WordPress is as popular as it is because it has many great features, and amazing results can be achieved with it regardless of skill level. It is reliable, both in functionality, security, and the service that is provided both for the free packages, and those that are paid.
It is always evolving to stay ahead of the curve and make sure that you have all of the tools you need to have an attractive, functional, and easily found site. Below we are going to look at some of the reasons why you need to make WordPress your CMS of choice.
1. It’s Free
When you are working out how to start a blog the cost of the platform that you are going to use is very important.
Until you have a following that can start to pay you, or until your business is starting to get a return on the investment that you are putting into the website, having a free option that you can build up is extremely useful.
The great thing with WordPress is that starting off with the free package does not mean you always have to stay at that level, and you can increase your commitment as the website does more for you.
Or you can work it the other way, and invest in the website and receive more benefits from the other packages, which will help you with your plans to increase website traffic and make your site more easily discoverable.
You can keep the free package for as long as you like, and a lot of people use it for their personal blogging, or for their business, and it is one of those platforms where the free version does not mean any real curtailment of ability to do what you need to with your website.
2. Easy To Use
WordPress has always been an easy platform to use, and this starts with the set up, and runs through the daily use of the platform, and unlike a lot of programs which seem to get more complex, WordPress are actively working to make the process simpler.
When you first set up your website you are asked to name it, and then WordPress gives you both free and paid for options for domain names to choose from, and it asks you what the purpose of the site is, and has some pre-loaded options for certain professions, that make the set up super easy.
The recent shift to the block editing format has made it easier to create posts that you can format in sections, and which gives you a lot of flexibility in what you can include in your posts and your pages.
Plugins can be added and subtracted as needed, providing you with new functionality, and all of it is at the click of a button. With user interface that wordpress has kept simple and pretty consistent through its constant evolution, you don’t need to be a programmer or a designer to achieve the kind of results you want.
3. Flexible & Scalable
Your business has to change and adapt, and your website is no different, and WordPress recognises this. The way it is set up allows you to grow from a beginner to an expert, and as your business moves from its early stages to greater and greater success, your Wordpress site can grow with you.
Say for instance you set up an influencer blog, and build it to such a scale that you are able to monetize that influence and sell things, you can add shop functionality to your site. Want to create a flow between your newsletter and your website? That is also something that can be done.
Another important thing to note is that WordPress provides excellent security, both for the protection of your data, your client’s or member’s data, and any payment information that passes through your site.
WordPress is trusted by everyone from first time bloggers to major companies.
4. SEO Friendly
With WordPress, as opposed to other sites such as Wix, you get a Google-friendly URL, because WordPress gives you full control of the URL and your SEO, and there are a number of plugins such as Yoast that allow you to really hone your SEO to make sure that you are getting a lot of organic traffic to your website. Besides, you can make use of site traffic checkers to see how much traffic you are getting. These tools can help you understand how a certain website receives its traffic, where it comes from, and a lot of other information that can help you gain an edge.
Even with the free option Wordpress makes it easy for you to choose whether you are indexed by search engines, and if you install something such as Jetpack it will recommend plugins that are going to enhance the presence of your site, make it more discoverable, and if you have multiple sites there is functionality to make the management across these sites easier, and more consistent.
Your WordPress site is designed to be easily readable by the search engines, and you can optimize each page and post individually.
The back-end is really intuitive and laid out in such a way that even someone unfamiliar could learn easily, and the same is true of the way that SEO is set up in WordPress.
5. Mobile friendly
Mobile devices, as of 2017, account for approximately half of the web page views worldwide, and they are likely to continue increasing that margin as more and more people shift to mobile devices, and Google continues to foreground sites that are mobile friendly in its search engine queries.
A lot of people want to find data regarding your business while they are on the move, and if your website is not mobile friendly in a very real sense it is not user friendly either. Most people spend less than 15 seconds on a website before bouncing, but if it is not mobile friendly and they have to scroll around looking for things it may be even less than that. The other problem is that non-mobile-friendly sites tend to be on platforms or use code that makes them load more slowly as well.
WordPress gives you responsive themes that detect what kind of device your site is being viewed on, and switch accordingly. It also shows you how your design is going to look on each device, and helps you to improve the way it looks and functions.
6. Plugins
WordPress have taken the idea of plug and play and applied it to software, and of all the available platforms out there that you might choose, WordPress are very good at maintaining the reliability of these plugins and their compatibility with your site and any themes you choose.
There are literally thousands of plugins that give you access to an endless supply of functions that allow you to build on the function of your site.
These plugins are created both by Wordpress themselves, and by independent programmers that must comply with both community standards, and security standards that WordPress are stringent about enforcing.
These plugins can help with SEO, with integration of organic and paid marketing, with cross-posting. Basically any function that you wish your site had, someone somewhere either built or is in the process of building of a plugin to perform that task.
There are plugins that allow you to enter your own custom code if you need to.
All of these plugins are available in free versions so that you can test them out, and often there will be reasonably priced upgrades that you can purchase to get even more functions.
7. Templates
You may not have the best design chops, but you may have an eye for the kind of thing that you like, and the aesthetic and layout that you want for your website. This is where WordPress and other CMS formats come in to help. Regardless of what kind of business you run, WordPress can help you to design the dream website for you. For example, if you own a marijuana company, marijuana wordpress themes are available to get your website up and running. This is just one example of the many themes and designs they have to offer. The good news is that Wordpress as well as having a whole library full of technology that helps you improve and add to the functionality of the basic website, also gives you access to a whole host of themes.
If you are looking to create an ecommerce platform, or a writer’s blog, or something to showcase a portfolio, or you have seen a website that you like, you can apply filters to the themes library and find the template that meets your needs.
Often the template will have features designed to better showcase your product or service, in alignment with the filter you applied, and it may suggest a bundle of plugins to extend that capability further.
You are getting something that looks great aesthetically, and which has solid programming under the hood. You can start as basic as you want and build something more complex as needed.
Conclusion
When you make the choice to go with WordPress you are going to be in good company. 50 to 60% is how much of a share WordPress has of the global CMS market, and they are the most popular CMS for the last 7 years. Over 500 sites are built using WordPress every day. You will not regret your choice to go with WordPress, and as you learn more about it and become more proficient in its use, it will provide you with even more options that are going to help you and your clients immeasurably.
