7 Best Website Builders for Psychologists
Some psychologists may overlook the importance of their website. But the fact is, having a quality website is no longer a luxury; if you’re going to be competitive in this field, it’s a necessity. Your website is your first impression with prospective clients, and if it doesn’t look professional, they will likely move on.
An attractive, high-quality website will tell visitors that you are a quality psychologist. Thankfully, it’s easier than ever to create websites without breaking the bank, thanks to an ever-growing number of site builders.
But how do you know which psychologist website builder is the right fit for you and your needs? Not only are some better than others, but they each also have different strengths and weaknesses. Thankfully we’ve done the work for you. Here are our picks for the seven best website builders for psychologists:
What is the Best Website Builder for a Psychology Business?
- Wix – Best Overall
- Squarespace – Best for SEO
- Brighter Vision – Most Psychology-Specific Features
- Weebly – Best Value
- TherapySites – Most Convenient
- Duda – Best Templates
- WordPress – Best for Blogging
1. Wix 4.5/5
Wix offers an excellent combination of standardization and customization. Wix websites are all based around prefabricated templates, but there is a vast array from which to choose. It’s powerful, features an intuitive drag and drop functionality, and is incredibly versatile in both design and payment plans.
Wix Pros:
- A powerful platform that allows for extensive creative control without any coding experience required
- Excellent variety of apps and features allows for a variety of websites that fit different users’ needs
Wix Cons:
- Versatility can actually be a bit of a drawback: may lead to paralysis by analysis
- Once the site goes live, the template becomes fixed
Ease of Use: 4.3/5
The Wix design system is very simple, allowing users with no design or coding experience to create professional-looking websites. The drag and drop functionality is very intuitive, and most users should have no problem generating the design they want.
Wix is also great for brand new beginners, or people who don’t want to invest much time in website design without sacrificing quality. That’s because of the new Wix ADI (Artificial Design Intelligence) site builder. The ADI asks you a series of questions about your business and goals for the site and then generates a full website just like that.
Design Flexibility: 4.1/5
Wix is very easy to use, but it’s also incredibly versatile. The site actually offers more than 500 templates! And they’re not just small tweaks on the same general outline; these templates show a wide range of personalities.
Beyond this, Wix websites are highly customizable. You can add embedded videos, contact forms, quizzes, and even upload custom fonts.
Website Features: 4.7/5
Here is one of the areas where Wix really stands out from the pack. They offer a web app market with upwards of 200 apps. The Wix SEO Wiz isn’t just generic SEO tips; they will provide a custom SEO plan based on your industry, location, and goals.
Wix also offers a one-stop-shop marketing feature and a free domain name starting at the premium subscription level.
Help and Support: 4.9/5
Wix offers some of the best Customer Support on the market. Not only does it have a comprehensive FAQ section and a fantastic general customer support team, but it also offers support buttons on various sections of the site, so you can immediately get specific answers for your specific problems.
Value for Money: 3.5/5
Wix has a free option (which does not include a domain name) and eight price points for paid plans. The first seven range from $13 per month to $49 per month, and for large businesses, they offer an all-encompassing Enterprise level for $500 per month.
2. Squarespace 4.2/5
Probably the most widely-advertised website builder on the list, Squarespace nonetheless is a quality option with much to offer. It takes a bit longer to get the hang of than some other drag and drop options, but it produces beautiful sites with crystal-clear images; few site builders create a better first impression.
Squarespace Pros:
- Powerful SEO features make it as easy as possible for prospective clients to find your site
- Over 100 attractive templates from which to choose
- The site allows you to integrate social media directly
Squarespace cons:
- No app store limits customization; you have to rely on the default features
- Not as intuitive as some competitors
Ease of Use: 3.7/5
While Squarespace is certainly not difficult to use, it will likely take beginners longer to fully get the hang of it compared to options like Wix or Weebly. That’s a worthy trade-off for many, as it’s primarily because of the increased creative freedom and minimalist user interface. And if you’re particularly tech-savvy, you won’t have any problems with it. But it’s not quite as intuitive as other options.
Design Flexibility: 4.5/5
One of Squarespace’s greatest strengths is its attractive, hyper-polished design layouts. There are upwards of 100 templates from which to choose, all with customizable logos and fonts and clean design layout features.
Image quality is crystal clear, which is a must for a website to look professional. Best of all, every design template is fully mobile compatible. That’s a great feature, as many potential clients will search for practices on their mobile devices.
Website Features: 4.1/5
Annual paid plans come with a free domain; you can also purchase a domain through Squarespace, or seamlessly integrate your own existing domain.
Squarespace also has excellent SEO capabilities. SEO is a tremendously valuable area for growing practices, so this is a significant asset. Squarespace also has one of the best blog features available anywhere but WordPress.
Most major social media platforms are also fully embeddable on Squarespace.
Help and Support: 3.8/5
The Squarespace support team includes 24/7 email support, 24/7 twitter support, and live chat during business hours Monday through Friday. There are also other problem-solving features, including an internal forum and video tutorials.
Value for Money: 3.7/5
There are no free plans available, but Squarespace does offer a 14-day free trial. Overall there are four price points, the lowest of which starts at $12 per month for personal service.
3. Brighter Vision 4.0/5
A more recent challenger to TherapySites in the counseling practice-specific website-building niche, Brighter Vision offers high-quality performance and modern site designs that you can create in consultation with a professional site designer. That said, it can take several weeks to get your site up and running, and (along with TherapySites) Brighter Vision is the priciest option on the list.
Brighter Vision Pros:
- Modern-looking site templates to create a sharp first impression with potential clients.
- You can work directly with a professional site designer.
Brighter Vision Cons:
- It takes a long time to get the site up and running.
- Limited templates are available.
Ease of Use: 4.3/5
Brighter Vision requires zero technical expertise to use, as users work directly with a professional designer to help create the specific touches that they’re looking for in a site. While you control a significant amount of the design process, you don’t need to build any of it yourself directly.
Design Flexibility: 3.3/5
Design Flexibility is one of the Brighter Vision’s most significant weaknesses. While you are working directly with a professional consultant, you are confined to a very narrow variety of template possibilities. Customization is limiting, preventing too much of a personal touch.
While the site designs look modern and attractive, they will invariably look relatively similar to other psychologists’ sites created by Brighter Vision.
Website Features: 4.5/5
Brighter Vision was designed with therapy practices in mind, and it has a variety of features that support psychologists. Those include a direct payment portal, a listing in Psychology Today free for six months, and strict HIPAA compliance through encrypted email communications.
Brighter Vision offers blogging capability, which is an excellent way for psychologists to connect with prospective clients while demonstrating their expertise. The package also includes a Social Genie holistic marketing tool.
Help and Support: 4.1/5
Brighter Vision offers live chat support, 24/7 email support, and a variety of ongoing resources. Those include a blog packed with tips and a weekly podcast.
Value for Money: 3.0/5
Brighter Vision is one of the priciest website builders on the list. They have no free option, the basic tier costs $59 per month, and the “Grow” tier costs $79 per month.
4. Weebly 4.0/5
Weebly is the go-to for psychologists who want to get their site off the ground with minimal fuss and financial investment. While it’s not quite as easy to grasp as Wix, it’s still quite intuitive and easier to use than many competitors. Best of all, it allows you to get a site launched with plans starting as low as $6 per month.
Weebly Pros:
- Extremely wallet-friendly. Weebly is by far the most cost-effective option on the list.
- Simple, intuitive user interface makes designing very user-friendly
Weebly Cons:
- Most apps are only available with the premium plan.
- Limited flexibility to move design elements around within templates.
Ease of Use: 4.0/5
Weebly utilizes an intuitive, drag and drop design system. It’s relatively easy to use but doesn’t quite stack up with Wix in this category. It can take a bit of time to fully get the hang of the user interface as there are limited visual cues to help you get started. That said, it is quite simple and straightforward once you know where you’re going.
Design Flexibility: 3.7/5
Weebly offers a solid 40 different design templates, matched with a variety of industries. Many of the clean, minimalist designs are great for psychologist websites. An exciting perk for coders is that Weebly offers a Code Editor feature that allows for greater customization to the templates. However, you certainly don’t need any coding experience to utilize the basic site-building features.
Website Features: 4.5/5
Possibly Weebly’s biggest strength is its variety of website features. It has a massive app center featuring over 300 apps, including social media, marketing, ecommerce, and more. Users can embed videos and directly integrate social media accounts.
Several of the apps are SEO-related, and you can manually add several SEO boosters, including meta titles and custom URLs. You can also create membership tiers for visitors, allowing certain pages to be private and invite-only.
Help and Support: 3.7/5
Weebly offers 24/7 support tickets, phone support 12 hours a day, seven days a week, and live chat 12 hours a day Monday through Friday.
Value for Money: 4.4/5
Weebly is wallet-friendly at all levels. The basic personal plan is available for $6 per month, and provides 500MB of storage, but does not include a free domain. The upper tiers are also less expensive than competitors, including the Professional plan at $12 per month and Performance plan at $26 per month.
5. TherapySites – 3.8/5
TherapySites is a long time veteran of the therapy-oriented website-building industry. Once the sole figure in this niche, TherapySites has recently seen competition from Brighter Vision and has struggled to keep up in certain areas.
That said, they do offer quick, no-fuss setup and an array of therapy-specific features and design options.
TherapySites Pros:
- No-fuss setup will allow you to get your website off the ground quickly, with or without expertise.
- Therapy practice-specific features available.
TherapySites Cons:
- It’s relatively pricey, with just one all-inclusive package offered for $59 per month.
- SEO is very generic; their SEO program is not customized based on location or goals.
Ease of Use: 4.1/5
One of the strongest attributes of TherapySites is the simplicity of design. The user interface is extremely intuitive, and it only takes a few quick steps to get your website off the ground. If you’re looking to get a website as quickly as possible without expending significant time or effort, TherapySites is a great option.
Design Flexibility: 3.0/5
Conversely, design flexibility is one of the biggest weak spots of this service. As you might expect with a site-builder that fast and simple, the designs are all fairly similar, and often look fairly outdated.
Website Features: 4.2/5
As the name implies, TherapySites is designed with therapy and psychology practices specifically in mind. The all-inclusive subscription includes client-management tools, built-in client forms, online appointment requests, and pre-written mental health information.
Unfortunately, you don’t own the domain, you simply rent it from TherapySites. You do own all the content you create, but you’ll have to manually copy and paste it if you decide to relocate your site.
Help and Support: 4.3/5
TherapySites offers chat support, FAQs, and even weekly “how-to” sessions to help beginners.
Value for Money: 2.7/5
TherapySites is one of the priciest options on the list. There is no free service and just one paid tier at $59 per month.
6. Duda 3.7/5
Duda brands itself as a site-builder for pro web designers, but it is accessible for beginners. And it’s available at a reasonable price.
Duda separates itself with its variety of attractive templates, and its unique “user journey” features, which can be incredibly useful for psychologists looking to not only generate leads but capitalize on them.
Duda Pros:
- User Journey feature allows you to customize the website experience for different visitors—more on this in a moment
- Upwards of 90 attractive design templates
Duda Cons:
- Customization within templates is very limited; design elements cannot be moved around with the freedom that other site builders provide.
- No app store and minimal additional marketing features.
Ease of Use: 4.2/5
Despite Duda’s marketing, it is a very beginner-friendly platform. It uses drag and drop functionality, but the templates are very structured, meaning there is little creative freedom to move design elements around within them. However, there are still customizable areas.
Design Flexibility: 4.7/5
Here we have Duda’s greatest calling card. Duda’s templates are very attractive, and they have more than 90 from which to choose.
The true flexibility, though, is found in the “user journey” feature. It’s available on every price plan, and is a truly unique option. It allows you to shape the way visitors perceive your site based on the circumstances in which they visit.
For example, you could create a splash page that displays when someone first visits your site, but does not show up for subsequent visits. Even more importantly for practices, you can create different contact pages that display as widgets if users are visiting the site from your local area.
Website Features: 3.0/5
Unfortunately, Duda does not have a wide array of website features. There is no app store, so it’s quite difficult to include features that aren’t part of the default setup. Further, Duda has minimal SEO support and negligible marketing support beyond the user journey feature. While Duda’s positive attributes are quite strong, it is a very narrow site.
Help and Support: 3.6/5
Duda staggers its support options based on the plan you choose. Basic users only gain access to the help center and email support, whereas team and agency users get those two plus a live chat and phone support. Agency users get priority email support as well.
Value for Money: 2.9/5
Duda has no free plan, and three price tiers. The Basic Plan comes in at $14 per month, Team at $22 per month, and Agency at a sizable $74 per month.
7. WordPress 3.5/5
If you’re interested in blogging as a part of your website—an excellent tool for psychologists looking to demonstrate expertise and inform and attract potential clients—WordPress is likely the best choice for you.
But it’s also a very well-rounded general site builder. While it’s not the most versatile, it does still give you a significant amount of control over your website. That said, there is one significant downside—users will have to be proficient in coding to create and maintain a site through WordPress.
WordPress pros:
- Excellent blogging capabilities are the best on the list.
- Affordable price options, starting at as little as $5 per month.
WordPress cons:
- Relatively narrow template options available.
- Requires at least a moderate amount of coding experience to have anything other than an extremely generic-looking website.
Ease of Use: 3.0/5
WordPress is likely the trickiest-to-use website builder on our list. While you can have a simple, generic site without coding experience, if you want to have greater control over your site, and create anything customizable, you’ll need to customize the code yourself.
WordPress offers a powerful blog, which is a great side-feature for psychologists. But that is often the centerpiece of WordPress sites without coding, whereas you’ll likely prefer for it to be a complementary aspect of your website.
Design Flexibility: 2.6/5
As we just mentioned, WordPress’s default templates are focused on blogging. There are relatively few default templates available, with quite generic appearances.
Website Features: 4.1/5
Aside from its trademark blogging capabilities, WordPress offers excellent social media integration, in both directions. You can activate a setting so that blog posts are automatically posted to your social media accounts, on top of your social media feeds being embedded on your website. That can be a great tool to help market your practice.
WordPress also offers excellent SEO tools and takes most of the work out of your hands in that regard.
Help and Support: 3.0/5
WordPress does not offer a live support team. However, it does have a very deep array of support pages, and an easy search function to help direct you to potential solutions.
Value for Money: 4.4/5
Here is an area where WordPress really stands out. They have a free plan, a personal plan starting at $4 per month, and a business plan for $25 per month.
Roundup
Ultimately, the best psychology website builder for you comes down to your needs. If you’re looking to utilize SEO to quickly grow your practice, go with Squarespace. If you want to get your site off the ground with as little monetary investment as possible, you’ll want Weebly.
If you’re okay investing a bit more and want a psychology-specific site design, check out TherapySites or Brighter Vision. But if you just want the best overall website-builder, we recommend Wix.
