CMS is a great tool for businesses and is being used by more than 64 million active websites at the moment. Users don't need to write website code from scratch to develop websites or manage their content when using a CMS. However, choosing the incorrect CMS platform when building a website would only make things more challenging.
There are currently thousands of content management systems in the market, and the number is rising. So, if you want to choose one for your business then your decision must take into account the purpose and breadth of the website because each CMS platform has a distinct target market and offers a variety of features.
In this article, we will detail 12 of the top CMS platforms, along with their features and advantages, to assist you in selecting the most suitable CMS for your business. But before we do that, let’s understand what CMS is in detail.
A content management system (CMS) is a piece of software that manages the foundational elements of building web pages. With a CMS, users may concentrate on the front-end features of website development, such as managing content and modifying the website appearance.
In a normal scenario, programming languages like HTML, JavaScript, and CSS are used to create web pages. You would need to master these languages and write a lot of code if you wanted to construct a website without using a CMS platform. However, by enabling you to create a website without writing code or understanding programming, CMS solutions address this issue and give you the choice to create a website without having to do any coding.
Understandably, many organizations and freelancers don’t have the time to learn HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to completely code a website. This is where website builders and CMS platforms come into the picture. With these tools, you can quickly and effectively build a personalized website that offers smooth interactions for both users and visitors on the front end. Both these tools, website builders and CMS platforms, have built-in features, pre-designed templates, and extensions for building a custom website without coding or even having a basic understanding of coding, but they take quite different methods to build and run websites.
Use a website builder if you want web hosting and tools for creating websites all in one location. With a website builder, all you have to do is purchase a custom domain, and after that, you can construct sophisticated multimedia sites with cutting-edge components like animations and scroll effects and alter the way your website looks. Your hosting platform will take care of your site's upkeep, security, backups, and other issues while you concentrate on the design and content. However, you have to give up some flexibility to have this ease of usage. Website builders don't have the comprehensive functionality, content management tools, or customization choices that CMS platforms do. Because of this, agencies, artists, restaurants, and other user types wishing to quickly create image-rich websites should consider using website builders.
Related: Hiring a Web Designer or Using a Website Builder? (esearchlogix.com)
Consider a CMS for features and customization possibilities that are more advanced. With a CMS, you may totally customize the look and feel of your website, include multimedia in your articles, categorize and tag your content, control multiple users, alter the source code of your website, and much more. Creating and managing a bigger, more complicated site that can expand over time will be possible, even though the setup and launch of your site will take more time.
So, if you’re a business that has the time to spare and wants to invest in a website where you could have more control, then you must go with a CMS platform.
There’s no point in choosing a platform that does not align with your vision for your website or requires a huge amount of effort from your end. The role of a CMS platform is to make your life easier and at the same time offer services that could make your website stand out. Thus, it becomes essential you take extra care while choosing the platform to help you build and maintain your website. Here are a few points that you must always consider while looking for a CMS Platform.
When choosing a CMS, ease of use is an important consideration because it has a significant impact on employees' adoption and workflow. If you have a platform, it makes sense that all your team members who have access to the platform should find it simple to use.
To break it down even further, understand that everyone in your company, from content marketers to developers, will be working in the CMS backend. So, you require CMS capabilities that facilitate the completion of each of these team members' regular tasks.
Although customizability might come after usability, an ideal CMS should deliver on both. When assessing a CMS, consider the customization possibilities that are already integrated into the dashboard, the number of accessible extensions, and whether you can edit the source code.
The majority of CMS platforms enable you to select a pre-designed theme and tailor it to your brand if you need to build a website with the least amount of development resources possible. To add more sophisticated features to your site, many CMS platforms also provide coding choices if you employ a developer.
You require a platform that will safeguard your users, content, and front-end visitors. Think about the platform's role and the role you'll play in securing your site while comparing various options.
These are merely a handful of inquiries to make when comparing various CMS platforms. As a general rule, you need a platform with strong security policies, tools, and people in place to keep your site safe for you if you don't have the time or are unfamiliar with best practices for safeguarding your site.
Almost every decision that you make for your company involves a certain budget. So, you should go for a CMS solution that satisfies the needs of your business, the expectations of your visitors, and your company’s budget.
Fortunately, many platforms offer many tiers of services with resources that scale up at each price point. Similar to customization options, these upgrade options show that the CMS can expand as your business expands.
Examining the CMS system's current clientele, which includes well-known businesses or rivals, is another excellent technique to whittle down the available options.
A CMS's features may be important and able to develop with a growing business if reputable brands in your industry and others comparable to yours use it. Even if you already use a CMS, you can feel that it isn't helping you achieve your objectives or you might want to follow the CMS tactics of other well-known companies.
WordPress, which was first introduced as blogging software, has grown to become the most widely used CMS ever. The open-source platform is frequently used in the publishing and blogging industries as it mainly focuses on editorial features like articles and blog postings. It can prove to be quite beneficial for smaller firms who are just developing their web strategy or have less knowledge of design as its interface and website themes are extremely easy to use.
Moreover, WordPress also offers a variety of plugins and other customizing options if you're a tech-savvy web editor or developer who wants to add tweaks to your site.
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Downloading WordPress is free because it is open-source software. However, if you want to use premium plugins or themes, you will need to pay for a domain name, hosting, and more.
Drupal is a highly popular open-source content management system that is especially suitable for large communities of developers, marketers, and agencies. The CMS enables developers to design sites that can manage massive amounts of data and high traffic or allows marketers with less advanced skills to establish a site from a template.
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Drupal is open-source software that is also available for free download. However, for non-technical users, in particular, the costs of creating and maintaining a Drupal site are significantly higher than those of WordPress.
Joomla is an open-source CMS platform that’s used by over 2% of websites. The basic software of Joomla provides greater capabilities than any other CMS platform, like its multilingual features. However, it has a steeper learning curve, and the first setup can be quite difficult for non-technical people. It's also perfect for developing content that may be highly customized. If there isn't a lot of text on your website, Joomla might be a better choice for you to think about.
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To establish and maintain a Joomla site you'll need to pay for domain registration, hosting, themes, and maintenance. In general, Joomla sites cost more to host and design than WordPress sites but less than Drupal sites.
Shopify is one of the best CMS platforms out there for eCommerce websites. It is a website builder and content management system all-in-one with integrated payment processing for online sales. The software includes a CMS in addition to features for brand development, online marketplace selling, social network selling, and processing in-person sales using Shopify POS. The platform is simple to use and doesn't call for any programming or development expertise. With Shopify, you can create and manage eCommerce content if you know how to use the internet.
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Shopify packages include web hosting, an SSL certificate, and a Shopify subdomain. A custom domain is an extra expense that you will incur.
Basic plan- $29/per month, Shopify plan- $79/per month, Advanced plan- $299/per month
CMS Hub by HubSpot is made to make it simple for businesses to create and maintain websites that are responsive to every device and visitor. You can also capture leads, do A/B testing, make email campaigns, and track contact-level analytics directly in your dashboard because the CMS Hub incorporates HubSpot's marketing, sales, and service capabilities.
Also keep in mind that since CMS Hub Professional includes HubSpot's CRM built-in, you can use smart content to produce different iterations of your website pages, landing pages, emails, and forms based on the certain contact information you have stored.
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CMS Hub Professional costs $300 a month and is intended for businesses with rapid expansion. CMS Hub Enterprise costs $900 a month and can be used to set up two brand domains, a customized CDN configuration, serverless services, and more.
Magento, an eCommerce platform owned by Adobe, offers virtually limitless options for tech-savvy business owners who want to advance their online purchasing experience. It also offers the option to develop a progressive web app for your online business. Although Magento is adaptable and has strong security, it is also difficult for non-technical individuals to use. To set it up, you’ll probably need some technical knowledge (or you’ll have to hire someone who has that knowledge).
Although Magento has two variations—Magento Open Source and Magento Commerce—we'll concentrate on the self-hosted version in the following sections.
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It costs nothing to download and use Magento Open Source. The expenses of domain registration and hosting are around the same when compared to WordPress, however, the costs of premium apps and themes are more for a Magento site. You're also more likely to need to work with a developer to aid with the setup and customization process if you choose Magento over WordPress because it's a more complicated platform.
Magnolia is a headless, all-in-one solution for managing multi-channel, multi-site, and multi-language experiences. Customers have the option to choose between cloud service and client service. While the client-hosted option enables businesses to have custom Java development and integration on their infrastructure, the cloud-based service enables them to execute projects rapidly without having DevOps or IT assistance.
Magnolia is not as straightforward as compared to other CMS programs. Magnolia provides several tutorials to help newcomers get up to speed to help combat this. In addition, whether you choose client service or cloud computing has an impact on how simple something is to use.
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Magnolia uses a quote-based pricing methodology based on the specific requirements of your company. To get a custom quotation, you'll need to speak with them directly for a consultation.
Optimizely has been constantly increasing the tools available to marketers while still being most known for its A/B testing features. The Optimizely content cloud was developed by combining the two companies' strengths after being acquired by Episerver recently. This platform gives developers a way to swiftly design and launch new pages and websites while also enabling editors to create and distribute aesthetically appealing material with ease.
This CMS is flexible and adaptable by design because it lacks a head. As a result, Optimizely is capable of supporting an infinite number of platforms and layouts.
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Although Optimizely offers a number of plan choices, you must speak with them directly to obtain a pricing. All package features interact with one another, a single package could not offer all the functionality you need.
Another well-liked CMS platform for small to medium-sized eCommerce shops is PrestaShop. It is a very adaptable platform for managing online stores because of its vibrant community and extensive feature set. Additionally, its extensive interface makes it simple to enter and track products.
PrestaShop is an open-source platform which is beneficial as it means you can change the code of the main software and use it for free. But that also means that before you can begin building up your store, you need to select a hosting company. Before utilizing an FTP client to upload the software to your server, you'll also need to construct a database.
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PrestaShop can be downloaded and used without charge, however, it is not a cost-free e-commerce solution. A custom domain, hosting, and an SSL certificate (if not already included in your hosting plan) are extra expenses. To link other software applications with your online business, you'll probably need to buy a number of premium modules, including a security module.
Typo3 offers excellent scalability, making it suitable for enterprise-level websites. It stands out because it divides the management interface from the web front-end. Thus, it is more difficult for hackers to interface with the functionality of the websites. Lufthansa Group, a major airline corporation, uses an illustration of a Typo3-based website which allows bilingual visitors to the website to read the most recent news and browse for job openings.
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Hiring a developer or agency to assist with the process represents the largest cost of creating and maintaining a TYPO3 website. The good news is that TYPO3's website has qualified support available. The bad news is that depending on the length and breadth of the web project, the cost can range from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars.
The best option for folks who aren't tech savvy or beginners is CrownPeak's CMS. The CMS can do anything its more complex competitors can accomplish, despite the interface being completely foolproof. Companies have freedom in how they integrate the hybrid headless CMS into their current systems. Simple clicks will allow you to quickly develop and publish new articles, pages, and workflows.
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CrownPeak only offers quotes for its prices. To acquire recommendations for the best items, you'll need to get in touch with them and arrange a call so they can learn more about your specific business needs.
When it comes to finding a CMS platform for enterprise companies, there is no match for Contentful. Contentful as a CMS makes it extremely easy for businesses to develop and manage their digital content in a particular place and then deliver it to multiple digital channels with the help of tools for creating, editing, and managing content and also an API to ship the content.
One of the main goals of Contentful is to provide both the flexibility that developers require and the content management functionality that marketers demand.
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There are three price categories offered by Contentful: one for free users, one for teams starting at $489 per month, and one for enterprise businesses. You'll need to get in touch with the seller for a precise price for the enterprise tier.
As we've seen, a content management system (CMS) enables you to manage your content and transform it into a website without constantly editing code. While some of these tools are almost entirely devoted to assisting you in the launch of a website, others are more concerned with just managing your content and enabling you to publish it anywhere via APIs (the headless CMS approach). Your ideal platform will provide the CMS features you require, enhance your team's content management skills, and ultimately let you give your website's visitors a pleasant experience.
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