Why WordPress is the best platform for building websites

Looking to update your website to WordPress but not sure of the benefits?

Our web developers explain why WordPress is their chosen CMS platform when it comes to building a new website.

You may be bursting with questions about why we choose WordPress above every other CMS (content management system) on the market. Well, rest easy, friends – we’re about to lay down some answers for you! Let’s look at why almost every website we design and develop is powered by WordPress.

Here’s Root Fifty-Two’s top 10 reasons (straight from the mouths of our developers)

1. It’s secure & stable

One thing you really don’t want as a business owner is a website that’s constantly going offline for one reason or another. Well, this is where WordPress has your back.

Generally speaking, WordPress is a super stable and secure platform. One which is audited regularly by hundreds of developers and tech nerds across the globe. But the really great thing about it is that there are simple ways to enhance your site’s security even further; you can add password protection to folders, install regular updates to help fight off bugs and potential security threats, enable an SSL certificate for your website (everyone who’s anyone has one) to help keep your users safe while online, and get access to powerful security plugins that have enterprise-class WordPress security to help protect your website from hacks, breaches and malware.

2. It’s great for SEO

You may have heard of SEO before. It’s a phrase that’s regularly thrown around with the assumption that everyone knows what it means. But we wouldn’t do that to you, so here it is, in simple terms…

SEO (search engine optimisation) basically covers all the stuff you can do to your website to make Google, along with other search engines, like it more. When Google likes your site, it’s more likely to choose it to show to people whenever they search for something, so it’s a good idea to invest some time in improving your site’s SEO.

Sounds important, right? Well, it is. Designing and developing a decent website which focuses on hitting clear SEO targets can make a huge difference to where your site ranks in Google searches. Still not sure what we’re on about? Read our SEO guide to learn more.

Anyway, back to the point – we choose WordPress because it makes SEO easier. It’s as simple as that, really.

WordPress has easily accessible tools which will show you how SEO-friendly your content is. Or, if you want Google to really fall in love with your site, there are loads of options for SEO plugins that you can install to give you a better picture of where you currently stand. It will also provide tips on how to improve your site’s SEO. If you’re wanting to get really stuck in with it, we recommend installing Yoast SEO. The free version is fairly comprehensive in itself, and once you’ve gotten to grips with it all, you can take things one step further and upgrade to Premium.

3. It’s really popular

According to a recent study conducted by Kinsta, WordPress is way ahead when it comes to being a leading platform on the CMS market, with a 65% CMS market share, and 43% of all websites built using the platform.

No, your eyes are not deceiving you. That figure was 43% of ALL websites GLOBALLY that are built using WordPress.

To put this into perspective, that equates to over 64 million websites across the globe. Joomla is the second-biggest CMS platform, and its market share is 12 times smaller than WordPress, so no one else comes close, really.

What does this mean for you? It basically means that, as a platform, it’s really reliable! As it’s trusted by over a third of website owners, you can rest assured that your website will be in good hands. It only highlights why WordPress is the best chosen platform for your business.

4. It’s scalable, flexible, and customisable

The beautiful thing about WordPress is that it can be as simple or as complex as you want it to be. It’s well suited to all types and sizes of business, with the wonderful capability to expand as your business grows.

Use the basic version of the platform (which is completely free to install and run, by the way) for a simple blog site to unload your general everyday thoughts and ramblings, or roll with the big boys and get into adding widgets and plugins to increase your site’s functionality and get it doing exactly what you want it to. What’s great is there are basically unlimited plugin options out there, so you’ll never be restricted. There’s also a whole library of themes built in, so you’ll be able to customise it visually, too. You can also build your own custom theme, like we do!

Want to have tailored pages designed specifically to target and promote certain services? You can do that! Want to set up an email marketing strategy which allows for automation to a specific database of contacts? You can do that too! And if you’re looking for help with all this, you know who to call.

5. It’s great for small businesses and eCommerce applications

We turned to Web Developer Cameron for this one. He said:

“For building eCommerce websites, we use WooCommerce, which is an eCommerce plugin for WordPress. This provides an inventory and order management system, and also allows business owners to generate reports and update customers regarding their orders.

“WooCommerce is great because it has an extensive array of add-ons, so you can get things like payment gateways and conversion tracking with Google Analytics, so you can see at which stage potential customers are backing out of their purchases.

“It’s quick to sort out too. If you already have a simple website set up, you can install WooCommerce, set up a payment gateway and get started with accepting orders pretty much straight away.

“WooCommerce also has an intuitive way of importing and exporting orders, customers, and coupons, so migrating from one WooCommerce site to another is relatively simple.”

Has Cameron convinced you? Get in touch with our team to find out more about how we can help with building the eCommerce website of your dreams!

6. It’s well maintained

Root Fifty-Two Developer Lee informs us that:

“WordPress has a long history of constant and continual improvement. In fact, there have been five major versions of WordPress since 2003, and countless point updates, so they’re really on it and invested in making sure WordPress is always the best version of itself it can possibly be.

“As a CMS, it’s constantly being reviewed for functionality and developed to provide the best features and an improved user experience, which makes it a dream for us developers to work with.

“There’s a whole community of developers who volunteer their time to work on the code, and all of that effort results in a constant cycle of new releases (usually around four times a year), which just supports the idea that the platform is constantly evolving.

“WordPress as a company is also very transparent in their plans for the future. Their WordPress roadmap is accessible to anyone, and outlines all of their plans for future development and new feature releases, so you constantly know where you stand and where you’ll be able to go next.”

7. It offers a great network of support (from developers and other users)

We called upon Developer Chris for this one…

“WordPress has an ecosystem of battle-tested plugins, built and maintained by developers from all over the world. Some plugins are premium, but there are actually quite a few free ones that will still do the job.

“Additionally, because the CMS is so popular, you’ll never struggle to find answers to any questions you might have, whether that be from user guides, online tutorials, or other digital resources. And as it’s constantly maintained by this open-source community of developers, all of those great, techie minds can be called upon in the forums whenever you want to learn more about WordPress and how it works.

“This also means that if any issues do pop up, you’re likely to be able to find an answer and a solution fairly quickly and with little effort. This means less downtime for your site, and costs saved for your business.”

8. It’s simple to use

Amongst all of its many qualities and attributes, the fact that WordPress is one of the simplest CMS platforms to use is definitely up there.

If you are deciding to go it alone, there are hundreds of themes to choose from that are entirely customisable, and you don’t need to be super tech-savvy to figure out how to get your site looking just the way you want. But if you’re looking for something super swish – a website built away from the cookie-cutter model, and that really stands out from the crowd – our in-house team of expert website designers and developers are on hand to create it for you.

The network of developers that look after WordPress always keep their users in mind. Because of this, WordPress offers an intuitive interface and easy-to-use dashboard, meaning that once your website is all set up and running smoothly, you’ll be able to edit and add content to your heart’s content (see what we did there?), without having to know what HTML is, and without having to rely on a developer to do it for you!

(Don’t worry though, if you choose to trust us with your website, you won’t be abandoned. If you’d rather us continue to take care of things – because let’s face it, you’re already incredibly busy, and it’s one less thing for you to worry about – just say the word!).

9. It’s accessible

When we asked Developer Cameron about this, he said:

“WordPress is an open-source software under the GPL licence, which means as a CMS it’s completely free to use.”

… Don’t understand the first part of that sentence, but we understand “completely free”, and that sounds good to us!

In addition to being a “completely free” platform, it’s also a multilingual platform, with the capacity to support over 160 languages, so it’s great for businesses with a global audience.

(That being said, it is worth noting that English is the most popular language used on WordPress, with over 70% of all blog posts on the platform being written in English – just something to think about when it comes to writing content for your audience).

10. It provides great functionality

When using WordPress, the capabilities to expand your site’s functionality are endless! Because of this, this last little section is going to feel like a bit of an info dump, but here goes…

a) WordPress has a built-in blog, so you can easily keep your website constantly updated with fresh content, and keep Google happy as a result.

b) WordPress is mobile-friendly, and all themes are programmed to be responsive for mobile browsers.

c) WordPress is also optimised for speed. Slow websites = high bounce rates, and WordPress knows this. That’s why it comes with specific features and elements that you can use to boost the speed of your website, and with relatively little sweat, too.

d) WordPress is compatible with a host of different third-party tools, making for really simple integrations. Whilst you can go nuts with widgets and plugins to customise your site and the experience it offers, you’ll also be able to integrate things like email marketing software, payment gateways (for taking online payments), Google Analytics (so that you can keep a constant eye on how your website is performing), and pretty much any other tool you can think of that you might need to get your website running well and doing what it’s supposed to do for your business.

e) Get started quickly and use the basic plugins, upgrade to premium plugins for increased functionality, or enlist the help of a professional website design and development team like ours to really maximise the potential of your WordPress site.

Ready to get things going with your new website? Get in touch with us to start talking strategy. Or if you’re looking to find out more about why WordPress is the best platform for building websites, pop in for a brew and a chat – contrary to popular belief, our developers love a good natter!*

*as long as there’s biscuits.