How to Design & Edit a Squarespace Website (Step-by-Step)

You have taken the plunge, started your free trial, picked a gorgeous template, and now you are staring at the dashboard wondering: how do I actually edit my Squarespace website?

Do not panic. While it looks incredibly professional, Squarespace is explicitly designed for total beginners. In this in-depth tutorial, we will show you exactly how to design on Squarespace, from editing basic text to setting up your SEO, building isolated landing pages, and capturing emails.

How to Edit a Squarespace Website (The Basics)

The core of Squarespace's platform is their newly upgraded "Fluid Engine" drag-and-drop editor. Unlike older website builders that locked you into rigid rows and columns, Fluid Engine gives you a flexible grid.

To change anything on a page, you simply navigate to that page on the right side of your screen and click the "Edit" button in the top left corner.

Once you are in Edit mode, everything becomes interactive:

• Double-click any text box to rewrite it or change the font.
• Click on images to swap them out or add cropping effects.
• Drag elements freely around the grid. It will naturally snap to the alignment lines, making it almost impossible to design something that looks "bad" or misaligned.

How to Create a Landing Page on Squarespace

If you are running paid ads, launching a new product, or hosting a webinar, you need a dedicated landing page. The goal of a landing page is to remove all distractions (like navigation menus) so the user only has one choice: click your call-to-action button.

Here is how to create a landing page on Squarespace in 4 simple steps:

1. Go to your Pages menu and click the "+" icon under the "Not Linked" section to add a new "Blank Page".
2. Click the gear icon next to the page name to open the Page Settings.
3. Under the "Advanced" tab (or using a quick CSS snippet if you are on version 7.1), look for the option to hide the header and footer. This isolates the page from the rest of your site.
4. Add a compelling headline, a massive hero image, and a clear call-to-action button!

How to Do Squarespace SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

Building a beautiful site is only step one; getting Google to send you traffic is step two. Many beginners ask how to do Squarespace SEO, assuming it requires coding knowledge or expensive plugins like Yoast. Squarespace actually makes it incredibly simple natively.

To optimize your entire site, click on "Marketing" and then "SEO Appearance". Here, you can define your overall site title and meta description. But to really rank on Google, you must optimize each individual page.

Every single page has a gear icon next to it in the Pages menu. Click that gear, navigate to the "SEO" tab, and write a custom SEO Title and SEO Description for that specific page. Make sure this text naturally contains the exact keywords your customers are searching for!

Advanced Features: Email Lists & Google Reviews

You don't just want visitors; you want leads. If you are wondering how to create an email list on Squarespace, they have a built-in tool called Squarespace Email Campaigns. You do not need Mailchimp! You simply add a "Newsletter" block to any page or footer, and it automatically collects emails directly into your Squarespace dashboard.

For local businesses wondering how to add Google reviews to Squarespace to build trust, you can use the built-in "Code" or "Embed" block. You simply sign up for a free third-party review widget (like Elfsight or TrustPilot), copy their HTML code, and paste it into the block. Your 5-star Google ratings will dynamically appear on your site!

Haven't started building yet? Grab our exclusive promo code below before you launch your site!