When choosing a CMS (Content Management System) for hosting your blog, you are faced with a range of excellent options. In this article, we’ll briefly describe the main platforms, and give a tentative recommendation based on our own experience.
We hasten to add that “experience” is the important word there. Once you’ve amassed a few thousand hours working on a particular CMS, there’s a good chance that you can wring a lot more capabilities out of it than you could if you switched to another – at least in the short term. But if you’re starting from scratch, some are undoubtedly easier to pick up, and more powerful, than others.
WordPress
WordPress is the most widely used CMS for blogs and offers a user-friendly interface with a vast selection of themes and plugins. It provides flexibility, scalability and a thriving community for support.
Make sure you know the differences between wordpress.com and wordpress.org, however. In short, for .org, you need a hosting package and then to download and install it (or use your host’s one-click install feature).
Thereafter, you are responsible for all updates, security and maintenance. With .com, the hosting and updates are handled by WordPress itself. It can be free, but you pay for extra capabilities.
Joomla
Joomla offers a balance between flexibility and ease of use. It has a user-friendly interface that makes content management and site administration relatively straightforward. Joomla also provides extensive customisation options, allowing users to create complex websites with advanced functionality. Finally, it has a strong community support system, offering resources, extensions and templates for you to enhance your website.
Drupal
Drupal is a powerful and highly flexible CMS that offers advanced content management capabilities.
It can handle complex websites and large amounts of content with ease. Drupal provides robust security features, ensuring a secure platform for your blog. It also has a highly active and supportive community that contributes to its continuous development and offers extensive documentation and modules for enhanced customisation and functionality.
Ghost
Ghost CMS is specifically designed for blogging, providing a streamlined and distraction-free writing environment. It is known for its simplicity and ease of use, allowing bloggers to focus solely on content creation.
Ghost offers fast performance and optimised loading times, ensuring an excellent user experience. Additionally, it provides built-in SEO features, making it easier to optimise your blog for search engines.
Online publishing platforms
As well as wordpress.com, there are other online blogging platforms that require no downloads – you just create an account, log in and get blogging. Among the most popular are Blogger (owned by Google), Medium and Substack. However, if you want to be a little more creative, you can build a site on Wix, Weebly, Squarespace or such like, as they also support blogging.
Which is the best?
While all of these CMS options have their merits, WordPress is often considered the best CMS for hosting a blog. Its popularity means it has a vast community of developers, designers and users who contribute to its ongoing development, provide extensive support, and create an extensive library of themes and plugins.
WordPress offers a user-friendly interface, excellent SEO capabilities and a wide range of customisation options. It is also suitable for various blog sizes, from personal blogs to large-scale professional websites.
If you need help setting up a WordPress blog or migrating to or from the platform, we can help. Leave a message or give us a call and we’ll get you up and running.
