Do you remember the first website you ever made? I do, unfortunately – it was back in the early AOL days and was, of course, terrible. I updated it approximately once and mainly featured video game stuff I was playing at the time.
The next website was some Geocities nightmare that was almost nothing but animated gifs and terribly pointless rambling. Both websites were atrocious but I didn’t care; I was just happy being able to post stuff online for everybody (read: nobody) to see.
Back then, the few simple tasks you could perform while making a website seemed like magic even though it took forever. Nowadays I could recreate those eyesores in less time it took to connect to the web in nineteen ninety whatever. However, despite all the time and innovation, making websites can still be a pain.
On top of that, there’s never really been an option for businesses to create a website. Most services are geared towards the casual, personal websites you frequently find all over the place. Luckily, Puzl came along to fill in this gap.
Ease of Use
One of the most important qualities for a website creation service is ease of use. If it takes a degree in design and coding then it’s not doing its job. We sign on to these things because it makes our lives easier, not more confusing. Unfortunately, most don’t realize this, and include dozens of unnecessary steps and pointless options.
Sign-up on Puzl is fairly easy, though extensive. There are many questions that detail everything about your company which you may start to get annoyed with. However, these questions aren’t just for fun. They fill in information on your website (like the company name and phone number) you otherwise would have to fill in manually. It seems like an unnecessary step at first, but you’ll soon find this is for a reason.
When it comes to actually editing text and pictures on your website it’s a little mixed. Double clicking on an item leads to a menu for you to edit the information quickly, which is nice. Some websites make you jump through hoops to edit even a simple box of text. Puzl even lets you adjust picture size in no time flat.
Where it goes off the rails a bit is when you fill your website up. Moving stuff around the page is simple enough, just click and drag; however, if there’s another picture of text box in your way, you’re out of luck. It simply doesn’t let you put it down. You have to move the offending object into your “closet” or it will forever get in your way.
I see where they were coming from here – nobody wants to lose a small picture behind a handful of other boxes. However, it seems like the process could be streamlined, like prompting when you try to move something and an object is in the way. As it is now it’s a usefully annoying feature that takes some getting used to.
Options
Website builders are usually pretty good about offering plenty of options so you can make the page “yours.” How are you supposed to show your personality if you can’t put the text all in purple Wingdings at 50 font?
Since Puzl is a business website creator, though, you won’t find quite as many options as you would with other free website builders. Everything you will find is strictly professional. Starting out you won’t find a plethora of themes to choose from, just simple designs that let viewers know they’ve stumbled on a business site and not someone’s insane blog about their cats.
Want to say “heck to the man” and change the font to Wingdings anyway? Too bad, you’re stuck with the one you’re given. Forget switching the color to neon plaid pink, too, as you’ve only got a few professional colors to choose from.
One annoying “feature” of building a site on Puzl is the irremovable Business News page it comes with. So far after publishing my test website nothing has appeared there nor can it be changed to anything else (or added to). So far it’s been completely pointless and almost seems like an error.
Note: Velly from Puzl emailed me and informed me while you can’t delete it, you can “hide” the news page by clicking on the Page Manager section and changing the “Visible” option to “Hidden.” She also explained the idea of the news page is to give you a way to quickly share articles and blogs and publish them elsewhere like Facebook and Twitter.
Result
Despite the few grievances here, Puzl is one of the easiest website builders I’ve ever used. It’s also the least confusing, which was nice to not get a headache trying to do something simple. Clicking and dragging everything is easy so you can easily customize your site’s look.
Another thing I thought was great was the inclusion of a workable preview site. It seems simple enough, but the other builders I’ve used haven’t included this. Heck, Blogspot doesn’t even know how to get this right, and they’ve been around forever. Your Puzl site’s preview page is fully workable so you can see how customers will actually interact with it.
If you want a complicated, stylized website that showcases your company’s originality – well, you might want to go with a custom design. However, if you need a workable site that does its duty and is easy to create, then give Puzl a shot!
