What Are the Best CMS Content Management Systems for My Website?
If you’re thinking about creating or updating your website, this article will be very useful for you because you’ll learn about the most well-known content management systems and their main features so you can choose the most appropriate one for your project or business.
As a gift, at the end, we share the most popular plugins from the WordPress store (one of our favorite content management systems) that will make your website more complete and give it special functionalities.
Keep reading…
Part I – What Are Digital Content Management Systems?
Content management systems or CMS (Content Management Systems), are software used to create, edit, and publish content on the internet.
The goal of these systems is to provide a user-friendly interface that allows you to update your website’s design, images, and texts.
But that’s not all you need to get your website online; besides a good content management system, you also need:
- Domain: a unique name that will identify your website on the internet. For example, our domain is www.tropicodigital.com
- Hosting: the place where all the information that will be on your website (text, images, videos…) is stored, allowing users to access it.
Part II – Types of Content Management Systems
Below, you’ll find the most recognized content management systems
Joomla:
It is an open-source content management system that works with modules. Installing it is easy and free; you can also access a good number of plugins and templates to create a functional and aesthetic website.
It is widely used for intranets, community portals, information portals, magazines, newspapers, robust forums, among others.
Disadvantages: technical handling is more complex than other CMS, as is SEO.
Complexity 4
Drupal:
This content management system is open-source, so all functionalities are completely free, it is flexible and designed for SEO.
Drupal is ideal if you want to create a robust system with many functionalities, for example: virtual stores, online educational systems, large organization websites, etc.
Another advantage is that it supports a higher volume of visits compared to CMS like WordPress.
Disadvantages: if you are looking for a friendly and intuitive content management system, Drupal is not your best option, you need to have knowledge of PHP and SQL.
Another negative point is that you need to check if the hosting where you are going to host your website is compatible with this CMS.
Complexity 4
Moodle:
It is also an open-source content management system, which means it is free to download, modify, and distribute.
This system is exclusively designed for free course platforms. It has sections for creating courses, conducting evaluations, creating student and teacher accounts, etc.
Disadvantages: it is not a very user-friendly platform from a visual and functional standpoint. To create a good website with this CMS, you need to know programming (PHP and SQL).
Complexity 3
Prestashop:
Now we’ll get into the specifics of e-commerce or virtual stores.
This platform, like the previous ones, works with PHP programming frameworks.
An advantage is that they have active and participative communities for all help-related material. It is also a secure CMS.
It is one of the most used platforms in the world, evidently very good.
Disadvantages: you might need to invest more money if you want a good template and more specialized plugins. Its URLs are not as friendly as other platforms and if you want good SEO configuration, you probably need to hire a programmer.
Complexity: 3
Shopify:
It is a highly demanded content management system for e-commerce.
With it, you can configure multiple payment gateways, add product details, manage traffic, and ensure all payment security.
It is very common to use Shopify for businesses like dropshipping.
Disadvantages: even with easily uploadable templates and catalogs, you need to have some knowledge of PHP programming and many functionalities that are free on other platforms may require payment here.
Complexity:
Opencart:
It is one of the newest content management systems, but its popularity and demand have been growing rapidly because it has many modules, extensions, and themes to create quick and easy-to-use websites.
Its admin is very simple.
Disadvantages: being so new, its community is not very large, making it difficult to solve basic problems; but Opencart offers free support, what more can you ask for?
Complexity
This eCommerce management system is widely used worldwide and has approximately the same age as Prestashop, but it is the simplest and most intuitive of all those mentioned above.
Its product and configuration capacity and possibilities are extensive. It also uses microservices to help complete tasks or functions.
Disadvantages: if you choose to set up your website on Magento, you need a very powerful server. The usage license has a cost.
Complexity
WordPress
And our list ends with WordPress
Probably at Trópico, we have a bit of a preference for this content management system
We are not the only ones saying it, it has plenty of arguments to compete with other content management systems and the best part is that you don’t need to know programming to create a good website.
It is ideal for creating websites and blogs. With the help of plugins (most of them free and of high quality), you can easily implement online stores, course platforms, among other functionalities.
Here are
3 of the Best Plugins Your WordPress Website Should Have
- Woocommerce: has over 15 million downloads and despite working under PHP programming language, it allows you to have an online store in less than 20 minutes. It is very intuitive and easy to use.
- Thrive Architect: is quite easy to use, allows campaign integrations, such as Landing Pages, Building Quizzes and Courses, among other functionalities.
- Elementor: this is our second ally, I have also had the opportunity to use it and it is really very easy to use. So if you’re not a graphic designer.
Now that you have all this knowledge, you can choose the most suitable content management system to “build” your website.
If you have any questions or still haven’t decided which one to choose or, more importantly: what digital strategy is most effective for your business, schedule a consultation call with us. IT’S A VERY REVEALING APPOINTMENT! and the best part, it’s free 😉
