WordPress
WordPress debuted in 2003 and is the world’s most popular content management system. It has very humble blogging beginnings, but is now said to power over 26% of all websites in the world (~75 million), and is used on 40% of all CMS based websites in the world. Due to its scalability it can be used on everything from an occasional blog, to the largest online shopping stores of multi-national corporations.
Here are some of the main advantages of WordPress:
- Support – There are millions of people using WordPress, so getting an answer to your question is very easy. You can check out WordPress support forum where you can get an answer from knowledgeable contributors.
- Easy to install – Many web hosts offer quick and automated WordPress installs. You can get a WordPress website running in five minutes or less.
- Customisation – There are more plugins and other customisations available for WordPress than any other CMS. Because of its popularity, developers and designers constantly create new WordPress tools that you can use to customise your website and make it look like a high-dollar custom website.
- Free – WordPress is absolutely free to use.
Like every other CMS, WordPress has some drawbacks. The main one is that it prevents users from making significant structural edits. Because of this, you can’t make many huge design changes on your website without the help of a developer or designer. However, this might be a good thing for the most people since it prevents them from messing up their website, so for the majority of people, WordPress is the most suitable CMS to build a website.
When it comes to learning WordPress, there are thousands of tutorials, videos, and websites out there that you can use to learn almost anything. Another place where you can ask questions is WordPress StackExchange to get an answer to your problem quickly.
Joomla
Joomla, in terms of robustness and difficulty, is somewhere between WordPress and Drupal and is the second more popular CMS. It can run a great number of websites without problems and it doesn’t require a higher level of technical knowledge to use as Drupal does. Since is the second most popular CMS, it has thousands of plugins available for you to choose from. This way, you can customise the look and feel of your website the way you want it.
Joomla is sometimes described as a middle ground choice between WordPress and Drupal. Users say that is strikes the perfect balance between user friendliness and customisation, but it is much more complex to use than WordPress. You’ll definitely need some time to get used to working in Joomla, especially if you are new to it. Some of the parts of Joomla can be complex for a beginner such as positioning modules on pages, assigning plugins to modules, configuring layouts and other tweaks that are necessary.
Let’s take a look at some of the things that Joomla is great at:
- Free – Like the other two CMS, Joomla is free to use on your own server (you can’t get it hosted for free like you can on WordPress).
- Great help portal – You can quickly ask questions and get technical support.
- Social networking – Joomla is the best choice among the three CMS if you want to create a social network. You can get your social network running quickly and easily with Joomla.
- Not too technical – Joomla is sort of in the middle between WordPress and Drupal in terms of ease of managing a website and the power it provides. You probably won’t need to contact technical support too often when using it.
Like every CMS, Joomla has some drawbacks. One of them is a learning curve. While it’s not as technical as Drupal, you’ll need to spend some time to get familiar with the platforms and all of is features. Another thing is search engine optimisation (SEO) of the website. Joomla has some SEO capabilities that you can take advantage off, but you’ll need to put in some hard work to get it fully search engine friendly (WordPress is much easier).
When you need some help, first check out their help portal, and if you don’t get your question answered, you can check their documentation.
Drupal
Drupal is the third most popular CMS today and it powers 8% of the websites who run a content management system. It’s one of the most powerful open source content management systems available and with that comes a steeper learning curve. Out of the box, Drupal is the most powerful CMS available and you’ll be fascinated by how many options it contains. Some of the options that would require custom coding in WordPress and Joomla are available right away by default in Drupal, plus you can enhance it with third-party extensions. But you have to know that it comes with additional difficulties and it can take a lot of work and patience to master.
If you want to use Drupal, then you should have at least some knowledge of common web programming languages such as HTML and PHP. There will be things like error messages and code that you’ll have to identify so knowing those languages will be of a great benefit. If later on you’d need to expand your website to something more complex, then you’ll need to hire a technical expert.
due to its relatively smaller user-base, Drupal is typically harder to find someone who has advanced knowledge of it, so keep that in mind. On the other hand, WordPress experts are easier to find and are much less expensive. You’ll also have to purchase your domain name and hosting because Drupal doesn’t allow you to host your website on their servers.
Here are a few good things about Drupal that you should know:
- Free – You can download Drupal for free and install it on your hosting
- Advanced – Among these three CMS’s, Drupal is the most technically advanced.
- Customisation – There are many available plugins for Drupal that make it easy to customise. You can also edit the root files which is important for developers.
- High performance – Pages on Drupal load more quickly when compared to Joomla or WordPress because it’s less resource-intensive so you can use it on a lower end server.
You can get support at Drupal website, as well as Stack Exchange and other popular websites.
Drupal is great for big and serious websites and for companies that can afford to hire full-time administrators and developers. For example, the White House website runs on Drupal. For smaller businesses that can’t justify that kind of ongoing expense, we recommend avoiding this option.
How To Choose The Right CMS For You
All of these content management systems have their own advantages. If you go searching on the internet in an effort to find a definitive answer you’ll run into opposing opinions on all three platforms and everyone will say that their CMS is the best, and perhaps get stuck. Like always, there’s no universal answer. The solution that is the best for you will depend on your unique situation and what exactly you need. One of the most important factors to consider when making your choice is how much time you are prepared to spend learning the platform and then maintaining it after that.
For people who are looking to quickly set up a website for their small to medium business, WordPress would ordinarily be your first choice.
Joomla might be a better choice for medium sized websites or for those who need something like social network as well.
Drupal is perhaps the best solution for very large and complex websites which will require extensive features and customisation.
Note that if you are not tech-savvy, then WordPress is probably going to be the best for you because is the easiest to set up and use.
If you go with one option then later on feel like you made the wrong choice, you should know that it’s relatively simple to switch from one to another, but you’ll have to invest some time and be very familiar with the process in order to make sure everything goes smoothly.
Regarding the available languages, Drupal takes the top spot even though is not as widely used as WordPress and Joomla. Drupal has 100 available languages, compared to 62 on WordPress and 66 on Joomla.
In terms of security, Joomla has been reported to be the most secure, Drupal is moderately secure, while WordPress has been indicated to be the least secure of the three, based on the user rankings. On the other side, the security of WordPress plugins and extensions were reported to be the most secure. Drupal user rankings show that its plugins, modules, and extensions happen to be the least secure.
Joomla and Drupal are both template based CMS platforms and are built by programmers and not designers who have branding, marketing, and design expertise. Because of the way they were built, there is no real emphasis on branding features, but it is possible to create a site with unique branding using these platforms. It is a more time-consuming process to do so when compared to WordPress.
Both Joomla and Drupal have generally complex and sometimes confusing dashboard because they have been built by programmers who didn’t really put the usability effort into developing these platforms. This is one reason more for which most people opt to use WordPress instead.
CONCLUSION
Making a right choice is not easy so you have to bear in mind what kind of website you need. What is your overall budget? Do you plan to work with a professional web developer or your own level of expertise? The best choice for most people is WordPress, and the massive WordPress market share is testament to this assertion. It’s really easy to add new content and there are lots of free plugins and layouts that you can use to tweak your website in all possible ways without needing to know how to code in any programming language. WordPress also receives many security updates regularly which is very important.
Go with WordPress, chances are you’ll never leave. It has a massive and vibrant community and it will very likely satisfy the needs of almost any individual or business. WordPress also provides great SEO out the box and it can handle the majority of uses at any scale.
Some Quikclicks clients that have chosen WordPress as the CMS platform for their new business websites are below. They cover a wide range of industries for small business:
- Colour Life Painting are the painters of choice for House Painters North Shore.
- Dent8 Dental is a holistic dentist in Taringa, Brisbane. Dr Alannah Freer is a Holistic Dentist Brisbane. She provides BPA-free, fluoride-free and mercury-free dentistry.
- CJ Building Consultants – your trusted partner for all building inspection needs, specialising in pre purchase inspections.
- Jewell Hancock Employment Lawyers are a full service employment law firm exclusively for employees and can assist with any workplace issue facing an employee. Employment Lawyers Melbourne
- Scent Central elevates brands through the unique Science of Aroma Marketing and scent marketing.
- Pumpmates is the largest supplier of Blue Diamond pumps for air conditioners
