Are companies starting to move away from Wordpress or is it still the go-to CMS?

[Fairground]

Hi all,

At our company, we have been utilising Wordpress as the primary platform for developing our websites over the past few years. This choice has been driven by our belief that Wordpress offers the best solution for our clients. However, we acknowledge that there are numerous other platforms in the market that can compete with Wordpress. Our hesitancy to switch to another platform lies in the uncertainty of the extent of support, updates and developer communities available for these alternative platforms.

We would like to open up a discussion to the community and pose the following question(s): Is Wordpress still considered the go-to platform for start-ups and SMEs? Or are businesses beginning to shift away from the platform? If there is indeed a move away from Wordpress, we would appreciate insights on which alternative platforms are currently preferred.

We look forward to your feedback

Kind regards
Fairground team

 

[fisicx]

Hi @Fairground and welcome to UKBF

Wordpress is as you say very popular and well supported. It's an easy way to build a website and can be customised and enhanced in thousands of way.

Most of the alternatives mean relying on someone else hosting your site with limited options to export to another platform. And very often the features you want cost extra.

If you have zero experience of building a website then site builders like squarespace, shopify and wix will do the job. But you will soon become frustrated with the lack of options and control.

All of which means Wordpress will continue to grow but many startups may look at site builders because that don't want to have to look after their own site.

As an aside, I've played with a number of alternate CMS options but migrate back to WordPress. Mainly because I make more money building WordPress themes and plugins than I do with other platforms.

 

[Shopclicks]

This choice has been driven by our belief that Wordpress offers the best solution for our clients. However, we acknowledge that there are numerous other platforms in the market that can compete with Wordpress.

It would take something pretty amazing to get me away from Wordpress as someone who builds Wordpress sites. What do you mean by 'compete'?

 

[ctrlbrk]

WordPress has consistently been the dominant CMS for a while now.

Like @Shopclicks I am puzzled by the OP.

You talk about your hesitancy but don't explain why you are considering a switch in the first place. ?

 

[Fairground]

It would take something pretty amazing to get me away from Wordpress as someone who builds Wordpress sites. What do you mean by 'compete'?

Thank you @Shopclicks for your reply, maybe compete was not the correct choice of wording. Offer an alternative would probably be a better way of putting it.

 

[fisicx]

If you want to offer your clients an alternative that’s totally up to you. But I can’t see the point.

 

[Shopclicks]

Thank you @Shopclicks for your reply, maybe compete was not the correct choice of wording. Offer an alternative would probably be a better way of putting it.

Were you thinking along the lines of - Shopify might be a good alternative to Woocommerce? Not a chance.

 

[Paul Carmen]

@Fairground an alternative to what, to what end, what are you trying to achieve?

Most SMEs don't really care about the platform, and often only know in detail if they've built or been involved in the build themselves.

When looking for a website build most companies are interested in the costs and the shiny element of the site, not the platform. The more savvy customers are interested in what it can do for them; e.g. sales, leads etc.

 

[antropy]

This choice has been driven by our belief that Wordpress offers the best solution for our clients.

Well that's a false belief, WordPress is pretty rubbish when compared to "proper" enterprise CMSs like Silverstripe or ConcreteCMS.

Is Wordpress still considered the go-to platform for start-ups and SMEs?

Unfortunately, yes it is.

Or are businesses beginning to shift away from the platform?

Unfortunately, no they are not.

Paul.

 

[Shopclicks]

Unfortunately, yes it is.

Always so negative about Wordpress but without the reasoning behind it.

 

[antropy]

Always so negative about Wordpress but without the reasoning behind it.

We gave our reasons in detail on that other post.

Paul.

 

[Shopclicks]

We gave our reasons in detail on that other post.

Sure, but it was wrong.

 

[antropy]

Sure, but it was wrong.

Oh so you've changed your story now from "we didn't give any reasons" to "we did give reasons but you disagreed but you didn't tell us why".

So you're the one not giving reasons now, interesting.

Paul.

 

[Shopclicks]

So you're the one not giving reasons now, interesting.

I don't think I need to defend the most popular platform on the planet. But if you think it's not fit for purpose, you could explain why and show examples. I'm afraid simply saying Wordpress was unusable because of speed and lack of customisability doesn't cut it when there is a plethora of evidence to the contrary.

 

[antropy]

I don't think I need to defend the most popular platform on the planet.

Of course you do, being popular doesn't mean it's good. There are over 2.2 billion Christians and 1.8 billion Muslims in the world and they can't all be right.

there is a plethora of evidence to the contrary.

If there's a plethora, where is it?

Paul.

 

[Shopclicks]

Of course you do, being popular doesn't mean it's good. There are over 2.2 billion Christians and 1.8 billion Muslims in the world and they can't all be right.

What a strange analogy. This is not a belief system. It's statistics.

If there's a plethora, where is it?

You're kidding right?

There's an example of demo Wordpress site with a demo shop in my profile. By all means take a look and come back and tell me how unusable and slow Wordpress is.

 

[fisicx]

Nobody is going to win this discussion. Nobody is going change their opinion of their preferred platform based on arguments here or anywhere else.

Wordpress pays my bills. Other platforms may be better but it’s the popularity of Wordpress that gets me new clients so I see no reason to change anything.

 

[anonuk]

Out of interest to those Wordpress gurus out there....how's Wordpress's security these days?

This is a genuine question as I had a hosting company in a previous life and was plagued by wordpress sites getting hacked so never bothered with it on my own sites. Is Wordpress/Woocommerce secure enough to compete with the likes of Prestashop?

 

[fisicx]

It can be very secure with very little effort. It’s just that many Wordpress admins don’t bother with even the basics.

Secure your server, install wordfence and have a looooong password. And don’t have admin as your username.

You can even set up 2FA.

Also work making sure your themes and plugins are safe. Cheap junk off enevato aren’t always well coded.

 

[EcomAlistair]

Hi all,

At our company, we have been utilising Wordpress as the primary platform for developing our websites over the past few years. This choice has been driven by our belief that Wordpress offers the best solution for our clients. However, we acknowledge that there are numerous other platforms in the market that can compete with Wordpress. Our hesitancy to switch to another platform lies in the uncertainty of the extent of support, updates and developer communities available for these alternative platforms.

We would like to open up a discussion to the community and pose the following question(s): Is Wordpress still considered the go-to platform for start-ups and SMEs? Or are businesses beginning to shift away from the platform? If there is indeed a move away from Wordpress, we would appreciate insights on which alternative platforms are currently preferred.

We look forward to your feedback

Kind regards
Fairground team

Webflow is a phenomenal CMS platform. I cannot imagine I will ever own a Wordpress site again.

In my digital marketing days I built Wordpress sites, but the maintenance aspect was a total pain.

Webflow works, is rapid (sub 1s page load times) and is booming. It has a great community as well.