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Articles + Insights​ on Ethical Marketing + Business Strategy

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FYI
Sarah Moon

Limitations of Blogging with Squarespace

One of the things I talk to my clients about a whole lot is what their sites can and cannot do. This depends on a whole lot of factors, including template choice, technical skills and, yes, the platform you’re working with. One thing I’m very clear with each new client who’s fallen in love with Squarespace thanks to the ease of creating content is what the system cannot do. 

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Build a Brand Bridge
Sarah Moon

A Total Makeover for Canby Rental & Equipment!

I couldn’t be more excited to launch a new online presence for my client Canby Rental & Equipment. CRE is a three-generation family owned business in my small hometown on Canby, Oregon. It’s a business focused on sales, rentals and service of small equipment–everything from Stihl chainsaws to tractors to weed whackers. I’ve know the now-owner, Matt, for many years, thanks to high school English class and it was a blast taking their website in a brand new direction that you’re unlikely to see from another small equipment company. 

Their previous site was functional, but didn’t represent their growing business and wasn’t mobile friendly (a common story). Also, because the business had grown, it didn’t represent the breadth of sales/services/rentals the company offered, nor did it allow them to grow the site as needed (also a common issue). Using a simple content management system like Squarespace was a big step forward for CRE, and I’m excited to see where Matt takes his website and business in the coming years!

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Commit to Content
Sarah Moon

Squarespace for Bloggers & Publishers: Part 1 – Choosing the Right Template

Despite its popularity with small business, artists, small-scale stores and even larger corporate clients, I still don’t see a lot of inquiries about using Squarespace for blogging. Part of this is probably because Wordpress and Blogger have been so dominant for so long and especially in the case of the self-hosted versions of Wordpress.

And, despite really liking Squarespace, I do think that it’s not the best choice for all blogs. It’s possible that Wordpress or even Blogger (which I personally do not care for–it’s just not pleasant to use) are better solutions for you. I’ll cover that topic in a future post in this series. I’m assuming that if you’re reading this you either already have a Squarespace site or you’ve settled on this as the platform for you. And as a result, you’ll be considering which template is right for your blog. 

While Squarespace has many beautiful templates to use as starting points, just a handful are appropriate for blogging- and publishing-focused sites.

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FYI
Sarah Moon

Real Talk: Squarespace vs Shopify (and more!)

As Squarespace has grown like wild over the last couple of years, my inbox is flooded with folks who want to launch online stores on the system. As a Squarespace Specialist and someone who’s launched loads of stores on this system, this is good news for me. However, as often as I receive inquiries that are a good fit for Squarespace’s commerce system, I receive inquiries from folks who would be better served by a system other than what Squarespace offers in terms of Commerce. 

Yes, I said it: Squarespace isn’t the best solution for all online stores. 

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Build a Brand Bridge
Sarah Moon

A Tasty New Design for the Pie Spot

Not to brag, but it’s pretty awesome when a restaurant specializing in homemade pie asks you to re-imagine their website. Because, obviously, in order to really get the creative juices flowing, you’ve got to sample the wares, am I right? 

Pie Spot is a neat little bakery just down the street from my office here in northeast Portland (they’re actually across the street from my other clients, GreenSavers), and while I’d been a customer for many years, I was introduced to them formerly by my frequently graphic design collaborator, Ashli Hughes of Cascade Creative PDX. Ashli has been Pie Spot’s social media manager for some time, and saw their frustrations with their old Wordpress site first hand. It was time for something that really showcased all the yummy goodness the restaurant offers, and would make it easy for them to manage their ecommerce during business seasons, when they prefer to disable online ordering in order to best serve their customers. 

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