Christine Darby // Published: August 2023 // Updated: May 2025

Squarespace Courses promise a streamlined way for individuals and small businesses to create and sell digital products—think online courses, memberships, and video libraries—all under one branded platform. The pitch is clear: turn your expertise into income.

While Squarespace suggests nearly every service provider has a course to sell, the reality is far more nuanced—and for many, misaligned with their actual goals or capacity. Creating a successful digital product requires more than just knowledge—it takes time, strategy, and the right fit between content and audience. This article breaks down the real pros and cons to help you decide if it’s worth your investment.

What Are Squarespace Courses and Digital Products?

Squarespace offers native tools for designing, hosting, and selling digital products—such as multimedia courses, memberships, video-on-demand libraries, and more—directly on your own branded domain. These tools are built into the platform, making it easy for creators and small businesses to launch digital offerings without relying on third-party integrations.

For a breakdown of plan options, transaction fees, and limitations, refer to our detailed guides on Squarespace’s pricing plans and customer payment options.

Note that functionality differs between Squarespace 7.1 and 7.0, particularly in how pages and templates support digital product delivery. Also, while Squarespace’s built-in tools offer solid ease of use and brand alignment, they don’t match the depth or flexibility of dedicated course platforms like Teachable or Kajabi. That said, for many solo creators or service businesses, Squarespace’s native offerings may be more than sufficient.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the types of digital products you can offer through Squarespace, each with different requirements and audience expectations:

Squarespace Courses is only available on version 7.1, but if your course doesn’t require sequential lessons, you can build a course using a membership site on version 7.0.
The Squarespace course builder includes sequential lessons, chapters, and progress tracking. And over time, depending on the popularity of Courses, Squarespace will likely continue to build out features that are more in line with traditional Learning Management Systems (LMS) such as the ability to release curriculum a set number of days after a student enrolls.
When you build online classes, you are promising in-depth knowledge and a structured learning experience. You’ll want to design modules, chapters, or lessons with a logical progression. Online course creation can include video lectures, written content, interactive quizzes, assignments, and supplementary materials like worksheets or reading lists.
Potential challenges with any online course are maintaining consistency, ensuring that every module offers value, and keeping your content updated.
Note, Squarespace Courses is not compatible with SCORM or xAPI standards.
Membership sites are available on both versions of Squarespace, see the latest instructions.
A Squarespace member site can be used to bundle together many different types of digital content to sell as one offer. For example, a member area could include a course, a video library, and a members-only store.
Members expect exclusivity and value in return for their commitment or subscription. This could be a mix of articles, videos, webinars, and other resources that aren't available to the general public. Membership sites include continuous updates, community engagement, and often layered content catering to different segments of the membership.
Challenges of membership models include regularly producing content to keep members engaged, curating a mix of content types, and fostering a sense of community.
A video specific page with a paywall is available on version 7.1, while on 7.0, you’ll use a gallery page or regular page inside of a Membership area.
VOD users anticipate quality and variety in video content, seeking both entertainment and informational value. An online video library might include tutorials, documentaries, episodes, or any other type of video content relevant to your target audience.
Challenges include ensuring high-quality video production, keeping content fresh and relevant, managing storage, and potentially handling licensing or copyright issues for certain types of content.
Online books offer detailed information on specific topics, divided into chapters or sections. A blog can be used to self-publish almost any type of book—novel, memoir, business book, etc. You can charge for the ebook by placing the blog in a Member Area.
A client posted their first novel using this method before moving on to self-publishing. They included interactive features like music playlists and maps to enhance the reading experience.
Business, technical, or academic books will contain diagrams, case studies, examples, and actionable steps, and can be similar to an online professional learning course. The key is to offer both in-depth theory and real-world application.
Challenges of ebooks include making your content digestible, balancing visuals with text, and ensuring the information stays relevant over time.
If using Squarespace to create a paid newsletter, you’ll use a Member Area or a Subscription product (available on the Advanced Commerce plan) alongside Squarespace Email Campaigns. This can be achieved on 7.0 or 7.1.
While newsletters don’t need to be as exhaustive as the options above, they should offer substantial value, especially if they’re paid. Newsletters can contain curated content, summaries of recent developments in your field, exclusive insights, or mini-tutorials. Depth here is about timely, relevant, and actionable content.
Challenges include staying updated with industry trends, producing content at a consistent frequency, and balancing promotional content with genuine value.
Note, if you already use Mailchimp, you can create a paid newsletter with Mailchimp.
Virtual events and summits bring together experts and enthusiasts in an online conference format. These online gatherings often feature a series of keynote speeches and panel discussions, usually focusing on a particular niche or topic.
If your event includes interactive workshops or networking sessions for attendees, then you’ll want to use dedicated online event software. But if a virtual summit consists of only pre-recorded videos and conversations, Squarespace can host this program with a little administrative setup. A client hosted a week-long virtual summit with prerecorded speakers by using two Squarespace Member Areas—one for free signups and one for paid access.
Challenges associated with hosting virtual summits include securing high-profile speakers, creating engaging content and a varied agenda, maintaining participant engagement over the duration of the event, ensuring a stable and reliable technical infrastructure, and managing time zone differences for a global audience.
Squarespace does not yet include 3rd-party community software—discussion boards and forums where students can post questions, engage in discussions, and share resources—but community-building features might roll out in the future.
Challenges of running an online community include ensuring consistent engagement, maintaining a positive and respectful environment, and moderating content to prevent misinformation and harmful behavior. The larger a group becomes, the more difficult it is to control—as The New York Times learned with its Facebook cooking community.

Pro Tip: Squarespace Courses can be paywalled or open to the public. A public course is available to search engines for crawling and indexing. If you do not want a public courses’s individual lesson pages to be indexed, learn about hiding content on Squarespace. Membership sites are not accessible to search engines.

The Appeal of Digital Courses

Diversified revenue stream: Digital products give creators a way to turn their expertise into income while diversifying beyond client work or services.
Scalability: Unlike physical classes with limited seating, online courses can be sold to an unlimited number of students without any significant additional costs.
Global reach: These products can be purchased from anywhere, giving you a global audience—provided you already have a solid distribution strategy in place with SEO content, email marketing, social, or paid ads.
Potential for recurring profits—if your topic remains stable: Once a digital product is built, some can be sold an infinite number of times without additional production costs. However, this benefit doesn’t apply if your product centers on a topic with frequent changes.
A Cautionary Example: To illustrate, when we launched in 2013, the Squarespace platform had minimal support documentation. We considered developing a “how to use Squarespace” course and watched with interest as another business implemented the idea. The issue? Their in-depth video-based course was focused on Squarespace 6.0 and within weeks of their launch Squarespace released 7.0.
The dismay experienced by the course provider was palpable. And it underscored an important point: if you build a product based around someone else’s product, you give up control over your product’s lifespan and adaptability. It could mean perpetual adjustments and amendments to your course material, negating the idea of “one-time creation, recurring profits.”

Hidden Costs and Challenges

Time-intensive creation process: Creating high-quality digital products requires a substantial upfront time commitment.
Updates and maintenance: Many digital products—particularly those tied to fast-evolving topics—demand ongoing updates to remain accurate and competitive.
Market saturation: Over the years, many creators have jumped on the digital product bandwagon, so it’s easy for your content to be lost in the noise. Standing out requires not just building an authentic course, but a unique angle and defined niche.
Loss of authenticity: As some creators become more focused on monetizing digital products, there’s a noticeable shift in priorities. The initial drive, authenticity, and ethical principles that once defined their content can get overshadowed by the lure of increased revenue.
Brand dilution: Partnering with questionable affiliates or endorsing low-quality products damages credibility long-term. This trajectory risks alienating your audience.
Revenue dependency: If your business becomes too reliant on course sales, shifts in algorithms, consumer interest, or competitor offerings can disrupt revenue.

Is Building a Course Right for You?

Subject matter expert: If you have deep knowledge in a specific field—and a clear way to teach it—you may be well-positioned to create a course that delivers real value. The most effective courses come from creators who not only understand their topic inside and out, but also have a genuine connection to the material. This authenticity translates to better engagement and trust from learners.
Established content creator: If you already have an audience—whether through a blog, newsletter, YouTube channel, or social media—you’re ahead of the curve. With healthy organic site traffic or a social media following you can validate your course idea and reduce marketing friction. That said, audience size doesn’t guarantee sales. Success depends on how well your course topic aligns with their needs and interests.
Business seeking value-add: For service-based businesses or niche product companies, digital products can serve as effective upsells or educational tools. A course might help onboard clients, deepen product usage, or simply offer a premium resource that builds brand loyalty and recurring revenue.

Who should reconsider?

Novices without a niche: If you don’t have a clear target audience or subject matter expertise, creating a course will be directionless and likely yield minimal results. Using AI to brainstorm can help, but if you’re asking ChatGPT, “What course should I build?” you’re not ready.
Those seeking quick profits: High-quality digital products require time, testing, and iteration. If you’re looking for fast income, this isn’t the path. Be especially wary of “how to build a course” programs that promise easy money but offer little substance—they profit regardless of your outcome.
Overextended businesses: If your team is already stretched thin, adding course creation, promotion, and ongoing updates to your workload may do more harm than good. Without time and focus, even great content will underperform.

What It Takes to Build a Successful Course

In the world of online courses, user-friendly platforms like Squarespace serve as accessible gateways for creators and small businesses. However, despite the perceived ease and potential benefits touted, the reality is that the market is increasingly saturated. This makes it a challenging venture, especially for those without a background in marketing or a substantial following.

Platforms and course creation mentors paint an optimistic picture, but keep in mind, they will profit regardless of whether your course succeeds or fails. Potential creators need to be aware of the realistic challenges they will face.

Furthermore, you’ll want to consider the “sunk cost fallacy,” a phenomenon where individuals continue to invest in a project due to the resources already spent, even when it might not be the most rational choice. When people invest considerable time and effort into building a product, it can be difficult to halt or withdraw it, even if it’s underperforming. Creators cling to the hope that sales might pick up in the future or feel attached to the content they created. It’s important to maintain an objective viewpoint, evaluating the current circumstances rather than being swayed by past investments.

Nonetheless, we’ve seen that creators who hone in on specific niches, offer high-quality content, and know how to reach their ideal audience have the potential to carve out a success story, even in a crowded market.

Final Thoughts

Squarespace makes it easy to launch and sell digital products—but ease of use doesn’t guarantee results. Long-term success depends on the quality of your content, the precision of your audience targeting, and the consistency of your marketing efforts.

Before committing, assess your bandwidth, subject expertise, and whether there’s genuine demand for what you want to create. Don’t confuse platform access with product viability.

And as you pursue monetization, stay grounded in the values that built your credibility. In a saturated market, authenticity and integrity are competitive advantages—cutting corners to chase revenue will cost you trust. Online courses can be a smart move, but only when backed by a well-reasoned, strategic plan.

More Resources

With Squarespace’s new course builder, there will likely be an influx of courses on “How to Build a Squarespace Course.” Yet, with video tutorials and free how-to resources available, we think DIYers are already well-equipped.

Squarespace’s support documentation includes: