Wix
A commonly used website building and hosting platform.
With templates and drag-and-drop tools, Wix can help you build a websites that matches your vision without coding or design skills.
Where to start with Wix?
Wix is a website builder that simplifies the process by providing templates, drag-and-drop functionality, AI tools, and applications to ensure you can create a website with little to no coding or web development experience.
Whomever will be the main point person should create a Wix account and house the draft site on their dashboard. This can later be shared, but starting with who will "own" the site will mean less hassle later.
Let Wix get to know you.
Before you head to the Dashboard and "Edit Site," revisit the big picture questions of what you want out of your site. When you figure out the purpose of the site, plan the pages you want to serve as the basis of your website, before diving into the nitty-gritty.
Wix follows an intuitive path forward, to help you jumpstart a webpage. By telling it what kind of website you are looking to build and the look and feel you think will resonate with your audience, it can help you find a template or customize a template to move things along.
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You can also consider what sort of pages you want to have to begin with. This goes back to your previous questions — Who are you looking to reach? How do you want to craft your message and engage your audience?
Piecing everything together.
Once you have a blueprint, you want to put your content together piece by piece. It might help to plan each page out first — structure, content, media — before drafting it straight in Wix.
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When you do work through each element, it may be frustrating to get the Wix component to fit your vision. Being patient, doing some exploring, or giving your query a quick Google search will definitely get your site where it needs to go.
Your website is composed of pages and your pages consist of sections. Your sections are made up elements.
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The upper left hand corner will give you a menu to manage your pages and along the left hand side are tools to manage each section and element (text, images, videos, applications).
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All of these components can be added in a drag and drop manner and configured with floating setting boxes that appear as you work on them or click "edit". Some examples from the making of this page are as below. Be sure to preview in web and mobile (see upper left hand corner to toggle between the icon), as most people usually design in web but audiences frequently access the content through their phones.
Finding an online home for your website.
After your website has been populated and its ready for the internet, connect it to a domain so that it has a home on the web.
Wix's pricing structure is subscription based as listed below as of June 2023.
Furthermore, as of this time, the cost of a customized domain and advanced features per month: US$34-64.
Select a unique domain URL that represents your organization and is convenient to work with (to type out or communicate). Once that is selected — publish!
But you're just getting started.
At the point you publish your website, it is a snapshot of your organization.
Knowing that your organization's priorities and goals change, put in place a review process to calibrate and update your website periodically. It should grow with you and tell your evolving story.
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Learning about Wix is also an ongoing process. Like many of the other tools you'll encounter in the toolkit, your software partners will upgrade and update its functionality. Below are some additional resources to help you get your bearing in the world of Wix, but keep your eyes peeled for updates that might add to your website.
Suggested Resources
A walkthrough that might help fill in some of the gaps in our simplified guide.
Another useful covers some pitfalls and tricks that might be handy as you proceed.
This Website as a Case Study
This website was built on Wix.
We chose a simple template and architecture, allowing users to navigate either directly to the tools they were interested in or through topical paths.
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Home Page to Tools
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Home Page to Website, Social Media, Data Analytics
Each Tool Page or each Elements Page then used the same template elements and format, so as to give the users a coherent and predictable user experience. That way, once someone goes through a page or two, they know where to expect the information.
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To integrate media from difference sources we looked to either "Add Elements" (video & music) or "Add Apps" (Simple Booklet to embed the PDF you see on this page). As Wix is a popular platform, intuitively worded questions to Google like "how do I embed a PDF viewer in Wix" leads directly to a tutorial or guide. You can also search through Wix (upper right hand corner), by inputting the keyword such as "donation" to locate the tool, element or app you need. There is no need to struggle to find a functionality.