If you're running your own business you often don't have the time to spend learning HTML or Web design, but you also might not have the money to hire a professional designer. These Web editors include functions that are important to small business owners - like ecommerce, but are easy to use even for the newest Web author.
Find the perfect HTML editor for you.Serif WebPlus is a Web site editor that is perfect for the small business owner who doesn't have time to learn HTML or Web design. There are hundreds of pre-built templates, fonts, and icons included. This is not a good design choice for a Web designer or someone who wants to become one. While you can edit HTML in this tool, it isn't easy to do. And while you can import your site into the tool, it changes the HTML on import which can make things look odd.
Dynamic HTML Editor is a WYSIWYG editor that is fairly easy to use for basic tasks. You click on what you want to add into your page, then draw it onto the page. This tool has built-in graphics editing that can be applied to specific parts of the page as well as images. It's a good program for people who don't want to learn HTML and need a graphic intensive Web site. With the latest versions, it adds ecommerce and RSS support which makes it great for small business owners who want to build and maintain their own sites.
WYSIWYG Web Builder makes it easy to build a Web page without knowing any HTML. It is a WYSIWYG-only editor with no access to the HTML code. But it supports nearly every HTML element I could think of and comes with an image editor and a lot of buttons and widgets.
Website X5 Evolution looks like a very interesting package for individuals and small business who don't want to learn HTML or Web design, they just want to put up a Web site. The documentation states that it will deliver XHTML 1.0 strict Web sites using CSS. It has features like a graphics editor, flash animation included, 500 pre-installed templates, RSS support, email forms, an ecommerce solution, and even password protected areas. Prices on the site are in Euros.
Contribute is a WYSIWYG editor for people who have no interest or need in learning HTML. It can connect directly to a blog to give you powerful editing features or to an existing website to manage the pages there. Contribute works best when working with a site created using Dreamweaver templates. Contribute also provides version control and authoring information that are not included in Dreamweaver.
Web Easy is a nice looking Windows program that would work well for newcomers to Web design and small business owners who don't want to learn HTML. It has no access to the HTML, so you don't need to worry about it. It has lots of wizards to add forms, scripts, and even ecommerce to your site quickly and easily. For instance, there is an eBay automator to help you sell things on eBay with nice pages.
Yahoo! SiteBuilder is a tool to allow customers of the Yahoo! websites to easily build and maintain their Web stores. It's very easy to use, with a lot of pre-built templates that can generate a site in minutes. There is no access to the HTML in this tool and it can only connect to the Yahoo! sites. But this tool is perfect for the small business owner who needs a website but doesn't want to learn HTML or Web design.
Web Studio 4.0 is trying to answer the challenge of Web design tools that tools like Word have provided. Namely, the idea that you should be able to build a Web page by simply dragging the images or multimedia elements that you want onto your document and then typing text around them. Web Studio 4.0 does a good job at this - by making the creation of a Web page easy to understand, by removing all direct access to it from the user. It works for small business owners who don't have time to learn HTML but need features like a PayPal storefront.
Website X5 Compact is a less expensive version of Website X5 Evolution. It offers the same WYSIWYG functionality, with no access to the HTML code. One feature missing that I was surprised at was tables - you need to purchase Evolution to get table support. The documentation states that it will deliver XHTML 1.0 strict Web sites using CSS. This looks like a decent product for small businesses and individuals who don't have time to learn HTML or CSS.
