Square Online vs. Weebly

[odddogcoffee]

Hello,

I am extremely confused about the difference between Square Online and Weebly.  I have had a Weebly store in the past for online retail purposes, but have since moved that site to a Shopify setup.  In any case, my physical store (coffee shop) uses Square POS, and I am wanting to create an online menu for users to place an order for pickup.  The goal will be to integrate those orders with Square KDS as well as automatic receipt printing through Square POS.  

The reason I am confused is because every time I click on the "Online" button from my square dashboard, it takes me to a list of options (Retail, Physical Products, Menu Items, etc).  I click "Menu Items", select "Pickup Only" on the next screen, and then I receive a strange screen that says 

"Early Access Only for New Users"  Eventually clicking around here and there I ended up back at Weebly, but Weebly seems better placed for eCommerce, not on-demand pickup orders.

Is Square Online a new feature?  I thought it had been around for years.  I'm just looking for some guidance as to how to go about setting up an online menu that will integrate with the Square POS products I currently use and hope to use in the future.  

Thanks

Mike

[Abigails_stl]

When I started my website 2 years ago, it was "powered by Weebly" ... and if I go to weebly.com it automatically logs me into my site, but if I click on "online" from my square dashboard, it takes me to square.online but that little "W" is still up there in the nav bar. It seems like little by little things are being more integrated into making it truly just square online. I will say it is pretty easy to use and we have definitely used it for a lot of pick up orders in the last 2 years... both on demand and future. You can set that all up in your settings on square.online by choosing how many orders you can handle in a specific timeframe. 

We are a retail store but like I said, we needed to pivot to curbside pick-up during the pandemic and square.online allowed us to do that. We even just added on demand delivery powered by doordash. 

[odddogcoffee]

That's helpful to know, thanks for your quick response Abigail.  You're probably not going to be able to answer this question, but based on your response a follow up I'm hoping Square Support will clarify is:

After getting stuck on that "Early Access Only for New Users" screen a few times, I gave in and went to my old Weebly account to see if I could punch around and see if the Square Online builder had moved to the Weebly builder altogether.  Not exaclty clear on that, but I DID see that I could arrange "Pickup" options.  Curiously, in order to arrange for pickup orders, I am required to upgrade my weebly plan.  This is not what it says here, where there's a free option

Square Online (squareup.com)

Secondarily, @Abigails_stl are you managing your "available for orders" settings through the Square App?  It doesn't look like I have any options from my iPad to manage or even access "Online" settings, it would appear I'd have to do that from a web browser or laptop.  

[Abigails_stl]

We pay the minimum (I think its $30 a month) for the Weebly/Square online site. So that may be a function that is available only with paying. And I can toggle on and off "available for orders" on my square.online (weebly) site (When I click on "online" from my squareup back office site it takes me directly to weebly) and I can put in the settings to preset it for days/times/quantity we can handle per period.

It looks like I can only turn it on and off from the website not from any of my apps.

[odddogcoffee]

Thanks for the insights Abigail.  I took a closer look and, in moving forward to “upgrade” from the fulfillment tab, there was not even an indication as to which plan would have given me the pickup option.  It was two clicks deeper.  I’m not opposed to paying for it, but I am mostly just concerned about launching the site from the Weebly environment and then learning that integrations like auto-receipt prints and Square KDS would not work, as that is my entire goal.  An integrated ticket system that allows online ordering.  I assume it would work, but nothing in the Weebly documentation or square dashboard gives me a ton of confidence about it.

Another angle I took and here is where I succeeded in launching (or even being able to access) the Square.online dashboard:  I just signed up for a new square account. So it seems I succeeded.  But I find it utterly ridiculous that the vast community of loyal sellers are currently blocked out of this functionality, or that there isn’t clearer documentation for how to navigate the difference between square.online and Weebly.  

I know you were trying to be helpful and aren’t square, I’m just putting this up here on the thread in case others come across the same issue