Which Showit Pricing Tier is Best for Your Website?

Showit has three pricing tiers, each with its own features. Clients often ask me: “Which Showit Pricing plan is best for me?”

Showit is a subscription-based service. You are billed either monthly or annually for your website. (Bonus: annual billing saves you $60 per year, regardless of your pricing tier!).

 

How Much Does Showit Cost?

Showit Pricing Tiers:

• Tier 1: Showit Website ($24/month or $228 paid annually)
• Tier 2: Showit + Basic Blog ($29/month or $288 paid annually)
• Tier 3: Showit + Advanced Blog ($34/month or $408 paid annually)

 

Does Showit offer a free trial?

Yes, Showit offers a 14-day free trial with no credit card required. You can start designing and experiment with how you like using the Showit interface. After the 14 days, you will have to choose a pricing tier to continue to access your design. You can also explore Showit’ demo mode without starting a trial.

 

Which Showit Pricing Tier is Best for Me?

Of course, price isn’t the only consideration when choosing a Showit pricing tier. Generally, Tier 1 is a good fit for those who don’t wish to blog, Tier 2 is a good fit for those just starting out with blogging, and Tier 3 is for users who are very serious about their blog and SEO. Below I’ll summarize the three different pricing tiers Showit offers, feature differences between them, and which is best for your website depending on your needs.

 

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Showit Pricing Tier 1: Showit Website

$24/month billed monthly

$19/month billed yearly

 

What Showit Pricing Tier 1 Includes

Showit Website Builder

This is the interface you will use to create your site design. If you have ever used a program like Adobe Illustrator, you will find Showit very similar! It’s very intuitive, and unlike other website builders, strict templates or blocks don’t limit your design. Your only limitation is your own creativity. You can change colors, fonts, and layouts easily and without frustration. While other builders require you to know how to code to customize your template, Showit does not. This makes it perfect for creatives!

Secure certificate (HTTPS)

HTTPS has become a standard across the internet. What this means is that Showit will install a certificate on your site that confirms you are who you say you are, and encrypts data coming to and from your site. You may also hear this referred to as an “SSL” certificate, referring to the encryption itself. A security certificate means that your website will be safe and secure for your users.

If you’ve ever tried to access a website and gotten the error message that “your connection is not secure,” it’s likely because that site did not have a secure certificate installed. For this reason, it’s great that Showit includes a secure certificate in your subscription. Even better, the Showit team will install your secure certificate for you, simply reach out to support and request it!

Web hosting with 20 GB of media storage

Hosting is where the content of your website is stored on a server. If you didn’t have hosting, your domain name (for example, alexcollierdesign.com) wouldn’t be connected to an actual website. It would be like dialing a phone number that’s been disconnected! Your website will be hosted on Showit’s servers. You will need to configure your domain to point to Showit’s servers. If you already have a domain, the Showit team will help you with transferring it. If you need a new domain, I recommend purchasing through Google Domains. Domain names typically cost about $12 and must be re-purchased yearly. Here’s a great tutorial on choosing a domain.

Storage refers to how much space you are allotted on Showit’s servers. Media storage refers to the image, video, and font files you upload in the Showit media library. 20 GB is a lot of space and will be plenty for the number of images and videos you will use on your site.

Regular design backups every 10 minutes, stored for 7 days

Showit designs are backed up every time a user clicks Publish. A snapshot is also taken about every 10 minutes as changes are detected in the designer. These snapshots are saved for 7 days. So if you accidentally delete something on your site, you can simply reach out to the Showit team for help restoring it.

Limitations of Tier 1

The biggest limitation of Showit pricing tier 1 is that it does not allow you to have a blog.

Is Tier 1 Best For You?

The Showit pricing tier is perfect for someone who does not need a blog on their website due to its low price relative to the other tiers. For wedding professionals, I would not typically recommend this tier. A blog is critical for marketing and driving traffic to your website. So if you are serious about SEO, you definitely need a blog!

 

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Showit Pricing Tier 2: Website Plus Basic Blog

$29/month billed monthly

$24/month billed yearly

 

What Showit Pricing Tier 2 Includes

Tier 2 includes everything included in Tier 1 (Showit Website Builder, HTTPS certificate, Web hosting with 20GB of storage, and regular design backups every 10 minutes, stored for 7 days), plus these additional features and capabilities:

Basic WordPress Blog

This pricing tier allows you to have a WordPress blog. This means you will log in separately from your Showit builder to publish WordPress posts. You are able to post text, images, Youtube & Vimeo embeds, and some WordPress plugins pre-approved by Showit. WordPress is a separate login from Showit, as shown here:

 

The full list of basic plug-ins from Showit is listed below and on the Showit website. However, your website likely does not require the use of all of these plugins. My favorite plugins that I recommend to my clients are Yoast for SEO, and Akismet to prevent comment spam.

Simple Migration 

If you are moving to Showit from another blogging platform, this pricing tier includes blog migration. The Showit team will transfer up to 50 of your existing blog posts, images, and comments to your new WordPress account. Currently, the only blog services that Showit support for migration are Blogger/Blogspot, Squarespace, Tumblr and WordPress.com. There is a 4-day turnaround time for migration, with an extra 1-2 days for Squarespace or WordPress.

Showit theme

While you will log into WordPress to write and publish blog posts, the layout of your blog page will be created in Showit. You can create different templates for your main blog page post list, single post page, category, and search pages. If you are purchasing a Showit template, it will come with a blog page design for you to use, or you can use your creativity to design a layout of your own! On your live website, Showit will “pull in” your WordPress posts so that they populate in your design. Check out the example below from my site:

20 GB of blog storage and up to 10K blog visits per month

Blog storage refers to the images and videos in your Showit library. This is different from the 20GB of space on the Showit platform. 20GB is plenty for most wedding professionals.

Blog visits per month refer to how much traffic there is going to your blog. You can easily track your current blog traffic using Google Analytics. Here’s a tutorial on setting up Google Analytics if you haven’t yet, but it’s a safe bet you are under 10k visits if you’re not sure.

One blog user account

You will be able to add one user to your blog account. If you have a team of other employees or assistants who need to access your blog, you would need the advanced subscription to add additional users. If you are a solo operation or don’t need anyone else to access your blog, one user is fine.

Limitations of Tier 2

If you do need a blog for your site, Showit pricing tier 2 does have some limitations:

• Blog media files are limited to 4mb per file. If you need to upload larger files you are not able to on Tier 2.
• You are not able to add custom embed code to your blog on Tier 2. This is for security reasons because of the way Showit’s servers are set up.
• You can only migrate 50 posts. If your current blog has more than 50 posts, you will need the advanced blog tier
• If you are migrating your blog from a platform Showit doesn’t support, like Wix, you will need to use a third-party plugin, which you can only do on the advanced blog tier

Is Tier 2 Best For You?

Tier 2 is the perfect choice for most wedding professionals, especially those in their first 1-3 years of business. Tier 2 is the most popular tier, and for good reason. The Showit designer allows you to create a stunning website, while the blog allows you to optimize for SEO and share your work. Here are some reasons you might want to purchase a Tier 2 subscription:

• You want to start a new blog or migrate your blog from another platform
• Your blog has fewer 10k visitors per month
• The basic WordPress plugins are sufficient for your needs
• You don’t need to upload very large files to your blog
• You do not have additional team members who need to access your blog

 

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Showit Pricing Tier 3: Website Plus Advanced Blog

$34/month billed monthly

$39/month billed yearly

 

What Showit Pricing Tier 3 Includes

Tier 3 includes everything included in Tiers 1 and 2, plus these additional features and capabilities:

Advanced WordPress Blog

In addition to supporting text, images, and video embeds (like the basic blog pricing tier), an advanced WordPress blog also allows you to add custom embed code and custom plugins (more on this in a minute!).

Advanced Migration

In addition to the basic migration, an advanced blog migration includes a full transfer from a self-hosted WordPress blog (wordpress.org) of all blog posts, images, and comments, custom plugins, and WordPress settings to Showit’s servers. An advanced migration is also for users with more than 50 posts to be migrated.

Custom WordPress Plugins

It is possible to add custom plugins to an advanced WordPress blog because Tier 3 is hosted on a separate server. Showit keeps an updated list of such plugins that have been tested and work well with Showit. There are, however, some plugins that are incompatible with Showit or WPEngine (which powers Showit). You can view those plugins on the Showit and WPEngine websites. An example of a plugin you may want to use on an advanced blog is WooCommerce for ecommerce sites. Showit does not provide direct support for any third-party plugins.

20 GB of blog storage and up to 25K blog visits per month

The advanced blog tier allows the same amount of storage as the basic tier, but it does allow for more blog visitors. For users who have between 10k and 25k visitors per month, Tier 3 is the perfect choice.

FTP/Database access

FTP and database access are available on request for Tier 3 users, but they are not typically recommended. FTP stands for “file transfer protocol,” which enables you to work directly with the files that make up your site. This is too advanced for most users, which is why it is not recommended, but very tech-savvy users will find it useful.

Unlimited WordPress Users

Multiple people can have logins to your WordPress blog. You are able to assign user roles like administrator, editor, or author.

Limitations of Tier 3

The only limitations on Tier 3 are blog visits per month and storage space. These are highly unique cases and it’s unlikely that the typical user will be constrained by these limitations. However, Showit does have special pricing for users who need more storage or visitors. These plans can be viewed on the Showit pricing page and require users to speak with the Showit team before purchase.

Is Tier 3 Right for You?

Tier 3 is the perfect choice for users who have a little more experience managing their website content and visitors. Here are some reasons you might want to purchase a Tier 3 subscription:

• You have over 50 blog posts to migrate
• Your blog has more than 10k visitors per month
• More than one WordPress user will need to access your blog
• You need specific plugins that aren’t available on Tier 2 (Yoast Premium is a common one, for example)
• You want to be able to add custom code to your blog

 

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So, which Showit pricing plan is right for you?

If you’re still not sure which pricing tier is best for your website, try answering these quick questions to determine the best fit:

Do you want a blog?

• Yes: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2) or Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)
• No: Showit (Tier 1)

Do you have more than 50 blog posts to migrate?

• Yes: Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)
• No: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2)

Are you migrating your blog from Blogger/Blogspot, Squarespace, Tumblr or WordPress.com?

• Yes: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2)
• No: Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)

Does more than one contributor need access to your blog?

• Yes: Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)
• No: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2)

Do you need advanced WordPress plugins on your website (WooCommerce, Tiled/Masonry Galleries in a Blog Post, Yoast Premium, etc.)?

• Yes: Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)
• No: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2)

Do you have over 10k blog visitors per month?

• Yes: Showit + Advanced Blog (Tier 3)
• No: Showit + Basic Blog (Tier 2)

Check out this infographic flowchart for more help choosing your pricing tier:

Alex Collier is a Showit web designer for wedding professionals. Are you ready for a website that elevates your business and books ideal clients? Get in touch!