Website builders for therapists in private practice can be empowering. The right-fit builder can help therapists create an awesome website entirely on their own – without the help of a designer.

But whether you’re a therapist just starting out or looking to grow, the process of finding your right-fit website builder can be overwhelming.

There are so many options that it can be challenging to know where to start. Many therapists have shared that when it comes to figuring out which website builder to choose they feel a sense of, “I don’t know what I don’t know.” Which is a stress-inducing place to find yourself in.

Even if you have clarity on your goals or a vision for the aesthetics, choosing a platform can still feel daunting.

  • Maybe it feels like you don’t even know what knowledge you are missing in the first place
  • Or perhaps you’re not sure what you ought to be looking for
  • Or maybe you keep asking questions like, “What features do I need?” or “What’s important?” and you don’t know how to answer questions like that

If this sounds familiar this post is for you. Especially if you find yourself doing tons of research and narrowing things down just to get stuck in deciding among the many website builder options.

In this post, we’ll share more about what website builders are, the benefits of using one, and the top three website builders for private practice therapists. 

Plus we’ll share six top tips for how to determine your right-fit website builder and insights on further help too.

Let’s dive in.

What Is A Website Builder?

A website builder is an online platform that makes it easy for small businesses, and private practices, to make websites – even without knowing how to code or do graphic design.

Website builders provide an array of templates or themes to use as starting off points and include editors to help you customize the template to fit you.

A good website builder will include both excellent templates and an easy-to-use editor. And once you have created your site, the website builder will allow you to publish it to the internet with your unique website address for the world to see.

What you’ll be able to do on your website will depend on the website builder but generally speaking good website builder software will allow you to:

  • Create a website navigation
  • Create and remove pages including adding text, images, graphics, and videos
  • Change colors of various parts of the pages
  • Change fonts and text formatting (much like a text editor like Word or Pages)
  • Insert links
  • Add maps
  • Have a blog

Some editors will also allow for drag-and-drop editing and provide extras like icons you can use. 

The Benefits Using A Website Builder

If you want to DIY your website, a website builder helps you get a website up and running fast. Compared to using an open source software that you have to host yourself or compared to the old school ways of learning how to code, a website builder accelerates the timeline.

  • You don’t have to learn to code
  • You don’t have to use graphic design software
  • You don’t have to do complicated web development stuff
  • You don’t have to take care of security or think about software updates

It really cuts down on time by taking care of the most difficult-to-learn tasks of having a website on the internet. 

In addition to the time savings, there’s also the benefit of saving money. Compared to designers who will charge $2000 or more per website, most website builders cost around $20 per month or $240 per year. 

Most therapists can learn to create and edit it completely on their own as builders are beginner friendly. 

Why These Are The Top Three Website Builders For Therapists

What makes these website builders stand out from all of the options out there? Here’s a breakdown of what it takes for these to be on this list:

  1. Features are a match for private practice websites. These builders have the main features that a private practice website needs.
  1. Support. From support desks to online communities, these website builders have solid support. So whether you face an issue with the editor or want to connect with others that are also using the platform, these website builders got you.
  1. Good level of design. The templates and themes on offer provide a good starting out point which can help therapists with zero design experience create something that looks good.
  1. Proven track record. These website builders are the tried-and-true options that have been around for years and years. They have proven and refined their editors and service.

The Top Three Website Builders For Therapists

  1. Squarespace – Best all around website builder for creating a professional-looking website yourself
  2. Wix – Best website builder for beginners needing a quick website and no blog
  3. WordPress.com – Best website builder for therapists who blog a lot

1. Squarespace

Overall 

Best all around website builder for creating a professional-looking website yourself

Find Squarespace

Squarespace Website
Squarespace Pricing
Squarespace Templates
Squarespace Help Center

Ease Of Use 

Squarespace has a limited-drag-and-drop editor that allows you to drag-and-drop elements into rows and columns. 

Although you may think the limitations reduce creative flexibility, it actually ensures that your site sticks to website design best practices and looks good across all screen sizes and mobile devices with less work. 

In addition, Squarespace incorporates pre-made design suggestions that span from font combinations to color pallets. If you are not a designer, no problem, these premade suggestions will help even non-designers create a professional-looking website.

Think of the editor like bowling with the bumper rails out. It will keep your ball in the lane so you’re more sure to hit a strike! And in this case, the strike is a website that looks professional.

Help, Support, & Community

Squarespace maintains a library of help documents where you can search for answers. In addition, they maintain a community forum and regularly host free webinars to learn the basics of Squarespace.

For further support, Squarespace has a reputation for having an excellent customer support team. In addition to the ability to send an email, they also have a live chat through which you can get immediate answers. 

Beyond the official support channels, you’ll find that the online community for Squarespace is wonderfully fanatic. There are tons of free tutorials and resources and also groups like the free Squarespace Community Facebook Group where members help each other with Squarespace related questions.

Value For The Price

At $12/month for the Personal level and $18/month for the business level, Squarespace is a great value considering the level of design, free training, and support. 

Every plan also includes a domain name.

Not only is the design of the templates awesome but also the user interface which is easy to use once you get the hang of it, plus it’s lovely and calming to spend time on.

Pros Of Squarespace For Therapist Websites

  • Easy to make something that looks professional without design experience
  • Amazing help center, trainings, customer support, and community 
  • Good blogging functionality

Cons Of Squarespace For Therapist Websites

  • Some of the pages may load slowly 
  • Takes some learning to get the hang of the editor 

Summary

Squarespace is a solid option for any therapist website and gets our overall review of being the best all around website builder for therapists.

Squarespace has all of the features needed, great templates, and a website editor that, while it may take a little longer to get the hang of, keeps things in order for you so you don’t have to think about it. 

One of our favorite features are premade design suggestions that help non-designers create a site that looks like it was professionally designed. No thought or learning involved, just look through the options and select what reflects you.

2. Wix 

Overall

Best website builder for beginners needing a quick website and no blog

Find Wix

Wix Website
Wix Pricing
Wix Templates
Wix Help Center

Ease Of Use

Compared to the other builders, Wix allows for a lot more freedom to customize the pages. With a drag-and-drop style editor, any element on the page can be moved to any space on the page. It makes it easy for those without design experience to just pick things up and put them in place.

Complete beginners may want to try the Wix ADI – which provides automated website design that relies on artificial intelligence that grabs information about you from your existing social media accounts and through answering a few questions. We have yet to hear of a therapist using this feature with success as it’s pretty new so let us know if you take it for a spin.

Help, Support, & Community

Wix support is pretty good. In addition to a help center stocked with articles and videos that can show you the way, you can also reach a support agent directly through submitting a written support ticket or requesting a call back. 

Beyond the official support channels, you can also find Wix support groups like the All Things Wix or Wix Partner Facebook groups where thousands of Wix users and professionals hang out and help each other with tips and answers. 

Value For The Price

At around $8/month for the “Combo” level subscription, Wix is an incredibly affordable option. Even though a website domain is only included at the premium level, you can easily purchase your domain at an external registrar for $10-12/year which does not add much to the monthly cost of a Wix website. 

For the level of website that you can create, it is a good value. 

Pros Of Wix For Therapist Websites

  • Beginner friendly
  • Tons of templates to choose from
  • Affordable

Cons Of Wix For Therapist Websites

  • Can’t easily switch templates after publishing
  • Too many choices when it comes to templates can lead to overwhelm
  • May look wonky on mobile or smaller screens unless you tweak it yourself
  • Blogging sucks (important: no migration options from Wix into other platforms)

Summary

Wix is a good website builder for beginners that don’t need a blog. 

While the editor is very easy to use and the templates many, the tradeoffs are that blogging functionality is sub-par and is best avoided on the platform. 

Also, your website may not provide the best user experience on small screens without finessing it yourself. 

That said, these tradeoffs are totally worthwhile in many cases.

3. WordPress.com

Overall

Best website builder for therapists who blog a lot

Find WordPress.com

WordPress.com Website
WordPress.com Pricing
WordPress.com Themes (Templates)
WordPress.com Help Center

Ease Of Use

Signing up for WordPress.com is easy and there is even a totally free level that allows you to dive in. However, once you’re in, you may find the editor is not as intuitive as Wix or Squarespace. 

There are certain unexpected quirks that you may need to look up in order to figure out how to use them – for example, creating a navigation menu isn’t all that straightforward.

That said, it could be worth it to get the hang of it. Additionally, the WordPress developers are enthusiastically improving the editor to be more user-friendly. With improvements being made regularly, you can expect this website builder to get easier to use over time.

Help, Support, & Community

WordPress.com has great customer support. In addition to a help center full of help articles and help videos, you can also get help through live chat and email. 

Beyond the official support channels, WordPress software has a massive and energetic community. 

Because of it’s open source nature and long history of being an elegant, well-architectured personal publishing software (since 2003) – the WordPress software you use at WordPress.com is the same software that powers over 20% of websites on the internet.

That said, for WordPress.com websites, the version we are discussing here, there may be differences between how you solve challenges on WordPress.com and the self-hosted version. 

This means that although you can hang out with the WordPress nerds, their advice can be confusing and may not apply to what’s possible on your WordPress.com hosted version depending on your subscription level. Your best bet at community is the WordPress.com forum.

Value For The Price

With a personal level at $4/mo, and a premium level with more features at $8/mo, WordPress.com is very affordable for the levels of features a private practice website would need.

You also get a free domain for a year and then $15/year after that. 

A higher payment level at $25/mo can unlock more templates and the ability to extend the functionality of the site. However, most therapists don’t need that level of bells and whistles. 

The evaluation of whether WordPress.com is a good value for the money may depend on what level of design and functionality you expect but we find that overall, WordPress is a good value for the money (especially for therapists who go for the personal level at $4/mo). 

Pros Of WordPress.com For Therapist Websites

  • Ultra affordable personal level plan
  • Stellar blogging above and beyond all others
  • Fun, passionate community

Cons Of  WordPress.com For Therapist Websites

  • The least intuitive of the three
  • Level of aesthetic design is lacking
  • Low level of design flexibility when you want to make customizations

Summary

WordPress.com is a solid website option for therapists – especially those interested in writing a blog. Out of the three builders listed here, WordPress.com is by far the best blogging option.

The tradeoff is that WordPress.com has lower design flexibility and most will find it less easy to use. And the themes available for jumping off points may leave something to be desired. 

But for the therapist who finds it fulfilling to regularly share their insights through a blog, creating your blog at WordPress.com cannot be beat.

Six Tips For Choosing The Right Fit For You

After reading the above breakdowns of each website builder recommended, you may still feel unclear on which out of the three to select. Here are six tips for choosing the right-fit website builder for your therapist website:

Tip 1: Try them out. 

Probably the most important tip of all would be to try each of them out. Either through a free trial or a free level – you’ll be able to get in and experiment. 

In all the website builders recommended in this article, you do not need a domain in order to take them for a spin so go try them all out today.

Tip 2: If the design is important to you, ask: what templates excite me? 

Creating your own website should be fun and should result in a website that feels like it reflects you. 

Which builder has the templates that most closely resemble the website you’d be excited to have for your practice?

Tip 3: What type of free, support content is out there? 

This might be something you’ll only truly experience when facing a challenge that you need to sort but this is a useful exercise when evaluating the options before you commit too. 

Go to google and type in the types of things you can imagine needing to do on your website. For example, try “how to add an image to my squarespace website” or “add a map on Wix.” Are you finding a lot of helpful articles and videos? Or are things kinda lacking? How complicated does it look like it will be to accomplish basic changes on your website yourself?

Tip 4: What type of paid content is out there? 

If you wanted to build a house, you would probably invest in some training to learn how to do it. Although a ton of information is available through a website builder’s help center, and for free, sometimes investing into a course or program can make things easier to learn in a step-by-step way. 

If you feel like a course would support you best, you may want to see what types of courses are out there. What website builders have courses that are aligned with what you’d like to learn and create?

Tip 5: Feel the vibes. 

Every website builder mentioned has it’s online community. Click through to the Facebook groups where fans, users, professionals all hang out. 

See what the vibe is like, what are the top praises, what are the top complaints? You can also ask your own questions before you commit! 

Tip 6: Consult with colleagues. 

If you are connected with colleagues who are in private practice and at least a few steps ahead of you in their practice building, sometimes hearing their website stories can help shape the direction you go in. What platform did they use? What’s their review?

Keep in mind that every therapist is different though so the experiences of others may not be a good roadmap for you.

Getting Help: Website Builders Pair Well With Further Help

Once you embark on creating a website you’ll find that website builders only do part of the stuff needed in order to make a great website. 

While website builders can help with a design starting off point and care for all of the basic tech stuff, they won’t write your website copy, they won’t log into your site and tweak things, they won’t help you customize your template to you. 

Website builders can’t do everything involved in making your website a success.

Although website builders are often touted as being “DIY” – you don’t have to do all of the things all alone. 

If you do need further help, help is out there. For example:

  • You can use a tool like Empathycopy to get your website written
  • You could hire a website designer to help with finding images, fonts, and colors and putting layouts together
  • You could hire a virtual assistant to do updates or tweaks (or investigate why that image you inserted looks wonky when you view your website on your phone)

And there are also tons of learning resources out there too. Information can be supportive and empowering. What would help support you in the process? What further help do you need and what type of help would be most helpful for how you work best?

Find support as needed.

Finding The Right-Fit Website Builder Can Help You Create A Website You’re Proud Of

Having a great website in your private practice can be a huge confidence booster. Beyond being an asset in your marketing, helping you get clients and referrals, it’s also a place on the internet that reflects who you are and how you help.

Taking the time to investigate the options out there for website builders and choose the right fit for you makes so much sense.

Hopefully this post has helped you along in your journey and you’ll find success with your website and beyond.

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