top | item 628641

Weebly Launches Free WYSIWYG Virtual Storefronts

27 points| jmorin007 | 17 years ago |techcrunch.com

12 comments

order
[+] simoncoggins|17 years ago|reply
Surprising that they would choose not to take a cut of sales, as it seems like a natural opportunity to earn some revenue. Then again it might make people more willing to get started and then find themselves needing the Pro features further down the line.
[+] immad|17 years ago|reply
It is also technically far trickier to do all the payment processing and take cuts and make sure everyone is paid and happy. This way they can let Paypal/GC do all that work and focus on making a great product.
[+] rms|17 years ago|reply
There would also be an expectation of more features -- inventory management and such. I expect they will do it soon enough.
[+] jack7890|17 years ago|reply
I consider myself to be a highly competent web developer/designer hybrid. But is it getting to the point where even for experienced developers, it makes sense to use something like Weebly? Especially for projects that don't require much customization?
[+] drusenko|17 years ago|reply
You don't have to do one or the other -- there is a huge middle ground. For the time being, a service like Weebly can't give you a great looking, completely custom design, and may never be able to (design is a very human process).

However, why go through the process of inputting all of the content yourself? You include a few tags, bunch everything up in a .zip file, and hand the theme off to the client, who can upload it into Weebly and create the rest themselves. One bonus: never having to deal with clients that require constant wording changing or fixing spelling mistakes.

Also, want to create a simple site for a hobby, to put your resume on, or to host an open-source project? Weebly is perfect for that, outputs nice, standards-compliant code, and you don't have to waste a lot of time hacking up a design by hand (even if you could). For the more involved site (your startup's site, for example), it will still make sense to start from scratch.

[+] dmix|17 years ago|reply
Experienced developers should have enough code lying around to make simple projects quickly. From my experience typing code is much more efficient then using visual interfaces(Textmate <> Dreamweaver).
[+] edw519|17 years ago|reply
Sounds like Viaweb, a generation later. Congratulations, guys.
[+] ssharp|17 years ago|reply
I was struck with the idea of doing a dead-simple e-commerce app a few months ago. I can think of so many ways that a powerful and simple WYSIWYG can be turned into a revenue generator. Congrats on implementing something great!
[+] terpua|17 years ago|reply
A WYSIWYG for restaurants is also a nice target (built in menus, pricing, etc.). Perhaps with a built-in reservation system.
[+] redorb|17 years ago|reply
yeah this sounds like something that could totally take over the current model of Weebly; not in the sense of a new business model (they are still charging for domain / DNS services) - but I think this could bolster that model up so nicely - they may have to focus on this more, thus becoming their core offering.
[+] henning|17 years ago|reply
Startups making easy to use stuff that actually solves someone's problem? Hm.

Interesting.

[+] _pius|17 years ago|reply
Weebly really seems to be kicking ass. Nice job guys.