Choosing the right Content Management System (CMS) is crucial to the success of your business. But your choice will depend upon your overall goals, needs and resources too.
When it comes to CMS, there are various options on the market for you to explore. The current two most popular ones are WordPress and HubSpot. So, in this post, we’ll compare the two in detail, what makes each one unique and the benefits and limitations of each platform to help you make the right decision when the time comes.
In HubSpot vs WordPress, the areas that we’ll cover are:
Ease of use
WordPress
One of the main reasons that this CMS platform is a hit with its users is due to the ease of navigation around the interface. There are thousands of themes available, which make it easy for you to build and design a professional website without having to learn how to code. This is a big bonus - we know how much of a headache coding can be.
Plus, due to its popularity, if you’re ever stuck or come across an issue, there are plenty of different helpful tutorials online that other users have posted. Not to mention the support that WordPress can offer - but we’ll cover that a little later.
HubSpot
Similarly, HubSpot is also well-known for being super-easy to navigate. After all, it was designed for businesses to get up and running simply and quickly. The platform gives you the option to choose from a premade template or start from scratch yourself.
HubSpot is automatically optimised for mobile and tablet users too, which saves the need for coding your website to be responsive. The platform also offers a range of in-house marketing tools, such as:
- Lead management.
- Sales automation.
- Analytics.
Unlike WordPress, HubSpot requires developers to learn a new coding language - HubL. WordPress uses PHP coding language, which allows for an in-depth range of customisation that supersedes the language developed by HubSpot.
If it’s ease of use and simplicity that you’re looking for then HubSpot has everything you need. And with all the marketing tools available, you can be sure that your efforts are always heading in the right direction.
Cost
Like any investment, a lot of businesses tend to look at cost as a main factor when deciding about their CMS. However, we’d advise you not to put too much onus on the cost. After all, just because one is more expensive than the other doesn’t mean that it’ll guarantee you better results or is a better quality product either.
WordPress
WordPress is free. However, there are some added costs that you’ll face. You’ll have to pay to host your site on the platform, which is around £15 a month. You’ll also have to buy your domain name, which tends to vary in price depending upon the demand for your chosen one.
If you’re going to use one of the themes then it might cost you a one time fee. Although, some of the more complex ones are priced per month. But bear in mind that not all themes will cost you, so it’s not a necessity to spend money on these.
WordPress plug-ins are another way in which the costs might start to add up too. Like the themes, some of them are free while others will cost you to install. Some common plug-ins, that come as a standard are:
- Yoast SEO.
- WooCommerce.
- Google Analytics.
- OptinMonster.
- Gravity Forms.
HubSpot
HubSpot can prove to be pretty expensive, which is unfortunately, one of their biggest drawbacks. Their pricing breakdown is as follows:
- The website is £300 a month and the addition of a marketing package too.
- Basic - £200 per month and a one-time onboarding fee of £600.
- Pro - £800 per month and a one-time onboarding fee of £3000.
- Enterprise - £2400 per month and a one-time onboarding fee of £5000.
That means that you’ll be facing a minimum of £1100 just to get your website up and running.
Design
WordPress
Designing your website with WordPress all starts with the theme that you decide on. This is an advantage and a disadvantage in the same breath. Although it’s good that they’re ready built and you just need to add your content, they’re pretty restrictive on how much you can customise them - which limits your design capabilities.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t customise at all with WordPress. Although, if you want to be able to carry it out you’ll have to be up to date with basic HTML and CSS coding languages or you’ll need to hire a developer who is.
HubSpot
HubSpot gives you great freedom when it comes to custom design. Utilise the readymade frameworks on the HubSpot Marketplace or create your pages with HubSpot’s Design Manager. Any template that you choose to buy from HubSpot can be directly altered to how you like it - unlike WordPress.
Like WordPress, you’ll need to know the basics of coding. And they both offer on-page editing too. This is a bonus as it allows you to see the different parts of your design as and when you’re adding them. Rather than staring at a screen full of code and not having any idea of what it’ll look like when complete.
Email marketing
WordPress
Unfortunately, WordPress doesn’t offer an email marketing tool within its platform. However, it can be integrated with other tools that manage your email workflows. The platform is compatible with popular tools like Mail Chimp and Constant Contact.
HubSpot
An email marketing package is included in the basic plan with HubSpot. The tool is integrated within your website, which makes it’s super easy to add users into your automated email workflows.
With HubSpot, it’s really simple to create email workflows and segment your subscriber list too. The fact you have your email marketing and website content all in the same place is so convenient, which saves you the time and hassle of forever switching between different platforms.
Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)
Google and other search engines don’t base their rankings on what platform your site is built on - they base it on SEO best practices. But your CMS platform can help improve your SEO to no end with the integrations that they’re compatible with. There are many plug-ins that can be downloaded for both platforms.
WordPress
The most popular SEO plug-in is called Yoast. It’s free and gives you a detailed view of how you can improve your SEO efforts throughout your whole blog. Set your keyword on each page and follow their expert guidance to see your blogs and pages shoot up the SERP rankings.
HubSpot
HubSpot was designed to help digital marketers so it concentrates more on SEO optimisation than WordPress does. The platform can scan your entire site and point you towards different areas of your site that you could improve to help rank higher up the SERP.
HubSpot indicates how you rank on each of your focused keywords. It also includes a strategy tool that allows you to incorporate topic clusters - one of the big trends in SEO optimisation.
You can't blame your SERP rankings on WordPress or HubSpot - it’s down to you to put the best practices into use. Both grant you the opportunity to prioritise these best practices, but HubSpot makes it a little bit easier with more focused guidance and tips.
Community and support
When implementing new software, it’s normal to get a little stuck. Which is why you need to be able to rely upon extensive support to help you ease any teething pains.
WordPress
WordPress has a support community that can post questions to get help from other users and support engineers too. You can typically find a solution to your problems by searching the issues in message boards - if not, submit a problem directly and they’ll be sure to get back to you right away.
A lot of issues with WordPress stem from the themes or plug-ins. The different plug-ins offer support for these issues.
HubSpot
To raise an issue with HubSpot, you simply submit a support ticket and you’ll receive a response within a couple of hours. One of the expert support team is always on hand to give you step by step directions on how to fix the problem.
Other support features offered are:
- Training courses.
- Certification tracks.
- Blogs, ebooks and other readily available content.
- 24/7 live customer support.
- Community forums.
- HubSpot Academy.
The right CMS is crucial for business growth
So, as you’ve just read, the right CMS can help improve various areas of your marketing approach. And for your business to grow to the potential that it shows, you need to be firing on all cylinders for the best results.
But you need to choose the right CMS to be compatible with your company. It needs to dovetail with your other software products to get the best out of it. Luckily for you, at Red-Fern we work closely with both platforms, so can help point you in the right direction for the perfect system.
To find out more or take your enquiry to the next step, why not arrange a phone call with us? One of our expert team will gladly take your call and advise you on the right product for your business.
