A CMS Makes It Easy To Build A Site And Maintain The Content
A content management system often called a CMS, is a system that makes it easy for non-techies to organize and manage their web content and their website. This is great because it makes it easy to build and maintain a website. And they are affordable and in many cases free of charge.
Do not confuse a content management system with a website builder as these are quite different. While you get a drag and drop editor with most website builders versus a CMS like WordPress’s WYSIWYG editor, you get less control over content and Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).
In short, a good CMS can both build the website and the content while a website builder is good at building the site and not as good at content creation and maintenance.
CMS’s can be found as free open source programs or can cost many thousands of dollars for commercial proprietary products. You have the choice of WordPress, Joomla, and Magneto for example that are available free of charge.
I recommend WordPress since it is by far the most widely used and supported CMS available, used by large companies down to family sites. There are tons of theme templates and add-ons available for free as well to make the building and maintaining of your site a breeze. And again it’s free.
WordPress is a free blog and CMS software
WordPress is an open source (free) blog software and a very good CMS at the same time. It makes it easy for anyone to setup, maintain and manage a website without advanced training in website development. Since WordPress is open source it is maintained by a huge community of developers constantly improving the system and adding features by means of software plugins.
WordPress lets you create pages (standalone content) and posts (time driven content) to build out your site. You can manage the look and feel of your site by using themes. These are custom designs that control how things are laid out and organized. WordPress is highly customizable so it can be used for any type of website.
WordPress is the most used CMS in the world
Over 60 million people have chosen WordPress to power their sites from mom and pop businesses right up to large corporations. WordPress has a market share of over 59% of the CMS market. Its closest rivals are far behind. Joomla is second with about 6% share, then Drupal at 5% and Blogger/Magneto at 3%. The rest of the market is made up of a long list of others.
So when you embark on building a website you will have made the best technical decision in choosing WordPress. I have tried both Joomla and Drupal and they are both a lot harder to master than WordPress.
I hope you can now see what is a content management system and why you should use one
If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below or contact me by email. I would like to hear from you and help you. I try to respond within 24 hours.
Mike Gaudreau founder of The Wealthy Boomers
This is very informative. Especially, your explanation of the differences between CMS and Website Builder. It is excellent. Also, the data supporting WordPress as the most used CMS in the world is great.
Thank you!
Regards,
Edwin.
Edwin,
Thank you for your feedback. I am happy that this article provided some useful information. I have been using WordPress for five years now. I also have used Webly and Wix and dabbled with Drupal and Joomla. WordPress merits being Number 1.
Mike G.