Lex Thomas's Blog, page 2

Hello Down There: Squarespace Teams Up with Martin Scorsese for its 2024 Super Bowl Campaign

Squarespace is proud to reveal its 10th Super Bowl campaign directed by Martin Scorsese. The 30-second spot, titled 'Hello Down There’, will run during the first half of Super Bowl LVIII on Feb. 11, 2024. 

Squarespace helps millions of entrepreneurs worldwide succeed and, for the first time ever, the platform has been tapped by extraterrestrials looking to capture the attention of the billions of earthlings below. 

Directed by the legendary Martin Scorsese, ‘Hello Down There’ is a humorous take on capturing the essence of human life consumed by the digital world. As the spot opens, people around the world are so preoccupied by the normal barrage of digital content that they miss the bold attempts by extraterrestrials to make contact. The intergalactic visitors become increasingly frustrated, until they decide to leverage Earth’s best tool for standing out and getting noticed – a beautiful Squarespace website. 

Leveraging the Squarespace platform, the extraterrestrials secured a domain and built a beautiful and unique website using Fluid Engine™, the simplest way to express creativity online. Creating their website was the first step in making their dream of intergalactic connection a reality. A website made them discoverable; it made them real. 

“At my age, it's a stretch finding a directorial debut. When Squarespace first approached me to create a spot, I thought this was my shot,” said Martin Scorsese. “Let's go big, let's do something out of this world – space guys building a website. I'm a New Yorker. We're busy, always on the move. Would we even notice extraterrestrials living among us? It's going to launch on this show called Super Bowl? Supposed to be big!”

“At Squarespace, we have always said that an idea isn’t real until you make a website for it,” said David Lee, Chief Creative Officer at Squarespace. “It’s been an honor to work alongside the cinematic legend Martin Scorsese to bring this insight to life through his lens for our 10th Super Bowl campaign. Our focus on design and creativity has always been at the heart of our business and the reason why people choose us – and nothing illustrates this more than our Super Bowl campaigns.” 

The Super Bowl advertisement is at the center of a broader marketing campaign that aims to highlight the legitimizing effect of having a professional web presence. In addition to the game day spot, the campaign includes a comprehensive global content marketing campaign leading up to, and following, the game that will be promoted across digital and social channels throughout the first half of 2024. Additional elements of the campaign include an extended version of the in-game spot, special edition movie posters, as well as additional video content, including a comedic short film featuring Martin Scorsese and his daughter Francesca Scorsese discussing the creation of a Squarespace website. Francesca also directed a behind-the-scenes look at the in-spot production process.

As part of the campaign, Squarespace launched a new special edition website template Hello Down There built on Fluid Engine™ that features a sci-fi inspired design system and offers dynamic commerce features, including an online store front, courses, and appointment-based bookings via Acuity Scheduling. 

For anyone looking to turn their out of this world idea or business into reality, a website makes it real. Whether an entrepreneur or extraterrestrial, Squarespace has all the tools you need to stand out and succeed. From securing your domain, building a beautiful and integrated online presence, and running your business, Squarespace makes it easier than ever to get started.

To learn more about the campaign or build a website using the customized Hello Down There template, click here. 

Our 2023 Year-in-Review

As we prepare for the new year, we want to take a moment to celebrate everything we have accomplished in 2023. It has been a landmark year for us – we celebrated our 20th anniversary, and released some of the biggest advancements to our commerce product to date. We are proud of our continuous work building products to help entrepreneurs stand out and succeed, and are incredibly grateful for the millions of customers choosing Squarespace. 

Take a look at some of the most exciting moments from 2023:

Celebrated our 20th Anniversary: We celebrated 20 incredible years on the web. From our culture of innovation to shaping technology, we have come a long way from a publishing tool to an entire suite of products for entrepreneurs. It’s incredible what we have accomplished over the last two decades. You can explore our journey through a timeline celebrating pivotal moments in our history. 

Launched Squarespace Domains, Welcomed Google Domains customers: Following our landmark acquisition of Google Domains assets this year, we are welcoming millions of new Google Domains customers to our platform. To support these customers, we relaunched Squarespace Domains with a more complete domain management experience, well-suited to provide domain-first customers a seamless experience.  

Launched Squarespace Refresh 2023: Our annual compilation of new products, features, and updates for a future where everyone can be an entrepreneur. This year’s Refresh showcased updates that span all of Squarespace's brands and platforms including Acuity Scheduling, Squarespace Payments, Squarespace AI, Courses, Client Invoicing, Bio Sites Pro, and Squarespace Domains, in addition to new ways to grow and scale with Enterprise and Tock. 

Launched Squarespace Payments: Central to our 2023 product releases was the launch of Squarespace Payments, which closes the gap for millions of customers seeking an integrated, secure way to transact seamlessly on a single online platform. The native payment solution enables merchants to collect money for goods and services directly, without having to integrate an external payment processor. In extending our beautiful design to transaction interfaces, we believe Squarespace Payments provides a better user experience for end users and customers, creating a seamless experience at every stop. The Payment solution will work seamlessly with other Squarespace offerings, such as email marketing tools and the scheduling platform.

Launched Squarespace Blueprint: We believe design is the ultimate competitive advantage, and this year, we introduced Squarespace Blueprint to help customers unlock endless design possibilities with more than a billion combinations to build a unique online presence. The interactive design experience features expert guidance, handpicked layouts and styles, live preview and progress bar, and more. When starting a new site with Blueprint, customers can now leverage AI in the onboarding phase to produce core site copy early on.

Launched Award Winning Creative Work: Our award-winning in-house Creative team continued to push the limits of creative excellence through innovative and dynamic campaigns. We produced global campaigns with renowned talent including Super Bowl with Adam Driver (The Singularity), a social campaign with Joseph Lee (The Artist and the Actor), and ran localized campaigns across international key markets such as the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, France and Australia. The team received multiple Fast Company Innovation by Design awards, won two Webby Awards, and our Super Bowl commercial was one of the most awarded of the year, winning top honors at ADC, AICP, Cannes Lions, Ciclope, D&AD and the One Show.

Launched Squarespace Collection: We launched the latest installment in our Squarespace Collection program in partnership with trailblazing photography collective Magnum Photos. For this campaign, we partnered with six of Magnum's world renowned photographers to capture original imagery from across the world. The results came together in a one-of-a-kind photography project, which includes six signature website designs inspired by each photographer’s creativity and the design choices they made for their own Squarespace websites. 

Continued Globalization of Our Suite of Products: In a testament to Squarespace's continuous commitment to supporting entrepreneurs globally, we increased our currency options 5x, which, alongside our growing support languages, bolsters our ability to support our international customers. We are excited to continue empowering a broader community of entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed no matter where they are, further solidifying Squarespace's position as a global web-building leader.

Brought Pro Users Together for Our 2nd Annual Circle Day: Circle Day is a hybrid event dedicated to giving our Circle community, Squarespace’s partner program for professional web designers, behind-the-scenes product access and first-hand knowledge from some of Squarespace Circle’s most influential members. This year, we extended the conference to two days, adding a Member Workshop Day where attendees got to experience using the Courses product and develop their own "course" with fellow Circle members. Our CEO, Anthony Casalena, joined us this year for a Q&A and our Chief Creative Officer, David Lee, wrapped the conference discussing creativity and how to stay inspired.

Held Our Annual Hack Weeks & Design Weeks: At Squarespace, we celebrate creative possibilities. There is no greater example of this commitment at work than our annual Hack Week and Design Week, where members of the Engineering, Product Management, and Product Design departments have the opportunity to investigate creative concepts, freeing themselves to work on anything they want. 

Celebrated the 10 Year Anniversary of Dublin Office: We celebrated the 10th anniversary of launching Squarespace’s office in Dublin, Ireland in July 2013. In honor of this occasion we hosted various games, activities, and events such as Squarespace Olympics, video game tournaments and an in person happy hour for all employees in Ireland.  

Achieved Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies & Other Global Recognition: We are continuously humbled to be recognized as a best in class organization in various areas including being employer of choice, the excellence of our customer support team, our impeccable in-house creative work, or as an accelerating business. In 2023 alone Squarespace won over 25 awards and recognitions, including a Fast Company Award for Most Innovative Companies and Comparably’s Best Places to Work in New York.

We thank our customers and employees who continuously push us to be the best company we can be. We can’t wait to share more about what is in store for Squarespace in 2024. Stay tuned! 

Squarespace Refresh 2023: Introducing More Ways to Stand Out and Sell Online

We are excited to introduce Squarespace Refresh 2023, our annual release of new products, features, and updates in support of a future where everyone can be an entrepreneur. Many of the innovations launched in 2023 are designed to help entrepreneurs sell, and represent the biggest advancements in commerce since we launched two decades ago. 

Central to the 2023 product releases is the upcoming launch of Squarespace Payments, which will close the gap for millions of customers seeking an integrated, secure way to transact seamlessly on a single online platform. Currently in Beta, Squarespace Payments will roll out to customers in the U.S. in the coming months and launch in additional markets in 2024. This powerful payment solution will let you accept payments directly through Squarespace instead of having to connect a third-party payment provider. You will have complete control over your finances and easily manage payments, payouts and view refunds, disputes, and charges, all within a centralized dashboard. The simple signup process, intuitive onboarding experience, and access to Squarespace’s award-winning customer support team, will ensure you can begin securely transacting on Squarespace Payments within minutes. 

Squarespace Payments

In addition, we continue to make enhancements to Squarespace AI, a custom combination of Generative AI solutions aimed at helping you build an integrated online presence faster and easier than ever before. The initial focus of our new AI-powered technology is to help with a major pain point: content readiness, with new features that help you draft polished and professional website content. 

“Today’s entrepreneurs want a frictionless experience, more ways to sell, superior design and better outcomes when it comes to building a presence and running a business online,” said Anthony Casalena, Founder and CEO of Squarespace. “We continue to push the boundaries in what is possible, placing more powerful and dynamic tools in the hands of entrepreneurs worldwide. Our 2023 Refresh unveils incredible new ways to maximize success online, from the integration of Squarespace Payments, expansion of Domains, and the introduction of dozens of new tools and features that allow anyone to more easily monetize and sell online.” 

New products and features launching include:

New ways to sell: Tools to help you earn income, easily create additional income streams, and own your content. 

Squarespace Payments: Our new, native payment solution offers a fast and secure payment option for everyone selling on Squarespace. The new payments tool is easily accessible with a simple onboarding experience. 

Client Invoicing: With Client Invoicing, you can manage your business all on Squarespace – from vetting leads to receiving payment via invoices in one streamlined, customizable workflow. New tools include: 

Client intake forms & CRM: Capture important information from potential clients with intake forms and organize those details in Squarespace’s updated CRM.

Invoices: Collect payments from your clients with professional invoices that match your website brand identity.

Project tracking: Manage your client information, invoices, and tasks in one place with our project functionality.

Courses: Easily turn your expertise into income with a professional online course powered by Fluid Engine™, that is complete with beautiful course layouts, video lessons, progress tracking, and more. 

Commerce tools: Expanded commerce tools make it easier than ever for you to sell physical and digital products, including: fulfillment profiles, checkout improvements, shipping labels order tracking, UPS® shipping labels, improvements to subscriptions, shop page and product listing enhancements, and a new add-to-cart feature. 

Acuity Scheduling: Advancements in platform technologies and new branding celebrates Acuity’s core promise of never letting scheduling get in the way of success. Platform updates help streamline the client booking experience, making it more intuitive for clients to book appointments. Additional features include a new centralized dashboard, enhanced mobile app tools like mobile payment links, and payment features such as automated email receipts, hassle-free invoice creation and management. 

Email Marketing: Convert your site visitors into repeat customers with updated email marketing tools, including enhanced email automations, seasonal email templates, and an editable discount field that helps convert site visitors into repeat customers.

New ways to stand out online: Next-generation tools and technologies to help you easily create a unique brand and integrated experience across your online platforms. 

Squarespace Domains: A domain is the crucial starting point in your  journey to establishing an online presence. Squarespace is continuing to invest in building out our domains platform by adding new domains like .nz or .fr, introducing domain and email forwarding, and setting up bulk domain management, as well as overhauling the domains dashboard to emphasize simplicity in domain management.

Squarespace AI: Introducing new AI-powered tools that make it easier than ever to generate custom content. Squarespace AI helps populate nearly-final content on your websites, bringing you  much closer to a finished website product. Squarespace AI is available within the website text editor, Email Campaigns, Commerce stores, and Squarespace Blueprint to help you efficiently specialize your content to ensure it reflects your unique brand identity. 

Bio Sites Pro: We have expanded Bio Sites, beautiful one-page link-in-bio sites for social media, with the launch of Bio Sites Pro. The Pro tier offers premium features for you to have deeper customization, engagement, and monetization capabilities. The Bio Sites web editor option is also now available, which offers an easier way to create and update Bio Sites from any web browser.

Expanded Extensions: We added a dozen new Extensions to expand the functionality of our platform.

New Ways to Scale: Expanded tools to support businesses of all sizes and types as they mature and scale.

Enterprise: Updates help global brands scale their online presence efficiently and securely while maintaining brand integrity. New tools allow enterprise teams to easily collaborate on web page drafts and offer enhanced protection to keep internal sites secure through single sign on.

Tock: New and improved solutions for superior hospitality management. 

Enhanced User System: Search, discover, and book reservations easier than ever with Tock’s new iOS app. In addition, the new integration of Reserve with Google helps Tock customers drive more visibility, revenue, and covers.

Platform updates: New features include multiple start times for events, table prioritization to customize which tables get booked first, variable ticket types, and pricing for events. Credit card holds, to help reduce no shows, will be launching soon.

“We are excited to expand our platform with more tools for service sellers, a thriving and growing community of online entrepreneurs looking to turn their knowledge into ownable content and income," said Paul Gubbay, Chief Product Officer at Squarespace. “We have built one of the most comprehensive suites of tools for anyone looking to sell online whether it be their time, services, and expertise, or physical products.” 

Squarespace Collection: Magnum Photos Contact Sheet

© Sabiha Çimen / Magnum Photos, © William Keo / Magnum Photos, © Olivia Arthur / Magnum Photos, © Jacob Aue Sobol / Magnum Photos, © Bruce Gilden / Magnum Photos, © Steve McCurry / Magnum Photos

In addition, we introduced the second edition of Squarespace Collection (formerly Squarespace Icons), our award-winning partnership series, with famed photography agency Magnum Photos. For this collaboration, we partnered with six of Magnum’s world renowned photographers to capture original imagery from across the world. The results came together in a one-of-a-kind photography project, which includes six signature website designs built on Fluid Engine™. Each design is inspired by the photographer’s creative vision and the design choices for their own Squarespace websites, and are available as a starting point for anyone looking to build a website with Squarespace. As part of the series, all six photographers will provide a limited number of one-on-one photography portfolio critiques, available by signing up via Acuity Scheduling*. Find more information on the latest Squarespace Collection, including access to the new website designs here. 

To learn more about our latest innovations, visit Squarespace Refresh here.  

* Rules apply

Squarespace Launches Courses: A New Way to Easily Create and Sell Content Online

Today, we are thrilled to announce Courses, a new way for entrepreneurs to turn their knowledge and expertise into income. With Squarespace Courses, anyone can easily create and sell a professional online course, from chefs selling cooking lessons to wellness instructors creating meditation videos and photographers teaching the basics of photography. 

“We are always striving to create new ways for entrepreneurs to build a business and succeed online, and the launch of Courses is no exception,” said Paul Gubbay, Chief Product Officer. “We are excited to offer an effortless way to create and sell courses with Squarespace’s premium look and feel, to further support entrepreneurs looking to connect with and monetize their audience.”

Courses include beautifully designed layouts that can be fully customized to fit your brand. They offer an easy way to organize content into lessons and chapters, in addition to supplementary lesson content such as text, images, and downloadable resources. Powered by Fluid Engine, the Courses templates are fully customizable, and integrated into our all-in-one platform. They come with a best-in-class editing experience, built-in commerce functionality, marketing tools, robust analytics, and more. Squarespace offers course creators:

A new way to turn knowledge into income: Design, promote, and sell professional, multimedia courses with beautiful layouts and capabilities for uploading and hosting video and supplementary content

A great student experience: Engage audiences with rich lessons and chapters, as well as a progress tracker to follow along with sequential content. Students can enroll at any time, or can be signed up in cohorts that take the course at the same time.

Flexible fee structure: Sell courses individually, bundled together, or as part of a package with other content like memberships or video. Choose the right fee structure for your business, whether that’s one-time charges, installments, or recurring subscriptions.

Access to Squarespace’s all-in-one platform: Create content, accept payments, monitor analytics, and leverage marketing tools to grow your business all in one place.

Courses joins our growing toolkit for entrepreneurs to monetize their content, including tools for selling other types of digital products, like memberships and video. We’re also launching additional improvements to the ways our customers can set up paywalls and pricing plans on their websites, making it easier than ever to sell access to content. 

Starting today, customers can sell courses and other digital products with a Business or Commerce plan. Or, customers on any plan can purchase the all-new Digital Products add-on to unlock lower transaction fees and additional video storage space, starting at $9/month. You can learn more about Courses and pricing here.

Squarespace can also help customers match with and hire a trusted, independent expert to produce courses and get started selling faster. Visit Squarespace Marketplace to learn more.

Squarespace Launches Courses: A New Way to Easily Create & Sell Content Online

Today, we are thrilled to announce Courses, a new way for entrepreneurs to turn their knowledge and expertise into income. With Squarespace Courses, anyone can easily create and sell a professional online course, from chefs selling cooking lessons to wellness instructors creating meditation videos and photographers teaching the basics of photography. 

“We are always striving to create new ways for entrepreneurs to build a business and succeed online, and the launch of Courses is no exception,” said Paul Gubbay, Chief Product Officer. “We are excited to offer an effortless way to create and sell courses with Squarespace’s premium look and feel, to further support entrepreneurs looking to connect with and monetize their audience.”

Courses include beautifully designed layouts that can be fully customized to fit your brand. They offer an easy way to organize content into lessons and chapters, in addition to supplementary lesson content such as text, images, and downloadable resources. Powered by Fluid Engine, the Courses templates are fully customizable, and integrated into our all-in-one platform. They come with a best-in-class editing experience, built-in commerce functionality, marketing tools, robust analytics, and more. Squarespace offers course creators:

A new way to turn knowledge into income: Design, promote, and sell professional, multimedia courses with beautiful layouts and capabilities for uploading and hosting video and supplementary content

A great student experience: Engage audiences with rich lessons and chapters, as well as a progress tracker to follow along with sequential content. Students can enroll at any time, or can be signed up in cohorts that take the course at the same time.

Flexible fee structure: Sell courses individually, bundled together, or as part of a package with other content like memberships or video. Choose the right fee structure for your business, whether that’s one-time charges, installments, or recurring subscriptions.

Access to Squarespace’s all-in-one platform: Create content, accept payments, monitor analytics, and leverage marketing tools to grow your business all in one place.

Courses joins our growing toolkit for entrepreneurs to monetize their content, including tools for selling other types of digital products, like memberships and video. We’re also launching additional improvements to the ways our customers can set up paywalls and pricing plans on their websites, making it easier than ever to sell access to content. 

Starting today, customers can sell courses and other digital products with a Business or Commerce plan. Or, customers on any plan can purchase the all-new Digital Products add-on to unlock lower transaction fees and additional video storage space, starting at $9/month. You can learn more about Courses and pricing here.

Squarespace can also help customers match with and hire a trusted, independent expert to produce courses and get started selling faster. Visit Squarespace Marketplace to learn more.

Squarespace Enters Definitive Agreement to Acquire Google Domains Assets

We are excited to announce that Squarespace has entered into a definitive asset purchase agreement with Google, whereby Squarespace will acquire the assets associated with the Google Domains business, which will be winding down following a transition period. This purchase includes approximately 10 million domains hosted on Google Domains spread across millions of customers.

“We are exceptionally proud to be chosen to serve the customers of the Google Domains business,” said Anthony Casalena, Founder & CEO of Squarespace. “Domains are a critical part of web infrastructure and an essential piece of every business’s online presence. We look forward to serving these new customers as we have served millions using our domain products and are committed to ensuring a seamless transition.” 

“In keeping with our efforts to sharpen our focus, we have entered into a definitive agreement with Squarespace for the acquisition of customer accounts of the Google Domains registrar business,” said Matt Madrigal, Vice President and General Manager, Merchant Shopping of Google. “Supporting a smooth transition for customers over the coming months, with the help of the Google Domains team, is our top priority. Squarespace can provide an integrated experience of purchasing and managing domains along with offering other tools that these customers may need to build their online presence.”

Under the terms of the agreement, Squarespace will honor all existing Google Domains customers' renewal prices for at least 12 months following the closing of the transaction, as well as provide additional incentives to encourage Google Domains customers to build a website with Squarespace and adopt other Squarespace offerings. Further, Squarespace will be leveraging Google’s infrastructure powering the Google Domains product during the migration period in order to ensure the seamless transfer of domains.

Upon closing, Squarespace, a long- time reseller of Google Workspace, will become the exclusive domains provider for any customer purchasing a domain along with their Workspace subscription from Google directly for a minimum of three years. Squarespace will also provide billing and support services to Google Workspace customers that signed up for the service through Google Domains. Customers will continue to have the option to make changes to their domains account at any time.

The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2023, and is subject to certain regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions. While the majority of the benefits of this deal will be realized in 2024 and beyond, Squarespace believes this deal will be meaningfully accretive to its business from both a revenue and free cash flow perspective over time.

For additional information on the agreement, please click here. 

20 Years

I’m proud to announce that this year marks Squarespace’s 20th anniversary since founding. That is an eternity in technology, and it’s incredible what we have done over these two decades.

Squarespace was started in 2003 as a way for me to create a personal website and experiment with blogging (believe it or not, a new idea at the time). Little did I know that those original ideas would give rise to a global company that would eventually help millions of people get online, establish brands, and do business on the web.

Of the many things to be proud of at Squarespace, our culture around constant innovation and protecting great design continues to stand strong. When Squarespace was started, the web was a very different place. Internet Explorer was the dominant browser (there was no Google Chrome), web pages had no large images or animation, and the iPhone wouldn’t be released for another 5 years – so the mobile web essentially didn’t exist. Our product sensibilities have allowed us to evolve along with, and even help shape, the technology around us – and it is incredible the pace we continue to operate at and the relevance our products enjoy. Squarespace Refresh stands as a testament to that, where we announced over 100 releases and improvements to our products last year alone – more releases than any other time in our history.

To take a trip with us through these past 2 decades and look at some of our many milestones, we’ve put together this timeline. It’s an incredible body of work and I’m proud of everything we have been able to do for our customers.

I’d like to extend a huge thank you to our team, our customers, and all of our supporters over the years. We could not have gotten here without you all, and it is humbling and a pleasure to be part of this story.

Thank you again!

Introducing Squarespace Blueprint

Today, we are thrilled to officially announce the launch of Squarespace Blueprint, a guided website design system providing professionally-curated layout and styling options to help customers build a unique online presence from the ground up. By answering a few simple questions, customers can easily construct the foundations of a well-designed website and personalize it more quickly. Squarespace has a long track record of providing best-in-class templates, and Squarespace Blueprint extends that legacy by combining multiple template elements together to provide a unique starting point for every customer. 

We believe that design is the ultimate competitive advantage for anyone looking to build a successful brand or business. Squarespace Blueprint unlocks more than a billion design combinations, allowing anyone to express a creative vision or brand identity more easily than ever before. Customers select from a menu of design-forward layouts, fonts, and colors before further customizing website content in the Squarespace platform and publishing online. Key elements of Squarespace Blueprint include: 

Interactive Design Experience: a five-step online experience allowing anyone to make real-time design choices for a truly custom website.

Expert Guidance: clear design direction at every step that's easy for beginners and pros alike. 

Handpicked Layout & Styling Options: upfront access to professional layouts, color palettes, and font options, balancing a mix of modern and traditional styles.

Live Preview & Progress Bar: a live preview of the website as it's being built, plus progress tracking.

Fully Functional Website: a real, operational website with access to our Website Builder toolkit and Fluid Engine editor.

Any new or existing Squarespace customer can access Squarespace Blueprint via desktop in English, with other languages coming soon. To try it yourself, click here.

Squarespace Releases its Inaugural Environmental, Social and Governance Report

Squarespace, the all-in-one website building and ecommerce platform, announced the release of its 2022 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report.

Squarespace’s mission is to build products that help entrepreneurs standout and succeed. Since its founding, the company has been steadfast in its commitment to make its products continually easier to use and able to address more customer use cases. This translates to removing barriers to entry and making it possible for anyone to turn their entrepreneurial dream into a reality. 

“We are proud to launch our 2022 ESG report and showcase how our mission and ways of operating align to support our ESG priorities,” said Anthony Casalena, Founder & CEO of Squarespace. “We are in the early days of what we can accomplish as a company and we believe that our ESG strategy will benefit our overall performance in service of all of our stakeholders.”  

Highlights of the ESG report include:  

Employee Engagement: We believe in the power of the individual to make great things and are focused on employee engagement and development opportunities to encourage employees to meet their potential and contribute to the mission we collectively serve. 

Environmental Sustainability: We believe responsible energy use is important to our long-term success, and are working to reduce our impact, including maintaining eco-conscious workplaces across offices.  

Data Privacy & Security: Our “Be the Customer” company value guides our data privacy and security practices, including the privacy requirements our customers must meet to compliantly interact with their own customers.

Squarespace’s 2022 ESG Report follows the guidance of the Sustainability Accounting Standards Boards (SASB) standards and the recommended disclosure topics for the Internet & Media Services industry under those standards as promulgated by the International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation and the International Sustainability Standards Board. 

Squarespace's ESG report can be found here.

Squarespace Named to Fast Company’s World’s Most Innovative Companies List

Squarespace is proud to announce it has been recognized in Fast Company’s prestigious ranking of the World’s Most Innovative Companies for 2023.  

As a leader in web design for almost two decades, we are proud to empower millions of entrepreneurs to build brands and bring their businesses to life online. This year’s rankings highlight the businesses at the forefront of their respective industries, paving the way for the innovations of tomorrow. Squarespace is named one of the top 10 most innovative companies in Retail for expanding our commerce tools to support the myriad of ways entrepreneurs, including digital-first Creators, can monetize their audience and content, and scale their businesses online. 

“We’re proud to be recognized as a Most Innovative Company for our commitment in helping entrepreneurs succeed worldwide,” said Anthony Casalena, Founder & CEO of Squarespace. “2022 was an incredible year for our company as we brought to market more than 100 new features and solutions. Our platform of products is more powerful and intuitive than ever before, empowering millions to bring their ideas and businesses to life.”

For 20 years, Squarespace has been innovating in design and technology, advancing its platform alongside digital trends, to help entrepreneurs standout and succeed online. In 2022, we launched Squarespace Refresh, highlighting the largest set of new product features and innovations we have deployed to help anyone thrive online. We introduced video monetization, content automation, custom merchandise, digital collectibles, asset library, and link-in-bio offering Bio Sites, among many others. We also launched Fluid Engine, a next generation website design system for truly customizable, fast and easy web design experience. With an intuitive and agile editing experience, anyone—whether beginner or pro—can achieve the unique and professional design results that allow them to stand out and succeed online.