Websites and portfolios help
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Hi everyone!
I am working on becoming more professional and treating my illustration work like a business. I have been an illustrator for about 10 years now and still have not gotten my domain website and email
Anyways, I am going with GoDaddy for my domain but was wondering who you guys are using to build your website? I've been using Weebly, but wondering if I should switch to something else...
Would love to see links to your websites and what platform you are using to build them?Do you have a full website or just a portfolio page?
Thank you!
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Hi @Gabby-Correia , I use Squarespace.com for my website. I have a good bit of custom code to apply my own design and styling, but Squarespace has really good features for creating a portfolio website.
www.krisblack.com -
@Gabby-Correia after years and years of having a bad running wordpress website i switched to squarespace.
I am very happy, having a portfolio, a good working form for requests and a shop on the SAME domain/website. I'm absolute happy with my choice for now.
I follow a lot of illustrators who recomanded it. so i gave it a try and i like it.You have a 14 days trial, so you can just start to build your website and see if you like it.
I think it has some pretty nice features.Website: www.von-Nimmermehr.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/von_nimmermehr_illustration/ -
@von_Nimmermehr @krisblack Thank you so much guys! I will definitely check out squarespace! Taking a browse through your websites now
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@Gabby-Correia way to go on getting serious and building a website!
Looking forward to seeing it when it's up and running.Like you, my first foray into building a website was getting the domain from GoDaddy and using Weebly (for free). That worked, but then the second year, GoDaddy raised their prices so I switched to Weebly for the domain name, which was more affordable at the time. But Weebly also raised their prices and when I decided I wanted to expand what I wanted my website to do, I needed to purchase a plan from Weebly. That's when I started looking around.
I settled on Squarespace and pay a monthly fee -- included in that fee is the price for the domain name. While Weebly was okay and worked for me for many years, I've personally found Squarespace to be more user-friendly for me, and more flexible. While my site is still pretty bare-bones, behind the scenes I'm working on adding a blog and a store (which is the reason why I switched from Weebly). I also used the switchover as an opportunity to get a new domain name, which is shorter and easier to remember: mbaileyart.com -- feel free to check it out!
illustrator - author - smiley person
mbaileyart.com
instagram.com/mbaileyart/ -
Same here, I used Weebly for a good number of years but their prices kept going up. I’ve heard nothing but good things about Squarespace. I’ve read good things about Wix as well.
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@Melissa-Bailey-0 thank you so much! I should've waited on getting the domain name with squarespace, but so you learn. The pricing of weebly is also what is putting me off, it seems steep for what you getting out of it and I've always had trouble with the editor. I feel quite confident now in choosing squarespace. Checked out your website. love it
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@Gabby-Correia thanks! Glad we helped you make a decision.
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Hi @Gabby-Correia, i purchased my domain at a reasonable price from Namecheap and after many-many hours of trying Wordpress, I made the switch to Weebly and really like the simplicity and ease of use.
Can’t wait to see your site!
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Hi Gabby,
I setup a tumblr account and then set a redirect to point to my custom domain. Just an idea. Sounds like you paid for the domain already with GoDaddy. Nothing wrong (persay) with GoDaddy, but I use Dreamhost because they're employee owned. Next step would be to setup a Tumblr. Once that is complete you'd set a redirect via GoDaddy admin. GoDaddy support can help you with the redirect. Tumblr is free and works for me. It also makes posting new work super fast and easy. Anyhoo, just sharing, good luck! -jacob, jacobmallach.com
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@jicub That is such a good idea Jacob! Thank you for sharing, I will look into it
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@Jeremy-Ross Thank you for you input! I am in two minds whether to stay with weebly or move to squarespace now...
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@Gabby-Correia IMO unless you're thinking about using a bunch of custom code, I would probably stay with Weebly. The functionality will be pretty much the same as Squarespace for the most part, and you'd end up needing to go to a higher tier to use custom code anyway.
I typically recommend against Wordpress unless you really know what you want to do with it and you're choosing it because it fits the need.
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Just wanted to second @Jeremy-Ross 's choice of Namecheap for domain name management. GoDaddy is the go-to choice for many but it's not a company I'd personally want to makes business with (you can google that out).
Regarding website building I'm unable to give advice because I manage mine the way nobody else I know does — coding it out from scratch and using a semi obscure CMS named Jekyll. This said, I have used Wordpress and Adobe Portfolio in the past for this and they do the job, even if you can feel limited in regards to design choices. Plus, I feel some technical competence is required to get the most of WP, should you go that route.
Another alternative is Dreamhost's Wordpress-based Website Builder, where they handle all the heavy lifting for you and is really cheap. I've been using Dreamhost servers for almost 20 years.
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I use blogger for the main content (host) and bought the domain name through Godaddy, I pay every two years as it's far more comfortable and have it linked to my blogger page.
I did have to code a bit to make my blog work as a page and not feel like a blog but it's not super hard to do.There is also Google sites, seems to work as those other sites and its free.
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Thank you everyone for your amazing suggestions and help!
I ended up staying with weebly to save time in setting up a whole new website.
I have made some edits and would love your feedback.
Is there something I am missing or somewhere I can improve? Crits welcome on my portfolio too http://www.gabbycorreia.com/ -
@Gabby-Correia I think it looks great! Love your work also. The only thing I'd look into is getting an SSL so that the site shows "secure". It looks like it should be included in Weebly as just a setting. So I'd just double check that and make sure you are using the "https" version when you send the links out.
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@jdubz Thank you for the tip! I will look into it
