Duda Pricing Overview

Duda can't do everything. Anyone in this industry that knows what they are doing will tell you that these types of software make managing lots of sites easy, but they all fall short when it comes to more complex websites (User Logins, Specific Industry Features, etc). But... I have yet to work on a platform that is this rock-solid. And the best part is that they are constantly making feature improvements over time. Their team is actively working all the time to create new ways for us to service our clients, and they don't keep it a secret either. One of the marks of a good software company is taking feedback from your customers, looking at industry trends, and then applying them to your software in a smart, safe, and efficient manner. That's Duda. Rock-solid reliability, but ever-changing features that are well-thought-out. I personally have tried out almost all of Duda's competitors. None of them come close in my opinion. In fact, it's funny to watch all these other platforms SCRAMBLE to implement more Duda-like features. You can immediately notice the difference because t's so easy to get started with Duda. Their pricing structure is perfect for freelancer just starting out or for a large company that is looking to make a platform change. And their support does not treat you any different whether you have 5 websites or 500. Speaking of Duda Support, one of the best parts about Duda is their support system. During normal business hours, someone is always there to answer your questions no matter what it is. And if something is broken (we're in the website development field, things break) they are 100% on it immediately with helpful techs that actually know what they are talking about. I have been in situations where the tech was not able to help me, but they IMMEDIATELY escalated the situation, but they stayed with me for the entire process. I felt like they actually cared whether my issue was fixed or not. And that hasn't happened just once, it's happened a lot. I made a comment about what makes a good software company in the previous portion of my review, but you can ALWAYS tell what's a good or bad company based on their support. It's key to keeping your client base happy and actively using your product. Duda gets an S+ from me on their support. It's unmatched. Also, they are very quick to respond via their ticket system. Most companies you feel like you've just been put on the back burner. Not Duda. Finally, and maybe the most important part. Their editor. Now, is it the best editor in the business? Could be, I'm not sure. But what I do know is that it absolutely is the best editor for my clients to use. Duda has cut my training time to 1/4. We all know this common trait in this industry: "I want to be able to change everything on my website" - When in reality: We finish a custom Wordpress website, we train the client for an hour or 2, and they retain literally ZERO information and they log out forever. That may be good for hourly billing, but it's a time-scheduling nightmare. Duda makes this process super smooth, and if I had to put a number on it, I bet I have gotten a 40 - 50 % increase in my clients being active in changing content on their website. Some people may think that might take money away from you, but I would much rather lock my client into my platform because they actually like using the editor rather than them not understanding anything and getting frustrated, eventually leaving for something different.

Pseudo-Responsive Design: Duda's whole system was built on columns & rows. They have a 3-view process of editing your website (Desktop / Tablet / Mobile) which will load different CSS sheets depending on the screen size. Is this bad? Yes and no. I will say, I have experienced ZERO negative page speed / SEO problems from using this method. But it is a limiting factor when creating more complex designs. NOTE: Duda has released their Flex mode, which really aims at fixing all of that. Does the flex mode work? Yes, it does. It works REALLY well, but it is ever-evolving and changing, and it has some room to grow. So why did I put this in the negative portion of the review? Simply because of the time. It's 2021, and when your clients know the nomenclature of "responsive-design" (and actually know what it means) your platform better have that system completely fleshed out. I would estimate by mid-2022 this portion of the dislike section will be a moot point. Up-to-Date GTM & GA4 Tracking: One of the things that I am unsure why it's not updated yet is a specific section for GTM Tracking, as well as replacing (or adding) a new area for implementing the new GA4 system (yeah.. no one likes GA4, but we have to sort of submit to our Google Overlords on this one). This to me feels like a shortcoming. That needs to be added asap. GTM is too important in today's age, it can make or break retaining a client who is serious about driving traffic to their website. NOTE: There is a way to implement GTM tracking, but it's all manual code. I don't mind doing it when I have to, but there needs to be a dedicated place to put your GTM tag, and then it's just a 10-minute straight-forward process. Apps: Apps honestly are a HUGE benefit and one of the better parts of Duda. What my issue with is with some of the approved apps where we have only one option, and it's a bad app. I won't name all the ones I have a problem with (it's not many), but I will use one as an example. SiteSearch360: It's awful. If your search results are not relegated to its own dedicated page you might as well not even use it. Is that a problem with Duda? Yes and no. They need to either add another option or replace it. There are just a few apps that act like this, but they are some of the more core ones. Duda knows they are bad, they need to fix that. Forms: There needs to be more functional with the forms. They are very basic. We need more notification control over the messages and what they say & send. Duda's built-in forms work great for very easy contact forms. But anything past that you will need to invest in a system another type of software to HTML plug in. They offer plug-ins, and those are great, but I really feel like 75% of what those other software programs offer should be part of Duda's platform.

Duda forced me to have a process for onboarding new clients. It felt like every time I got a new client I was re-inventing the wheel (and I was). Duda helped (or forced, which is sometimes needed) me to get a process together to quickly and efficiently get new clients up and running. Duda also made it super simple for me to expand my business. A lot of that has to do with their team process. Duda does not charge you for your team members who work for you to build & manage websites. That's probably one of the most incredible benefits (and they really don't talk about it much - they do that more should). They also helped me look and feel more professional. Duda does not charge you extra for a "premium package" when white-labeling their software. It was honestly one of the biggest reasons I chose Duda. It's honestly not a huge deal that my clients know they are on Duda's platform (to be honest, I usually tell mos to of them) but they do not shove their name around when my client is logging in and doing what they need. It's all branded to my company - and that is very valuable.

- Easy to use the drag + drop website builder. - Nicely designed templates to choose from. - Affordable monthly website prices and agency plans. - Organized files and assets. - The feature where you can download images from a current website and load them into your Duda files is incredibly useful and time-saving. - Great and thorough customer support via email and phone. - More design flexibility than many website builders such as Squarespace. - Significantly easier to use than more custom platforms such as WordPress. - Nice e-commerce features and easily customizable. - Thorough data security built into the platform.

- There are not many built-in integrations with other apps such as email marketing, CRM connections with contact forms, membership communities, and online scheduling/courses. - Sometimes web pages don't display properly online temporarily, even when they are designed properly in the dashboard. - The royalty-free icons that come with Duda's website builder are not easily searchable by keyword. - The pricing strategy for the individual costs of their websites and the agency plans are really confusing. - The support/help articles are mostly text (no images). They're often very vague and don't answer the question I am looking for. - I haven't found a way to add multiple credit cards to my account so that my clients can pay for their own website subscription. - Duda's custom-code (that's a different language from what Wordpress uses-- I think?) makes it difficult to find specialized developers who can build more custom websites and software on the platform. - The analytics feature isn't very sophisticated, so I use Google Analytics for better metrics.

- I am able to have a really custom website. I get complimented on it all the time. There's no way I could have built something so custom with any other platform that I know of. - I am able to build websites quickly, in a fraction of the time and cost it would take me to build a website on a platform like WordPress or Wix. - I feel that my website on Duda is able to scale with me as my business grows. It has all the current and future features I'll ever need. - I like that Duda is constantly developing, improving their software, and keeping up with industry technology and trends. - I also really appreciated my onboarding video chats with Duda's team. Having that face-to-face conversation when I started really helped me see the brand as a team of talented and intelligent individuals who are genuinely looking out for my best interest!

Features are easy to customize - love the ability to utilize templates for quick editing and the "business information" section can be synchronized with a database allowing you to build at speed. They've also created content collection forms that can be easily sent to clients to improve the speed of information sharing, allowing clients to upload photos and other content rather than emailing it, downloading attachments, uploading them to the server, etc. You'll never have to deal with image quality reduction from receiving texted photos again!

Price is variable and inconsistent. There have been several pricing changes over the past 3 years that make it very challenging for a reseller to model their business with Duda as the platform. We have had to modify our pricing with each Duda pricing update, in order to remain profitable. This causes friction between us and our clients (many of whom are scaling themselves and adding new licenses with us all the time) and is not a great experience at all. We operate our business on a very thin margin. At the same time, Duda remains one of the most cost-effective platforms in the space - just be prepared for frequent pricing fluctuations.

Duda allowed a 3rd party referral partner of mine to scale up their website business to support dozens of clients quickly during the Covid-19 craze in Q2 2020. I support independent restaurants and their e-commerce needs. Pre-2020, many restaurants simply did not have their own websites or e-commerce tools that they owned (many used 3rd party marketplaces to sell food, but the cost became prohibitive in 2020). Duda made affordable websites for our clients a reality virtually overnight.

I purchased Duda's Agency plan through an amazing promotion they had in February 2021 and saved hundreds of dollars. I have recently decided to add an eCommerce store to my website primarily because of the value and because Duda does not charge an additional commission fee like many other sites do. Today, I requested a call back for an eCommerce store billing issue and spoke to Paola who was knowledgeable, pleasant and patient. She was able to resolve my issue and another totally separate issue which saved me hours of time. I was super impressed by her quick and efficient service as well as her willingness to help! Duda's promotions, eCommerce store and support team are the best!

I have experienced some difficulty correcting errors when I am editing my websites. I am not always able to return to the original edit when using their "undo" button. Also, it would also be nice if Duda had more integrations/apps for scheduling appointments. I had to purchase a subscription with VCita in order for my clients to be able to schedule and pay for appointments online. VCita is not a company I was familiar with and was a little disappointed in their pricing.

Duda is definitely solving a huge chunk of my time management and task delegation issues. Since I purchased the Agency package, I have multiple sites under one dashboard. This allows for easy monitoring, edits and updates. I also love that Duda makes it easy to provide limited and/or custom access to my sites to my team and external contractors through their Team tab without the risk of compromising my password or personal data. As someone that runs multiple businesses, my time is very valuable and I appreciate Duda's efforts of streamlining these processes which provides me with peace of mind.

I'm very impressed with Duda's flexibility in building custom tablet and mobile versions of each website. While responsive is great, it doesn't always work out as well as it is supposed to, and being able to create a stand-alone mobile version is critical in today's age. I'm also impressed with how easy to use the builder is for my clients. I don't have to worry about clients creating drama for me by moving important items on the page as I can lock them so clients can't edit anything they shouldn't be able to. Their support is also great and they have been nothing short of superb when I've needed them. It is also very important for me that my client websites are on a secure platform and Duda does that very well. Its also very affordable for me as a web supplier.

I feel the blog could do with some work. Not being able to set your RSS feed to summary only has caused challenges for some of my clients with regard to traffic. I don't feel it's super important myself, but it has meant that I've lost a few jobs because clients have affiliate levels they must reach and having their full blog post able to be read on feed readers (and therefore missing the click through) is critical to maintaining their traffic levels. In my opinion, the blog layout is very limited and small things such as not being able to create or post blogs from the mobile version of Duda are quite a challenge for me. They do seem to be working on the blog however so I will wait and see what comes next.

I have all my client sites together which is excellent and the agency pricing makes it easier for me to make money on my monthly hosting.

Duda continues to add more tools that are included in the cost of their platform. Things like SSL certicates. They continue to improve month after month. Also their mobile template is very edititable. Way more than others, including wordpress.

It used to be their ecommerce tool, but that has recently been upgraded and is now much, much better. The conversion to tablet is not the best, but at the same time, mobile continues to get better and I love the editing ability on mobile.

The cost is reasonable, and they seldom change the price. There aren't a bunch of pricing levels. When they come out with something new, it's included. It takes less and less time to do a website now.

All sites in one place easily manageable and accessible. A feature that I've just started using his side, it's and it's probably the best way of ever been able to back and forth with a client it works super well and I've had great feedback with it. I think if I could give any tips that should be a better way of on boarding people to site comments because initially I didn't think of using it or wasn't bothered. But as a web designer I can create a first iteration pretty quickly and then add my new client to a client portal give them the necessary privileges to add site comments and then work back and forth to get the website done. Compared to building on WordPress which are used to do or Adobe Muse back in the day it's a great experience it really is. Support is also a really great feature, that should not be overlooked.

So my issues with Duda are The following: There seem to be minor bugs that arise when editing for long periods although I can find workarounds using rollbacks. Store functionality is basic and really needs to be improved, once it is - I see it being a very powerful tool but right now it's kind of beta feeling. I'm very happy with the rate of updates since I have been a member/user of Duda it seems like you are very on top of adding new features. although there are some areas that I guess you are obviously working on that I'm not out or implemented yet. I do think that websites that need forms from customers work amazing. I have lost jobs due to not being able to implement highly customised stores. And prior to getting collections that was the case but this has now been resolved and the collection system is great. A quick note a big competitor of yours I think is web flow The marketing is focusing on the animated side of web design and I see that you've recently implemented new animation which in my experience after using was kind of buggy when doing a lot of it - this is an area of focus. I personally As the web designer think simple sites that work fast are great but there is a trend going on where this Apple like highly animated sites are on trend probably not that useful but on Trend. Cheers Taylor

The main problem is that I'm solving is great customer experience and fast delivery. clients feel very happy with having their own portal and branded site too. it makes them feel like they're having a proper experience for their money which is great and allows me to create great websites that work.

A lot of option and a professional look.

The price is very high. Competitively they are priced higher than others.

They offer a free site for nonprofits and I run a nonprofit. Having a professional free site allows us to showcase our organization and save on expenses.