How well is your website working for you?

++this is not a paid endorsement++
++I do not work for WordPress++
++ these opinions are my own++ 

When I started editing websites I learned MediaWiki, because it was really easy to create new pages, and you could make your own structure. This was a great fit both with the way my brain works, and with the project I was working on at the time.

Then I started working on other peoples’ projects, and I learned the content management systems they used. There were several, all with different strengths and weaknesses. I learned Drupal and Joomla and CMSMS and WordPress and some others.

Since then I have worked on many different projects with many different teams. Sometimes they used Drupal or Joomla (or some other thing that some consultant told them was a good idea) – or Wix (or something that a well-meaning friend recommended). Those people always had problems finding people to update their websites – they had to pay expensive developer hourly rates, or train a team member on the system, or try to hire team members who already know how to use it. And I always found that there were other things they could not do, that they could have done if they were using WordPress.

Here are a few important things to understand about WordPress:

• Almost half of the websites in the world use WordPress, so you’ve undoubtedly seen it in action
• The basic version is free
• It is extremely versatile – there are countless functions available, many of which can support business operations
• No knowledge of coding is required to use it, and extensive help is available online, so it’s straightforward for you / your team to make updates
• It is so widely used that the pool of skilled people is very large

This is why I recommend WordPress for small organizations. In most cases I am open to all tools and solutions, but using something other than WordPress brings the following risks:

• you may have trouble recruiting people who know how to use it
• you may be vulnerable to huge developer fees, which can leave your site outdated
• you may need to take on new tools for functions that may be available under your existing package