Have you ever given a second thought to your CMS of choice? Is it really the best option out there, and were you right in making that choice? In the digital world, CMS is the core system of your online presence and you should ask yourself these questions.
CMS helps you with the creation of the platform to present your content and it doesn’t stop there. It also helps you with managing your overall online presence.
When speaking of CMS, it is impossible not to mention WordPress. It currently hosts over 560 million websites, making it the leader in the market. With its ease of use and numerous possibilities, it doesn’t seem like the situation is going to take a downward turn.
But, recently, as the market grew, there are several alternatives that are quickly gaining in popularity. Let’s take a look at a few other CMS platforms, and more importantly, let’s see where they stand when it comes to WordPress.
Joomla
Joomla made an entrance into the market right after WordPress. It is important to notice its growth, which has been steady and, unfortunately, not very phenomenal. The prices of plugins are almost the same. Joomla is more tech-savvy when compared to WordPress, and it takes the important user-friendly factor away. Joomla seems to be useable only by hardcore professionals, considering its steep learning curve. A novice should try the hands-on approach with WordPress – he or she will surely come up with a website.
Working on Joomla will definitely be easier for a professional web developer, and it is no wonder that they tend to choose Joomla over WordPress. The biggest issue there arrives after the development, when the client, who is unlikely a developer, too, has to deal with the admin page.
The plethora of plugins offered by WordPress is something you won’t find with any other CMS on the market. For your content to score well with Google, you will need a flexible and easy to use Content Creation Kit. The marketplace and plugin database of Joomla is limited. It does not have anything similar, and this is where WordPress scores.
Speaking of the price, all of these CMS are open-sourced and mostly free for installation. What users have to pay for are mostly premium plugins. However, with Joomla, every version upgrade comes with a new feature. It, in some cases, might be an additional cost for the owner of the website. Joomla aims for the pocket more often than its counterparts, and many users can find this slightly annoying.
Drupal
The longest on the market, Drupal has been operational longer than most of the CMS platforms mentioned here. Yet its rise has not been as sensational as WordPress. Drupal is made to deliver high performance, and it has a major dependency on hardware. Meaning that, while it saves you on your server costs, it is more complex than WordPress and Joomla. So anyone attempting to build the website themselves will have to dedicate a lot more time to it.
Therefore, Drupal is not for making regular websites or blogs – there are simpler solutions out there. It is for bigger, more code involving, more content inclusive and interactive websites, which is why big enterprises consider Drupal as their CMS of choice. Apart from its complexity, the most important thing that is dragging Drupal to the bottom of the rankings is its lack of adaptability. Namely, when it comes to accepting the advancement of technology and its appreciation towards the contributors of this open-source platform.
What’s more, the theme library of Drupal is miserable, compared to that of WordPress. While other CMS have themes in thousands (and they keep on making more!) Drupal barely has close to 600 themes. Considering this limit of options, you would think that Drupal would be easy to master. Quite on the contrary, it takes longer for an individual with limited coding knowledge to set up a website with Drupal than with other CMS options. This is not the case with WordPress, where page building and customization are way easier.
Lastly, let’s not forget the hardships that Drupal encounters with 3rd party plugins. This causes these CMS-based websites to slow down, and considering the shortening attention span of today’s visitors, nobody has the patience for that.
Squarespace
Squarespace is a drag-and-drop website builder. Much like WordPress, this CMS is created for individuals with limited or no coding knowledge. While getting started with it is rather easy, editing might be a bit tricky to handle. When compared to WordPress, which allows you endless possibilities for customization with fonts, colors, blocks, backgrounds, header, footer, sidebar and so on, Squarespace has many restrictions to your creative intuition.
Another thing that deserves a call-out is that Squarespace does not cooperate well with plugins. It depends completely on its built-in features which will massively restrict your website’s functionality. Considering the SEO compatibility as an integral part of a website nowadays, Squarespace doesn’t come close to WordPress as plugins and tools are decrepit and not very user-friendly.
Now WordPress undoubtedly has a habit of keeping its user up to date with frequent updates, which is something Squarespace has not been able to do. Squarespace is a sweet spot for hackers due to its popularity, and it suffers even more hacks than WordPress. Its support in case of such an accident is, at best, average compared to WordPress. The most important aspect, and probably a deal-brakes is that it is more expensive than its major competitors.
Wix
Wix is very simple and straightforward to use, with a perfect name. This simplicity is one of the most important reasons why Wix is gaining popularity, apart from the annoying YouTube ads. Now, why this popularity is not long-lasting? Ads, again. Unfortunately, you have to pay extra and get a premium plan to get rid of the ads.
Wix is not as flexible as you would probably need it to be. How can this lack of flexibility be harmful? To start with, you don’t get access to the source code – this will limit your backend coding completely. While you might not consider this to be a deal-breaker, as it is intended for non-developers, the template editing options are as rare as the Vaquita Dolphins, too. You basically get what you get, and you gotta swim with it. Navigation is also limited to steps, and so this crucial aspect of user experience is limited as well. Websites with deeper navigation have no business with Wix and should look for another option.
Also, Wix lacks any built-in analytics. Basically, it makes it unsuitable for bloggers as the page tends to get bloated. Unlike self-hosted WordPress sites, Wix mostly uses subdomains. This further restricts the admin’s control of the website. Lastly, if Wix does not find your website complying with their terms, they will take it down and you won’t have a say on it.
Wix can be the right choice for beginners, but if you are a professional, then Wix will limit your creative possibilities to a great extent.
Trust us – stick with WordPress
Content Management Systems are on the rise and racing towards technological soundness. Looking into the above alternatives, which are capturing quite a chunk of the market, you can say that WordPress is the supreme ruler of the realm, and not be wrong.
Whether it’s about the editing flexibility, theme library, plugin array, or more distinctive features, WordPress takes the medal. When it comes to SEO compatibility, documentation, support and price, WordPress is miles ahead of others. By the looks of its feature list, market share, reach, preference and affordable pricing it is a crystal clear conclusion that competitors will have to upscale fast to match to the benchmark that is set by WordPress.
You can always look into other CMS before finalizing the platform for your website. Depending on your need and skills, you might consider an alternative to be better. However, the chances that other CMSs will please you the way WordPress would is very slim, and here’s to hoping you will realize that before you waste ages and money on the alternatives!