Did you know that WordPress is responsible for over 25% of the world’s websites and over 50% of the content management systems out there? That’s around 75 million different sites. Woah!
So when clients ask us what’s the best platform to use, why do we always say WordPress? The size is only one aspect.
1. Flexible & Customisable
WordPress is built with the average user in mind but doesn’t hold you back if you’re a designer of developer. There are multiple ways to customise a WordPress site, from purchasing an off-the-shelf theme, through to writing your own CSS in a child theme. There are literally no limits to what is possible, which means you are future-proofing your content.
We’ve seen it time and time again… a client built their own site using one of the monthly subscription website builders, then just one year down the track they hit a ceiling and their content has to be migrated over to a more professional – and customisable – CMS.
TOP TIP: Research any theme thoroughly before purchasing!
2. 40,000+ Plugins
From visual composing plugins, to interactive slideshow headers, e-learning platforms, SEO do-it-alls, and social media feeds, there are literally tens of thousands of free and paid plugins out there. They are easy to research and install through WordPress’ standard plugin dashboard, and simple to update.
And if you can’t find the exact plugin you require, there are thousands of WordPress Developers available around the world, ready to build one specially designed for your needs.
TOP TIP: Read the reviews on any plugin you are about to install and check when it was updated last.
3. Open Source
Open source? You mean free right? Yep, WordPress is 100% free and open source. This is the main reason why there are so many WordPress Developers out there creating the plethora of plugins. Most hosting companies even off a one-click direct install for WordPress, to keep things super-simple.
This does of course create a few challenges too, such as security. Fortunately, the WordPress team are constantly updating their code based on security threats as well as usability and functionality upgrades.
TOP TIP: Update your WordPress site REGULARLY! And have you hosting provider run nightly back-ups of your site just in case.
4. Multi-Lingual Capabilities
Out of the packet, WordPress is translated into 50-odd languages already. But that’s the back-end system, not the front-end content the user sees. We’ve created a few multi-lingual sites in our time and have found the WPML plugin to be extremely powerful, for both creating the second-language content initially and also managing this content going forward.
TOP TIP: Take your time with content translation and have multiple translators check over it before going live.
5. The Sheer Size
According to W3Tech, WordPress the CMS (content management system) used for over 50% of the world’s websites. That’s a hefty number!
If that many people are using it, doesn’t that tell you something? Even CNN uses WordPress.
TOP TIP: Turn off the comments functionality if you don’t want to manage the spam. Just like we do!