IBM Digital Commerce vs. Squarespace

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
IBM Digital Commerce
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
IBM Digital Commerce is an e-commerce platform that is designed to deliver omni-channel shopping experiences, including mobile, social, and in-store. In June 2019, IBM Digital Commerce was acquired by HCL Technologies.N/A
Squarespace
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
Squarespace is a CMS platform that allows users to create a DIY blog, eCommerce store, and/or portfolio (visual art or music). Some Squarespace website and shop templates are industry or use case-specific, such as menu builders for restaurant sites.
$12
per month
Pricing
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional DetailsPersonal: $12/month (paid annually) $16/month (paid monthly) Business: $18/month (paid annually) $26/month (paid monthly) Basic Commerce: $26/month (paid annually) $35/month (paid monthly) Advanced Commerce: $40/month (paid annually) $54/month (paid monthly)
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Online Storefront
Comparison of Online Storefront features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
7.6
3 Ratings
1% below category average
Squarespace
-
Ratings
Product catalog & listings8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Product management8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Bulk product upload8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Branding8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Mobile storefront8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Product variations8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Website integration8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Visual customization8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
CMS4.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Online Shopping Cart
Comparison of Online Shopping Cart features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
6.0
3 Ratings
23% below category average
Squarespace
-
Ratings
Abandoned cart recovery6.02 Ratings00 Ratings
Checkout user experience6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Online Payment System
Comparison of Online Payment System features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
6.0
3 Ratings
32% below category average
Squarespace
-
Ratings
eCommerce security6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
eCommerce Marketing
Comparison of eCommerce Marketing features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
7.0
3 Ratings
6% below category average
Squarespace
-
Ratings
Promotions & discounts7.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Personalized recommendations7.03 Ratings00 Ratings
SEO7.03 Ratings00 Ratings
eCommerce Business Management
Comparison of eCommerce Business Management features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
6.2
3 Ratings
23% below category average
Squarespace
-
Ratings
Multi-site management8.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Order processing5.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Inventory management6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Shipping6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Custom functionality6.03 Ratings00 Ratings
Security
Comparison of Security features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
-
Ratings
Squarespace
8.5
59 Ratings
6% above category average
Role-based user permissions00 Ratings8.559 Ratings
Platform & Infrastructure
Comparison of Platform & Infrastructure features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
-
Ratings
Squarespace
8.3
51 Ratings
8% above category average
API00 Ratings8.044 Ratings
Internationalization / multi-language00 Ratings8.733 Ratings
Web Content Creation
Comparison of Web Content Creation features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
-
Ratings
Squarespace
7.8
88 Ratings
3% above category average
WYSIWYG editor00 Ratings9.076 Ratings
Code quality / cleanliness00 Ratings8.069 Ratings
Admin section00 Ratings8.387 Ratings
Page templates00 Ratings7.088 Ratings
Library of website themes00 Ratings7.085 Ratings
Mobile optimization / responsive design00 Ratings6.784 Ratings
Publishing workflow00 Ratings9.076 Ratings
Form generator00 Ratings7.569 Ratings
Web Content Management
Comparison of Web Content Management features of Product A and Product B
IBM Digital Commerce
-
Ratings
Squarespace
8.2
78 Ratings
11% above category average
Content taxonomy00 Ratings9.066 Ratings
SEO support00 Ratings7.171 Ratings
Bulk management00 Ratings8.044 Ratings
Availability / breadth of extensions00 Ratings8.058 Ratings
Community / comment management00 Ratings8.958 Ratings
Best Alternatives
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Small Businesses
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Ecwid by Lightspeed
Score 10.0 out of 10
Divi
Divi
Score 9.8 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
Shopify Plus
Shopify Plus
Score 8.9 out of 10
Image Relay
Image Relay
Score 9.5 out of 10
Enterprises
Kentico Xperience
Kentico Xperience
Score 7.1 out of 10
Tridion
Tridion
Score 9.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Likelihood to Recommend
9.0
(5 ratings)
8.3
(88 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.0
(2 ratings)
10.0
(4 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(4 ratings)
Support Rating
8.0
(1 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
IBM Digital CommerceSquarespace
Likelihood to Recommend
IBM
I think WebSphere Commerce is well suited for customers looking to sell products online that need robustness and scalability as a priority. It provides a complete order cycle out of the box, or you can integrate with your existing order fulfillment. Online shopping models like digital subscriptions or a marketplace are not well suited as it requires a lot of customization
Read full review
Squarespace
I have a gorgeous website that I made myself, thanks to Squarespace. I'm able to integrate marketing emails, SEO, analytics, online carts, pretty much instantly. If you want to get started fast, it's really great. I think if you want to customize square space and you're having trouble, it would be most helpful to hire a square space designer. That's what I would have done in retrospect.
Read full review
Pros
IBM
  • Websphere commerce provides efficient contract based pricing. Contract based pricing greatly helps in handling prices for different business
  • Catalog filtering is one other strength of websphere commerce, as it helps to filter the show only those products that the customer is entitled to
  • Extended site model is one other strength of WCS as it greatly helps in having multiple e-commerce sites for different demographics, for branding etc
Read full review
Squarespace
  • Stupid simple to use. I know very creative people who cannot code and this is probably the easiest ever platform for them!
  • Pretty website templates and great functionality with showing off portfolios.
  • They've already figured out what are the problems that non-coding people have when creating websites and they've figured out a simple solution for all of it.
Read full review
Cons
IBM
  • The e-Marketing spots contain content associated with marketing activities to target customer segment - needs some improvement. The algorithm to set up the priority of each of the Web Activity with in eMarketing spot is little bit confusing.
  • The catalog load can be simplified.
  • WebSphere Commerce is a huge application - someone needs to spend at least 5-6 years to learn about the whole application.
Read full review
Squarespace
  • As a wine company it would really love it if Squarespace had an easy plugin for wine club subscriptions.
  • Squarespace would be awesome if it could automatically take your photos that you upload on the site and optimize them for the web and for the website.
  • I do wish we could have more than two contributors for the basic website costs.
Read full review
Likelihood to Renew
IBM
The scalability and various configurations of the product allows for a wide range of e-commerce site features. It provides a storefront to begin with so it helps with speeding up development.
Read full review
Squarespace
Unless our website requires significantly more functionality in the future, I can't see us terminating our contract
Read full review
Usability
IBM
No answers on this topic
Squarespace
It's simple to use for someone who is really good with computers as well as those who are not. I've been using my personal squarespace for years and have also helped clients build a starting page which they are later able to manage theirselves.
Read full review
Support Rating
IBM
No answers on this topic
Squarespace
Help is available directly from the back end and uses full sentence searching to find answers to questions others may have asked before. With a ton of articles and support questions documents, it is very likely that your question has been answered. If not each page has the ability to open a direct email to support. Each case has a number and can be followed. Responses are often quick and have links and directions clearly stated
Read full review
Alternatives Considered
IBM
IBM Digital Commerce was a lot more customizable and had a good engine for us to make enhancements. We were not locked down to certain integrations and we were able to utilize a lot of the features outside of the box vs using a prescribed set of features and functionality that other tools would force us to use
Read full review
Squarespace
Overall, as a designer, it makes perfect sense for small to large businesses to use a site such as SquareSpace. Costs are relatively reasonable with the ability to go in and do custom code.
The issue is certain aspects of it, depending on the plan, you can't do. So, if you want to do API to the site, you need to use the top-tier program to do so. Even at custom code, you won't have access to the API section.
As well, like all templates and themes, everybody is using the same style too.
Read full review
Return on Investment
IBM
  • For our clients in the apparel industry, the flexibility that WCS provides to scale up really helped their online business to grow tremendously.
  • Our client in the restaurant industry can't quite leverage what WCS has to offer though as it doesn't really fit their shopping model.
  • Another positive impact is that it allows our clients to streamline their commerce system in interacting with their backend.
Read full review
Squarespace
  • The key positive impact on my overall business objectives is how simple Squarespace sites are to implement new information. Whenever our services change, we can quickly update pages or even change how the website flows, in a very short window of time. This allows me to get back to more urgent work sooner.
  • Our Squarespace site for Club Swim Show helped present our web series to potential partners; Club Swim Show went on to partner with a popular swimming magazine and reach a larger audience through that magazine's hosting thanks to the professional design of our original website.
  • Squarespace does not bring in customers to my storefront, which is fine for me, since I sell things infrequently and it is not my main business, but might work against someone who is expecting a Shopify or Etsy level connection with buyer markets.
Read full review
ScreenShots