What Are The Best WordPress Website Building Solutions for 2023 For Freelancers and Agencies?
You are calling all freelancers and agencies seeking WordPress excellence in 2023. This podcast unveils the top-rated website-building solutions that will empower your creative journey like never before. Get ready to unlock endless possibilities with innovative themes, SEO optimization tools, and seamless integrations designed to elevate your clients’ online presence. Don’t settle for average results.
None Gutenberg Page Builders
#1 – Elementor* – https://elementor.com
*Elementor Flexbox is the new layout structure that makes website design easier and performance-friendly. Flexbox containers mark an incremental update from the old section-column layout we all are familiar with.
#2 – Divi – Founder and CEO Nick Roach – https://www.elegantthemes.com/gallery/divi/
#3 – Beaver Builder – https://www.wpbeaverbuilder.com
#4 – Bricks Builder
#5 – Oxygen – https://oxygenbuilder.com/
#6 – Thrive Architect – https://thrivethemes.com/architect/
Gutenberg Based Page Builders
#1- Spectra – https://wpspectra.com/
#2 – GeneratePress – https://generatepress.com/
#3 – Stackable – https://wpstackable.com/
#4 – Crocoblock – https://crocoblock.com
#5 – Kadence WP – https://www.kadencewp.com/kadence-blocks/
This Week Show’s Sponsors
Zoho: Zoho.com
Sensei LMS: Sensei LMS
LifterLMS: LifterLMS
LaunchFlows: LaunchFlows
Episode Transcript
[00:00:00.200] – Jonathan Denwood
Welcome to the WP Tonic This Week in WordPress and SaaS podcast, where Jonathan Denwood interviews the leading experts in WordPress, eLearning, and online marketing to help WordPress professionals launch their own SaaS
[00:00:11.890] – Jonathan Denwood
Welcome back, folks, to the WP Tonic This Week in WordPress and SaaS. This week it’s going to be an internal discussion between me and Kurt, and we’re going to be discussing what is the best website page building service solution for WordPress in 2023. If you’re a freelancer or a small agency owner, this should be a great discussion. I think we got some insights. So, Kurt, before we go into the main part of the show, would you like to quickly introduce yourself?
[00:00:50.510] – Kurt von Ahnen
Yeah, thanks, Jonathan. My name is Kurt von Ahnen. I run an agency called Money on a N oass. I specialize in learning and membership websites, and I do some work with the for LMS and Jonathan at WP Tonic.
[00:01:02.410] – Jonathan Denwood
We are going to be looking at the non Guttenberg page builders. We’re going to be looking at Guttenberg as well. And it should be a great show. But before we go into the main meat and potatoes, we got a couple of messages from our main sponsors. We will be back in a few moments, folks. Are you looking for ways to make your content more engaging? Sensei LMS by Automatic is the original WordPress solution for creating and selling online courses. Sensei’s new interactive blocks can be added to any WordPress page or post. For example, interactive videos, live streams, let you pause videos and display quizzes, lead generation forms, surveys, and more.
[00:01:50.090] – Kurt von Ahnen
For a.
[00:01:50.390] – Jonathan Denwood
20 % off discount for the tribe, just use the code WP Tonic, all one word, when checking out and give Sensei a try today. Hi there, folks. It’s Jonathan Denwood here, and I want to tell you about one of our great sponsors, and that’s Zolo. Com. If you got a WordPress website, membership website and you’re looking to link it with a great financial management package, Zolo can provide this solution. So all your bookkeeping needs are done through Zolo. If you need new inbox email functionality and you don’t want to pay the high charges that Google will charge you, Zolo offers a great email inbox platform. They’ve got over 50 apps and services that all integrate fantastic with WordPress at great value levels. And they almost always offer a fully functioning free product as well. So it’s just amazing value. Also, if you’re a WordPress developer or agency owner, Zolo are looking for great partnerships in the WordPress space. To get all this information, all you have to do, folks, is just go over to Zolo. Com and they have the product that you’re looking for. Thank you so much, Zolo, for supporting WP Tonic and the Machine Membership Shows.
[00:03:26.980] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s much appreciated. We’re coming back. I like to point out that we got some special offers from our major sponsors. Plus, we got a curated list of the best WordPress plugins, so you can build great websites on WordPress and you don’t have to troll the internet trying to find the best solution. To get all these good news. And also sign up for the WP Tonic weekly newsletter. That’s a great thing to do. You can get all these good news by going over to WP Tonic. Com deals, WP Tonic. Com deals, and you find everything there. So, Kurt, what I thought we’d do, we’ll split the show into two parts. The first part, we’ll look at the non Guthenberg solutions, and then we’ll look at block block functionality solutions that improve on Guttenberg in the second half. Would you agree with that, particularly?
[00:04:39.090] – Kurt von Ahnen
Yeah, I know that makes sense. Let’s dive in, man.
[00:04:42.150] – Jonathan Denwood
Right. Let’s go straight into it. And it’s better. I’m going to bury myself. I can feel the heat mail coming my way already, but it just has to be told as it is. This is really emphasized at the semi professional user folks or the power user. I think in general, that’s one of the problems with WordPress at the present moment is that obviously it has a very diverse user base from beginner to expert. We’re going to have emphasis in this show for the product where you’re building websites. You are a freelancer agency owner, and you’re building websites which you’re mostly either going to be handing over to a client or you’re going to be maintaining for the client, which will have an influence about which product you’re probably going to be utilizing. You’re probably utilize a different solution depending on those two outlines I’ve just given. So let’s start with the non Guthenberg world, let’s start with the £100 gorilla that’s Alamator, I struggle with our pronunciation, but really became very popular, really wasn’t the first in the sector, but really built a following. I think it’s got over 6 million downloads, has gone its own pathway, it’s totally separate to Göteberg, has some major strengths, has some major weaknesses, very diverse response in the WordPress.
[00:06:44.780] – Jonathan Denwood
Either people love it or there’s some that hate it. How would you classify your attitude and your experience with Animate or Kurt?
[00:06:57.840] – Kurt von Ahnen
Well, Jonathan, you described it, man. For me, Elementor is a love hate relationship. I’ve built some really cool websites with Elementor, and I’m not a very visual person, which maybe I’m shooting myself in the foot to say that on a podcast. But I’m not a graphic design type brain. And so being able to take elements that people give me and manipulate them in a way that Elementor allows me to do that, I really like it. I’ve built some great stuff. But that said, I can’t tell ell you how many times they’ve done a major update and websites are broke. And that to me is that’s a real problem for me on using this.
[00:07:40.890] – Jonathan Denwood
Particular.
[00:07:41.460] – Kurt von Ahnen
Tool.
[00:07:42.570] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, that has been a consistent problem. I think they’re trying to deal with that. Also, it really looked like for a time that their plan was to really fundamentally break away from their WordPress roots and become a standalone SaaS based competitor to Wix and other similar SaaS based solutions. But I think there’s still elements of their plan. But they’ve also tried to retrench back into their WordPress… I’m struggling for the right word because they seem to go to all the major word camps. They’re not allowed to… They have meetings around the major word camps like WordCamp USA, it’s coming up. I think the other factor is performance. I think, especially when it came to mobile, I think it’s reasonably easy to get into the high 90 result of animator with reasonably good hosting and a caching plug in like Rocket, WP Rocket. When it comes to mobile, it’s a bit trickier. Also, it’s notorious for what I call diviters. Divvies everywhere, really mucky codes, really. If you are old school, have HTML, CSS knowledge, ability, and you look at the code that other might produces, it’s a mess, basically. It’s all code.
[00:09:48.060] – Kurt von Ahnen
I’ve played with the flex box a bit, and that’s a lot lighter.
[00:09:54.160] – Jonathan Denwood
Yes. That’s been introduced. Hopefully, that resolve that problem to a high degree and help with the problems, especially around mobile. One of its great strengths is just the community around it, the amount of tutorials. I find it a client that has reasonable some experience with WordPress or mucking around with Wix or the equivalent and Squarespace they can reasonably, with some one to one training, they can deal with Elementor. They can go potty with it, but they can deal with it. And if you’re looking to do post types loops, it’s got a lot of third party. They’ve inbuilt, it was really lacking loops in Alameda. They’ve also introduced that. There were third party solutions as well that dealt with that as well quite effectively. There’s a lot of third party solutions aimed at Alameda. So it’s definitely got some strengths, but I do understand why if you use something like Astra, they’ve got a library of third party. It does make things a little bit confusing because they also added some of their own functionality to deal with a lot of people that just want to use Alimate, the free product. That can cause confusion because it’s got…
[00:11:40.990] – Jonathan Denwood
If you use Astra with Alimate, because it’s got its own header footer builder, that can cause duplication. But it’s a strong… If you’re conservative and you want something, I think they’re dealing with this update problem. Some people said they were doing it on purpose because their focus was on their hosted solution. I think there’s some truth to that, but also I think it’s well overplayed as well. On to the next. Do you have any comment on what I’ve just outlined?
[00:12:19.190] – Kurt von Ahnen
No, I’m right with you. We’re good, man.
[00:12:22.740] – Jonathan Denwood
On to number two, Divvy. Now, I’ve got the highest respect for the founder and CEO of Debbie Element, Elegant Themes, nick Roach, amazing old chipper, really understands his target audience. The Elegant Teams team seem really nice people. When I’ve ever met them at word camps, they always seem a nice crowd. I just don’t like divvy, never have, never been in it. I think it short code madness there. But I understand why people love it because they really understand their target audience, which is the freelancer or the person that’s got a graphical background. It’s got a lot of themes. It’s got a lot of premade themes, over a thousand you got for every niche, you probably can find three or four. It’s got a large third party theme community. I can understand its strengths. They’re in flux themselves because they’re turning… They’re trying to move… They decided that they weren’t going to try and build their own page builder with which they got at the present moment, which is a theme basically. It’s a theme plug in hybrid. They were going to become a Guttenberg Block editor, and they’re trying to build that out right. I think they still haven’t…
[00:14:18.930] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t know where they are with that at the present. You might know a bit more about that. I just I could never get into it because I’m trying to deal with divvy problems that’s made my hair go slightly gray over the years. What’s your thoughts about it?
[00:14:42.440] – Kurt von Ahnen
Jonathan, you know in the IT world, there’s people that go, Well, I’m a PC, and there’s people that go, I’m a Mac. And so there’s Mac and PC people. And then there’s people that just use computers.
[00:14:51.970] – Jonathan Denwood
Because they’re tools.
[00:14:53.050] – Kurt von Ahnen
And I’m a tool person. But then there’s always those people like, Oh, I’m a Mac. And they’re almost annoying about being a Mac. They’re the artist types. And those are the folks that I usually find in the Divvy space. I’ve used the product. I have clients that use Divvy, so I’ve had to go in and use the Divvy. And the interface is nice. It doesn’t bother me. But from a support standpoint, when I’m using certain membership or learning tools and a client is like, This doesn’t work. I can’t find this. I’m like, No, if you look at the right side of your screen, you’ll go to the over here. I’m like, I don’t see it. I don’t see it. It’s like there’s a toggle switch missing somewhere. I got to go, That doesn’t make sense. They go, Well, I’m in Divvy. I go, Oh, now it makes sense. It’s like there’s just things in their interface that are missing sometimes when it has to integrate with other platforms. And that to me becomes, when a tool distracts you from executing what you need to execute, it’s no longer a tool. And that’s where I find my problem with them.
[00:15:58.370] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, it don’t get me wrong. I’m not not somebody that hates a theme or something because it’s usually short codes. I think that’s a crazy attitude. I think short codes are great if used sparingly. I think the problem with Divi which is my personal take on it is that it’s short code madness central, always has been. And anybody that s got any experience that’s got a client that’s utilized a theme, that’s utilized short codes heavily, and then tried to have to go in and sort out a problem or customize it, it’s always a nightmare.
[00:16:47.500] – Kurt von Ahnen
Yeah. And you know what? I want to recap what I said because I don’t want to sell them short. I think for folks that have a portfolio oriented website or an artistic oriented website, something that is just putting content forward. I’ve seen people make beautiful websites and actually editing and working in that frame set is not hard. The interface is nice. I actually like the interface. I just find that when you build a more complex package, sometimes there’s integrations that don’t seem to communicate.
[00:17:19.840] – Jonathan Denwood
Divi, Elementor is really is mine. It’s got slightly more technical focus where Divi, if you’re a graphic designer doing various mixture graphic, like logo design, PDF design, and you’ve got clients and you’re building out. So it’s got enormous template library. You’re going to like how the back end works. You’re going to feel at home. So I totally get it. And it’s got a big Facebook and third party communities there, very supportive. I could never. I can recommend the elevator. I just couldn’t. If you’re looking for something, that’s free, because obviously they’re moving to Göteborg, they’re in mid turning point. They’re trying to turn the super tanker. It might work out. They got a lot of experience. I think there’s better solutions out there at the present moment myself. If you’re looking for a tool to build websites for clients and they can maintain the website themselves. I just think there’s better solutions out there. That’s my honest opinion. On to the next one, Beaver builder. Really, I still use Beaver builder on some of my own properties. What can I say about Beaver builder? Great people, great team, love them to bits, generous people. It’s maintained, it’s rock solid.
[00:19:15.490] – Jonathan Denwood
They’re not really doing much with it, I’m sorry. I think I got no whispers. I always felt when Guggenberg was being discussed, when they I think they issued just before Elevate. They were at a time head to head with Elevate about which was best. And then Elevate took a lot… They’re based in Israel. They managed to get a lot of external investment. Beaver Builder, it was just bootstrapped. To my knowledge, they never taken the outside investment. I think that was the problem. I think it’s always a difficult one. I think they took external money, they were able to accelerate the development advertisement. And then Guttenberg was announced. And it’s solid, but it doesn’t really… I don’t think it’s going anywhere. What’s your own feelings about Beaver Builder?
[00:20:31.340] – Kurt von Ahnen
My first exposure to Beaver Builder was when I started helping the team at Lifter LMS because a lot of their site, a lot of their original site was built on Beaver Builder. And as far as functionality goes, as far as use goes, as far as the structure of using it. I’ve had some other projects where they’ve had Beaver Builder and they’ve had to go in and make changes. To your point, it’s rock solid. It’s functional. It works really well. Then when you get into the all of the surrounding information that helps you make a purchase decision. What I really like about Beaver Builder from an agency perspective is all of their pricing categories all include unlimited websites.
[00:21:14.640] – Kurt von Ahnen
And so when you look at Elementor, Elementor is like, Well, this package gives you 25 sites. And so it’s like when you sell that 26th website, as an agency, you’re like, Well, now I’m at another couple hundred bucks, or I got to upgrade, or I got to whatever. With Beaver Builder, if you make that purchase decision upfront, it’s unlimited sites. I’m always trying to think in terms of from an agency perspective, what am I buying? How much can I reuse it? And how far can I go with it? I think Beaver Builder really answers a great question there. I met Bobby McCullough at San Diego, WordCamp US. He really just eye to eye, friend to friend, handshake to handshake, super nice guy. And then he introduced me to the rest of his team. And I saw him at World Camp Phoenix. I mean, they’re just tremendous people.
[00:22:06.070] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, they’re rock solid crowd. Always liked the Beaver Builder team because there’s a lot of people that are very too based in the WordPress community, the people behind Beaver Builder, what you see is what you get. They’re just great people. But I think they don’t provide the amount of templates that Divi provides. It’s a much smaller library of premade templates. They’ve got the theme builder, which you’ve got to buy extra. But I do take what you’re saying about the unlimited websites, that’s another thing. And it’s solid and the code is solid and it’s pretty fast. They might come back big because some of these other things that we’re going to talk about don’t have big teams either. They’ve got a solid base. I don’t think they’re going anywhere. I think if you’re using it now, I think you’re fine. Would I recommend it for future proofing? I don’t know what to say, really, because they’re such nice people. I just don’t want to make life difficult for them. They’re try to move on. The Darling. This has become one of the Darling’s bricks builder. This has become a bit of a darling with the crowd, the tinkering crowd, the crowd that looking for the next big thing.
[00:23:47.480] – Jonathan Denwood
But there’s a lot of substance behind this product. I just think in the world of Alligator, first of all, it’s built on Vue. Js. It’s not built on React, it’s built on Vue. Js. That’s why it’s super fast. It’s a theme, it’s not a plug in, but that theme is built in Vue. Js. I’ve always liked Vue. Js compared to React and obviously, Angler. I trained as a JavaScript developer. I ve always had a content for Angler. I just think it’s a typical Google product, over complicated with terrible documentation. React, well, because it comes from Facebook, when they were talking about the future of WordPress, and when I heard that they’re going to use React compared to Vue, my heart sunk. If you’re used to template, CSS, integrating, you like I just love Vue, JS. It’s a shame that the big wigs that automatic didn’t decide to use Vue in my opinion compared to React, but that’s just my opinion. It’s got a very elevator interface, isn’t it? Small team. I haven’t used it in anger, but I can see why people… It hasn’t got all the loops or the additional functionality if you’re building out for WooCombers.
[00:25:40.440] – Jonathan Denwood
The website, the code it produces compared to our is much better, much cleaner code. And it’s got a really slick interface that’s much more modern than I’ve got to say then Beaver Beaver Beaver builder. Have you been playing with bricks at all? What’s your own opinion on this one?
[00:26:08.920] – Kurt von Ahnen
I like to pride myself on being an early adopter, one of those people that is brave and jumps out early, Jonathan. But this is one that I did not jump in on. I got to play with this on a client website. My client was thrilled and was just bricks, bricks, bricks. They were like a cheerleader, had them, Pomp, Poms. Really, really into it. I liked the way that you can edit some of the photos, the way that you can edit some of the effects on the graphics and stuff. That part was cool. It was almost like having a photo editor in the program. But then, realistically, I could do a lot of those things in Elementor as well. But to your point, the interface was much more modern and slick feeling.
[00:26:53.720] – Jonathan Denwood
Quick as well.
[00:26:55.390] – Kurt von Ahnen
It’ll be interesting to see, maybe with a little more exposure, if I follow through on this one. I was looking at their pricing because that’s the thing that always gets me. And they’re listed for $249 for a lifetime license with unlimited websites. And that to me, as an agency, is really attractive.
[00:27:12.260] – Jonathan Denwood
Cheers. But it’s a totally two years old. Are they going to be around in three or four years time because we’re going to touch that. But it’s a small team, but they seem serious developers, and they have built something. I love that they built it on Vue. Js. And it seems I think they just don’t have the templates. You haven’t got the community that you get with DfE. You haven’t got that third party plugging developer community that get with Elementor, but you also don’t get the baggage that you get with Elementor. And also, Divi’s got his own type of baggage, but it’s a different type of baggage than the elevator, if that makes sense.
[00:28:05.020] – Kurt von Ahnen
What you were just saying to me, if I was to think of the ra ra cheerleader type, it almost aligns with the Divi user in that way. Once they make that decision, they’re really into it. And so if that energy follows through and they can, to your point, have that consistency, maybe they’ll pick up more and more market share and move forward.
[00:28:25.510] – Jonathan Denwood
Now, onto… Here you go, Jonathan. Let’s go on to number five. It’s going to be more. We’re doing well, though. Well, I could have added more to this because we would oxygen and break dance. Now, oxygen was, for the time, it’s still got its usage. It was the same crowd that really pulled into bricks, in my opinion. Now, oxygen is a sorry story, and that’s why I love bricks. And it’s got nothing to do with bricks, but it’s a sorry story of a founder that promised a lot and let a lot of people down. And he’s just gone on to a new product, break the dance, I wouldn’t touch either. Because break dance looks good in some ways. The things that attract with break dance are very similar to bricks, but I would just use bricks. I wouldn’t touch break dance because of the founder’s attitude and what he did with oxygen. He promised a lot when his business model offering life time deals that backfired on him. And he just swan off and he just left oxygen and he just swan off to break dance. Not good enough, really, but that’s just my opinion.
[00:29:58.600] – Jonathan Denwood
What would you say?
[00:29:59.920] – Kurt von Ahnen
I went back into oxygen. I did the demo just to make sure that my memory was correct, and I really don’t like it. When you get the pop up screen to adjust your text and stuff like that.
[00:30:16.240] – Jonathan Denwood
It did funky stuff with basic code as well.
[00:30:19.350] – Kurt von Ahnen
It feels like I’m back at almost like… Think about how long you’ve been in WordPress, right? Is this the first, second or third iteration of the dashboard? I feel like I went back in time. I wasn’t a fan and I sure hope I’m not hurting somebody’s feelings on that one. But when I look at cost and interface and the time it takes to build something, when I add all those things together, there’s too many other choices to select that one.
[00:30:49.220] – Jonathan Denwood
So last, from my far cut it now off, they’ve been bought by the chocolate factory, Willie Wank and the chocolate factory, have bought these people up. The original founders, the technical and the CEO, they knew their community very similar to how nick Roach knows his community in DIVI. Thrive architect was always a dog’s breath, as I was concerned. I couldn’t stand it. They bundled it with all their other plug in solutions. They made a bit of a walled garden to make it all sticky. They were trying to make a SIS WordPress in the wrong way, as far as I was concerned. It didn’t work out for them, and that’s why they had to sell up to W illy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. That’s where plug ins go to die, basically. They become part of the Chocolate Factory. And that’s it, really. Some people still love it. I just think it’s a dog’s breath, basically. What’s your own views?
[00:32:09.230] – Kurt von Ahnen
From a support standpoint, when a customer gives me a support ticket and it says they’re built on Thrive, I’m like, oh, boy. It’s like, here we go.
[00:32:19.740] – Jonathan Denwood
Here we go.
[00:32:22.390] – Kurt von Ahnen
Here we go.
[00:32:23.600] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s going to be an interesting couple hours.
[00:32:26.930] – Kurt von Ahnen
Jonathan, when I look at the pricing alone, it’s a reason to not move forward. It’s $300 a year and it’s only good for five websites.
[00:32:33.950] – Jonathan Denwood
That.
[00:32:34.870] – Kurt von Ahnen
To me is that that’s a hobbyist with a lot of money to spend.
[00:32:39.150] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, but they’re off for all this other stuff, don’t they? They include in all the other but you’re in the worst of two worlds because you can’t move that easily to other third party WordPress solutions, but you’ve still got update plugins, got to sort out your hosting, which you don’t get with a SaaS solution. It’s the worst of all worlds, as far as I’m concerned. If you’re a freelance agency, I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole. So before we go, just my opinion, just give you my honest opinion, you can send the hate mail to Kurt. So before we go for our midway break, what would… If you’re not looking at Guttenberg, what would I recommend you? I think basically it’s either Alameda or it’s Bricks. If you can’t stand Alameda for the obvious things, I think with DV, I know where they’re going. They’re going the Guttenberg route. I don’t know how the problem is they’re up against some really powerful competition, but Nick’s got the money and he’s got the knowledge and he’s got the team, so you can never count him out. But what they’re trying to do, the competition is getting stiffer and stiffer in the Guttenberg world, we still might pull it off.
[00:34:24.360] – Jonathan Denwood
So you don’t know, I wouldn’t recommend Old Divvy It’s just like I say. Elementor, it’s got its own problems. It’s got its great strengths, but it’s got its own problems, which they’re trying to sort out the updating and the d ividitis, as I call it, the flex box. Bricks, great. But are you going to end up with… Lifetime deals really look so attractive. Are you going to end up with the same mess as oxygen? You can’t make any more money. You got a load of support, walks away when it gets a bit tough, onto something better. Not particularly a fraud with that guy’s attitude, but there we go. So would you agree? Elementor bricks or you got a different point of view?
[00:35:17.930] – Kurt von Ahnen
For me, I was a very late bloomer in the community world, getting hooked up with the WordPress meetups and the board camps and stuff. But Elementor is so ubiquitous in nature, Jonathan. There’s so many people that are into it, that use it. And if you get up against a rock in a hard place, you can reach out to someone in the community and get help. So Elementor to me is the go to. And I don’t even know that I have a number two because I think it’s that or in Guttenberg and getting up to speed on the new stuff.
[00:35:52.780] – Jonathan Denwood
All right, we’re going to go for a break. When we come back in the second half, we’re going to look at the Guttenberg based solution, the third part, the major a third party solution. There’s some really attractive solutions now in Guttenberg, really. So we’re going to talk about the major ones in that space. It should be a great discussion. Kirk’s been really very diplomatic, I’m not. But we will be back in a few moments, folks.
[00:36:25.960] – Kurt von Ahnen
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[00:36:55.350] – Jonathan Denwood
Copy today. This podcast episode is brought to you by Lifter LMS, the leading learning management system solution for WordPress. If you or your client are creating any online course, training based membership website, or any type of E learning project, Lifter LMS is the most secure, stable, well supported solution on the market. Go to lifterlms. Com and save 20 % at checkout with coupon code PODCAPE4. Podcast 20. That’s podcast 20. Enjoy the rest of your show. We’re coming back, folks. I just want to point out that if you’re looking for great hosting support partner for your websites you’re developing for clients, especially in the eLearning community based space, why don’t you have a look at WP? What WP Tonnick’s got to offer? We really have some strong linkage in the WordPress community. We understand your needs as a freelancer, small agency owner. We provide a library of plug ins with all licensed, and we really understand when leadership community websites. So if you’re looking for a great hosting partner that offers a lot more, why don’t you go over to WP Tonic partners, WP Tonic partners, and fill in the form and we can have a discussion and we can offer you a great deal.
[00:38:35.700] – Jonathan Denwood
So let’s look at Guttenberg. Like I say, when I heard that they were going to build it on REACT, my heart dropped a bit. Why not Vue? But that’s all turned to the tunnel. Now, it’s been a long, long, long, long journey with Guttenberg, painfully long, long, long, long, but through the third party community, we got some great solutions that I feel make Guttenberg. A lot of people, they looked at it if they were a freelancer or they were agency, they looked at it and they were fine with it from day one. I knew some agencies in Reno that were fine with it, but they were pretty big agencies. So I also knew a lot of people that looked it and run to a elevator or run to oxygen, they just run to the hills. I think things have improved now, but also got worse, but better and worse in the same breath. Now, let’s look at some of the third party solution that build on top of Guttenberg. Spectra. I tease them by saying Spectra. I do that because of Adam’s involvement and presence of WP Crafter. He does look like a Bond villain, doesn’t he?
[00:40:08.300] – Jonathan Denwood
But he doesn’t care about being teasing him. He’s too busy counting the money. Bless you, Adam. So Spectra, from Astro, really great people. Great. They’ve gone full sight. They’ve gone bonkers. They’ve gone full sight. They’ve gone big. They got in big for full sight edited with Spectra. I think at the present, I totally understand why they did it. Great team. I think everybody at some stage probably will go full sight editing with their own take on it. What’s your own feeling around Asha and Spectra and Spectra? Well, as.
[00:41:00.840] – Kurt von Ahnen
An agency, Astro Pro was part of my tech stack for the last three years.
[00:41:10.040] – Jonathan Denwood
With.
[00:41:10.790] – Kurt von Ahnen
Elementor? Yeah, I used Astro with Elementor or Spectra with Spectra. I would just do a needs assessment with the client and figure out, are we going to use the page builder Elementor or we’re going to stay in the blocks? And then typically, I cheat those starter templates that they have, work out really well to get in there and just build something and get something up for the client to be able to manipulate and use.
[00:41:32.650] – Jonathan Denwood
Because you’re not. You’re in strong in p oment, so you’ve got great knowledge around training, support, consultancy, but you said that you’re not from a graphic design background. So it would appeal to you because you’re dealing with clients at a price point where they’re not going to allow you to hire a graphic designer to work with you. There would be no profit in it.
[00:41:59.330] – Kurt von Ahnen
You’re nailing it. So as a product, man, Astra and Spectra and that combination. And you mentioned training. It was really easy to show my clients after the build, hey, this is how this works. Click here, add this, add that. If you want to change something, great. If you need my help later, let me know. We’re here to support you. And off they went. It’s a great product.
[00:42:23.700] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, but it’s just I’m sorry, folks. Full time editing, it’s a bridge too far at the present moment. All these different luggie interfaces. Some people say a learner, somebody they get on with it, fine. I’ve got a different view about it. I think it’s more to do in some ways, I think the team that are working on the Guttenberg Project are doing a great job. They’ve improved it. It was a project in my mind about a year ago that was foundering. I was really quite concerned with it in some ways, but I think they’ve done a great job of rejuvenating it, getting it, cleaning up the UX problems. I’ve never liked the UX design of a bloody thing. I’ve never been somebody that loved it. I think they’ve got it to the stage where it’s workable. And I think with one of these block plugins of theme solutions that we’re talking about, I really like the Astro people. I just think for site editing at the present moment, it’s a bridge too far. That’s just my opinion. You’re throwing the baby out with the whole… What was it? You’re throwing the baby the baby out with the bath water.
[00:43:49.270] – Jonathan Denwood
But that’s just my opinion, folks. I think you’d be okay with it. I think there’s just some better recommendations here, in my opinion. But there we go. What do I know? On to the next one, Generate Press. It’s like in the first half, very similar. It’s a block, but its approach is very similar to the divvies approach compared to Alamate’s approach. Really clean code, comes from a developer that’s got a lot of experience. It’s a small team, hasn’t got a library of starter websites, starter child websites, starter websites, whatever metaphor you want to use, hasn’t got that library. But if you’re from a graphic design and you’ve got some layouts prebuilt that you use for various clients. It provides really clean code, but it provides a very blank platform to build those out. It doesn’t provide a library, but it’s got a passionate user base. And a nd it’s supposed to be quick. And got any experience with it at all, Kurt?
[00:45:21.380] – Kurt von Ahnen
I just want to be clear, we’re talking about Generate Press, right? Yeah. I was actually attracted to their list of site libraries.
[00:45:29.620] – Jonathan Denwood
I thought you’re on it now. I thought it was…
[00:45:32.560] – Kurt von Ahnen
And so their site libraries, to me, they look like a good foundation for having different things to choose from. And when I look at a library, I don’t look at like, oh, that’s a pretty website. I want looking at is the structure.
[00:45:46.490] – Jonathan Denwood
I’ve chosen the right one here. I’m checking myself. If I had the brain for it…
[00:45:52.050] – Kurt von Ahnen
I don’t know.
[00:45:52.960] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t know. I got to that age. I’m talking about the right one. Site library, I might be talking out my back side here. Oh, yeah, they have.
[00:46:02.180] – Kurt von Ahnen
Yeah. And so they’re very basic starter sites. But like I was saying earlier, I’m looking for that structural foundation, what that overall visual thing would be if I put the customer’s images, text, and logos in the proper place. And it gives you enough to start with.
[00:46:20.130] – Jonathan Denwood
Oh, yeah. They definitely done that. When I was looking at it and utilizing it, they’ve done a ton of work here. And they didn’t have to. They’ve done a ton of work here, and they t was one of the weaknesses. So take it back. They have moved that on. So it’s a strong player, isn’t it?
[00:46:38.290] – Kurt von Ahnen
Yeah, I know. I like it. And I want to play with it a little bit to see how it saves work. Because sometimes when you work in Guttenberg, it’s one of the frustrating things I have is Maxi blocks, for example. You interviewed Maxi blocks on a whole show once, and you would build this whole incredible thing with one of their site kits. But then if you make a change in Guttenberg, all the formatting to the site kit goes away and then you have to resave it as the site kit again. When you think about the end user, the customer that has to run with the website after you build it for them, that’s too much. So you want to make sure that you have something that’s easy to use?
[00:47:16.070] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, definitely. It was when I was looking at it about over a year ago, it was the main thing. It really provided a blank, but they’ve provided this library. So I’ve got the main developer behind it. I apologize, but it’s got a strong history in WordPress. Have a look at it. And I think they’re not a full site editor. I think they’re using the customiser actually, which I like I say, I definitely… I think it’s not the one I’m going to recommend, but I think it’s a strong second place maybe. But there’s some good stuff coming up. So onto the next one. Stackable. Stackable Well, until Kurt pointed out that Generate Press had moved on with their library, it was the main thing. They’re based in the Philippines, actually. It’s really impressive, actually, very impressive what they’ve built with it. They’ve gone full site editing now as well. It’s a full site editor. I’m pretty sure about that. They’ve gone full site editing. But which to me at the present moment, it’s a bridge too far. But that’s just my opinion. But if you’re fine with the… In the end, I think they’re all in some ways are going to become full site.
[00:48:43.550] – Jonathan Denwood
But I don’t know how this is going to pan out. But it’s impressive what they’ve built with this. Any knowledge of Stackable, Kurt?
[00:48:54.370] – Kurt von Ahnen
I’ve never used it in anger. I haven’t built a single customer website on stackable. I played around in it. I looked at the pricing. I like that they have a lifetime agency pricing thing. I think it’s 499. So I.
[00:49:07.360] – Jonathan Denwood
Like that. They were doing some amazing deals on that Zoom. They were hitting that Zoom hard. I don’t know if they’re still available, but they were doing some amazing deals. I chose a different pathway. But like I say, a young team based in the Philippines, but they’re doing some great stuff.
[00:49:30.120] – Kurt von Ahnen
And the interface looks really intuitive. It looks like I want to change this. And it’s like, here’s how you change it. It just seemed really straightforward. It doesn’t look like you’re pecking and hunting for stuff.
[00:49:44.880] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah. They’re building loops in, they’re building wood combers in. It’s a framework similar to Spectra. Yeah, it’s hard to see. There was definitely in the first half of the show, there was some stuff that I had no problem saying that you shouldn’t touch with a barge pole, in my opinion. I think in the second half, there’s nothing that we’re listing here that I… If you’re going to go down the Guttenberg route, there’s nothing here that I’m talking about with Kurt that I would have a problem about you utilizing. You just got to really choose something depending on the freelancer. Are you the more graphic design freelancer or you’re the more heavy developer type? Stackable, I think of Generate Press. I think Generate Press is more in the divvy world, is the more divvy appealing. Spectra, I think is more the elevator. Generate press, I think it’s in the middle. Stackable, I think it’s divvy as well, but I’m not too sure about that. On to the next one. How do you spell it?
[00:51:15.150] – Kurt von Ahnen
Crockerblock. Crockerblock.
[00:51:19.230] – Jonathan Denwood
This will blow your mind, this thing. Top marks, the Ukrainian’s victory for the Ukraine. That’s all I’ve got to say. Down with those bloody Russians. Horrible people. Not the Russian people, but the people that are running them. Terrible. Get back onto subject, Jonathan. Just blew me away what they’re building here. If you’re building much more complicated websites, you’re looking for loops, custom post types, and you’re looking for a visual editor, you don’t want to go into there. You don’t want to become a React expert. What they’re offering here, you can spend a lifetime learning it out because it comes with jet engine. They got into Gartner, but they’re also in the elevator camp as well. You’re getting a lot of stuff here. Good acknowledge of these people?
[00:52:35.240] – Kurt von Ahnen
Good. No. I’m embarrassed. When I went through your list, Jonathan, for the show, I was like, Who are these people? And then when you look at it, it’s a $1,000 if you want to sign up as an agency. But it comes with 20 different plug ins and all these.
[00:52:51.750] – Jonathan Denwood
It’s just a vibe load, isn’t it? And then.
[00:52:54.080] – Kurt von Ahnen
Here’s where they got me. And Jonathan, I don’t know, they might get my money. I might have to check this out. But they offer real time Zoom support and text chats. And if you’ve been in WordPress for any amount of time.
[00:53:07.960] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t know how they do that.
[00:53:10.060] – Kurt von Ahnen
Do you? I do that Zoom Mastermind with Lifter every week. So there’s companies that do Zoom get togethers. But how do you offer support to the general populace live Zoom support? I almost want to buy it and invent a problem and see how they handle it.
[00:53:33.420] – Jonathan Denwood
Well, you want to try it? You want to see if they’re prepared to talk to you before you buy it? That’s how I would deal with that. But there we go. It is mind blowing. It is pricey if you buy the whole thing, but you’re getting a hell of a lot of stuff, folks. Yeah, tons of.
[00:53:51.980] – Kurt von Ahnen
Templates and widgets.
[00:53:53.190] – Jonathan Denwood
And all kinds of stuff. I think for the time you’re spending on it, you’re going to be committed to it because it’s not only the price, but which is very reasonable for whatever you’re getting. And they’ve been around a while and they seem a strong team, just as like a stackable. You just got to choose. There’s no real weak solutions in this second half, folks. They’re all pretty general stuff here. You just got to choose your poison. On to the last one, Cadence WP. It’s the way that I’m probably going to move WP Tonic. I’m really impressed with Cadence being the Dverper. He’s like nick Roach. He really understands his user base. You’ve got some of the Dverper chops available there as you get with Stackable and Crockerblock. But he also understands it’s got a beautiful library of pre design starter. The lifetime deal is a fantastic deal. There was a offer, a fantastic, I bought it for what you get. Obviously, they’re with a hosting competitor, but they seem to be managing their plug in purchases in a sensible way. And I know some of the people in the… It’s a bit strange how they can’t really seem to really focus on what they’re calling their company.
[00:55:50.560] – Jonathan Denwood
Is it liquid work? Is it stellar? Is it whatever they’re going to call it? Somebody needs to stamp their foot down and decide what they’re calling this bloody thing. But that’s got nothing to do with the develop of cadence WP. I just love it. But I haven’t utilized the others now. I’ve utilized Spectra, but I love that as well. And watched him being interviewed, and he said that he was saying his attitude to full screen site editing is my own attitude. It’s got its place. He’s not saying he won’t go down. He’s using the customizer. I think Generate Press does that as well at the present moment. I think the interface how you’re going to utilize patterns, these new metaphors that come with full site editing have to be worked out a bit more. He’s watching it and I trust him. He knows what he’s doing. What’s your own thoughts about cadence, WP?
[00:57:04.510] – Kurt von Ahnen
I’ve got a fair amount of experience with Cadence and it’s always been one of my top go tos. And I work in a 3 to five year period. So over the last three years, I basically gave customers a choice. Do you want to be on cadence or astro? And then put that together, whatever that equals. And then their cadence blocks is tremendous. And you could use that with any other theme as well. So their tools are solid, man. I really like working with their stuff. Outside of that, I was thinking about… So I haven’t used Spectra in a full site editing capacity at all. But all my experience in Spectra has been in Guttenberg blocks. And what I liked about Spectra was it opened up the design elements that just really seem missing in plain Guttenberg. You go to edit a site and you’re like, how do I move this crap around? And then you activate Guttenberg and you’re like, I’m not active Guttenberg. You activate Spectra and you’re like, Oh, there it is. Padding and margins and all that stuff shows up. Cadence, to me, is like that. It’s like in plain Guttenberg, there’s stuff that’s just plain missing sometimes.
[00:58:14.650] – Kurt von Ahnen
And then when you have cadence, it opens up those possibilities and abilities a whole lot better.
[00:58:20.980] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah. So I’m committed to cadence. But folks, Spectra, I think you’d be fine. Generate press. I think stackable and Crocker Block. If you’re looking to develop bigger websites, more complicated using loops, custom blocks, cadence really works with ACF, advanced custom fields, which I’ve got a lifetime license with that, and WP engine. I’ve honored that, and I think they’re they’ve got no plans of not honoring that, and they’re building it out more. So it really works rock solid with cadence and ACF. But if you haven’t got that lifetime, I think all of them. But the thing that makes it hard is my attitude around full site editing at the present moment. Like I say, I think for the present moment, it’s just a bridge too far or I wouldn’t want to get involved in. And you don’t know what the team behind Guttenberg, what they’re going to throw out next. It’s ongoing, which is great. I just think it would have been better in a plug in, some of the more experimental stuff. That’s just my opinion. So what’s your final comments? Out of all this stuff, is there a couple of these that appeal to you more than the others, basically?
[01:00:10.300] – Kurt von Ahnen
I’ve used the term hobbyist already on the show today, Jonathan, and I think that that’s part of the key when we have these discussions is you have to recognize where are you at on this ladder. Are you a hobbyist and you’d like to play with stuff and learn new things and have access to cool new tools and maybe help your friends build something for their business? That’s one way. Or are you an agency and you have to have access to tools that are efficient and reliable, ubiquitous in nature so that other people can jump in if you need to because you’re going to have maybe offshore talent or something like that that you’re using. So there’s a lot to this decision more than just what’s cool and flashy, like the shiny new object syndrome. When I look at Krockerblock, dude, that’s a lot of stuff. And then you look at it, you go, Well, this could be a time job. Just learn in this. And then it says they have 22,000 users. And so someone might read that and go, well, that’s awesome. I got 22,000 users. They’re stable. But there’s 8.7 million sites built on elementary mentor.
[01:01:15.580] – Jonathan Denwood
I don’t think they go anywhere. I think for the person that’s looking for all in Brighton to move Gertrudeberg onto the next level that doesn’t want to become a React, their JSON knowledge is that as a level, you can do amazing stuff with a block. You can do amazing… I don’t think stackable as a developer tool is at the same levels, crop blocks, but they get in there and it’s got great, it’s got some other strengths. I think what we’re going to do is we’re going to up the podcast show, but we’ll probably keep on going. Well, should we end it now? Well, no, let’s just have a quick discussion. The last thing is something outside, but also interesting, has been announced from Adam and from the Astro team is this thing called zip WP, which enables you to build websites in one minute, basically. It’s using AI and I would imagine it’s used in spectra and full site editing to knock the website. And it also puts in AI content in the site. So what was your reaction when they announced it, WP?
[01:02:49.850] – Kurt von Ahnen
Well, my announcement was I better get my name on the list so I can try it out. And when I signed up on the list, I was number 8063 on the.
[01:02:57.960] – Jonathan Denwood
Waiting list. I got there before you. You all do.
[01:03:01.210] – Jonathan Denwood
The.
[01:03:02.960] – Kurt von Ahnen
Big thing is, okay, so what’s this going to look like? How’s it going to work? What’s it going to do? And we could be excited about it, but until I see it work, it’s just another thing. A lot of things in AI, we’ve covered AI before, Jonathan, and there’s lots of great tools out there, but there’s so much that’s overblown. I see these conversations about people go, well, AI is going to replace these developers. Think about it like this. How do you get ow many business clients have you made a website for? And they said, I absolutely must have access to the back end. I want to make my own updates. I’m going to do all this stuff. And then they never touched their websites. And for some reason, we’re supposed to be afraid that they’re going to use AI to replace us. They won’t even change the header on their homepage.
[01:03:47.480] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah, I think it’s a super interesting… I think we’re right to introduce it into the podcast because I don’t actually think there’s too much much more to say about until we actually see it. All right, folks, so Kurt, what’s the best way for people to find out more about you and what you’re up to, Kurt?
[01:04:10.580] – Kurt von Ahnen
Manyananomas.com will take you right to my properties, I’m on LinkedIn, man. Kurt von Ahnen on LinkedIn. I’m the only Kurt von Annen on LinkedIn, and I’m on there almost every day.
[01:04:22.290] – Jonathan Denwood
Yeah. And if you want to join the community, you’ve got a great WP Tonic Facebook group. It’s called the membership Machine Group. It’s named after my number of my other podcast with Spenser Forum, where we talk about WordPress and membership and marketing. Join us there for WordPress marketing, discuss sessions, AI discussions as well. So find us on Facebook. And we’ll be back next week. We’ve got some great guests in August. Should be a great month. Hopefully you enjoyed this. I’ve enjoyed it. Hopefully give some feedback about what we discussed. I’ve just given you my honest opinion. I’d love to get some feedback from you. I’m sure you will supply that. We will be back next week, folks. Bye. Hey, thanks for listening. We really do appreciate it. Why not visit the Mastermind Facebook group? And also to keep up with the latest news, click WP. Tonic. Com newsletter. We’ll see you next time.
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