What will Pagecloud mean for Web Designers?

One of the more interesting products to come out of this year’s TechCruch Disrupt 2015 was the introduction of PageCloud, an innovative web creation service that boasts a simplified drag and drop interface that promises to change the way we produce, edit and view websites.

Launching November 30^th, the tool has dubbed itself as the world’s most advanced web editor and promises to be a revolution for not just web creation and design, but the World Wide Web as a whole.

What is PageCloud?

The online platform introduces itself as a world-first web editing and publishing experience that requires zero coding knowledge or need of any third-party applications. Pagecloud is a visual page editor that allows just about anyone to make simple page edits and additions to their website right from their browser. You can change, add and remove elements from your website in a similar way to how you would make changes to a word document or a Powerpoint presentation allowing you to see your website dynamically change right in front of you. The idea is that if you do need to make a quick change to your website you won’t have to get the experts in, you can just do it yourself without risk of affecting the website.

“For the last 10 or 15 years if you wanted to make a simple change to a page on the web, like move something to the right, you better call a programmer or an agency and be willing to spend thousands and wait days or weeks. In a Pagecloud world, anyone with a web browser gets complete creative freedom.” Said Craig Fitzpatrick, CEO and Founder of Pagecloud who demonstrated Pagecloud live at this year’s Techcruch Disrupt.

Another feature includes dragging Youtube videos and Eventbrite ticket widgets from browser tabs to your website and have them appear straight away to be positioned wherever you want. Other features include dragging layers straight from Photoshop into the browser using a drag and drop technology that comes across as simple, intuitive and fast. You can do the same for any compatible files from your desktop too such as word documents, image, videos to see them appear as they should do on a webpage.

PageCloud also offers an intuitive mobile design tool that provides a mobile environment for your website where you can easily adjust and change your website to suit mobile devices by making certain text larger. The only drawback with this is that it's a mobile theme rather than a responsive template but as it's a cloud based service there's a possibility for this as well as other new features in coming years.

Could this service replace the role of a web designer?

Pagecloud appears to want just about anyone to be able to create and edit a website without any prior knowledge of doing so. Despite the user interface boasting an advanced web editing feature that someone could get the hang of it in a matter of hours, this doesn’t mean it will easily create a website for you, not a unique one anyway. There are a number of pre-designed templates for you to choose from but a website should still have its own brand, identity and style to make it stand out from the competition. Although the service does have a ‘Copy Website’ feature that can instantly copy an entire web page design from another site for you to dynamically amend and edit, you may still require the assistance and wisdom of a web designer to really show off your brand and style - otherwise it's just a generic template with your logo on it.

The idea is that small businesses and owners won’t always require a web designer or developer to make changes to the website, no matter how small they are. If some text needs to be amended on a page or an image needs updating, the owner can do this with just a couple of clicks without needing any prior knowledge of web design or coding. Even though many CMS tools like Wordpress and Drupal do something this already, the whole point of PageCloud is to dynamically change anything on a page within a live environment with just a couple of clicks. There’s no way to break the page due to user error and you always have a preview state of the website before you apply the pages.

Who should use Pagecloud?

This service appears ideal for small business owners who want a website done quick and easy. Similar to web services like Wix and Squarespace, all you need is to sign up to their service and you have the tools and hosting at your disposal. However, if you do choose to go it alone and choose a pre-made template for your website are you giving your business the branding it deserves? Although Pagecloud is offering some very unique features that should make website creation user friendly and intuitive, we shouldn’t forget that web designers are there to give your business unique branding online and advice on running a website.

A web designer can make your website stand out from the competition and be turned into something unique. Adding your logo, text and photos to a pre-defined web template is not too different from having a Facebook or Twitter page. Having your own website is your chance to make an impression on the web without limitations. Pagecloud looks to have a blank canvas to allow you to do this with the added bonus of an intuitive interface to easily add and change elements after the design. A web designer could certainly get the ball rolling on this platform as it's not their choice where you choose to host your website but the added benefit but how much a web designer could accomplish with it has yet to be seen.

Services like Pagecloud, Wix and Squarespace won’t replace the web designer’s job but it can make the process easier for the client after the design has been completed. Some web designers could certainly utilise the Pagecloud service but may still come across limitations. The service is due to be released at the end of November so we will see how it fares for businesses and web designers.