables you to design your store and utilize Shopify. Having an e-commerce site is now a possibility!