• Translation

In recent years, the Internet has taken the public by storm so rapidly that it has not only become a significant part of human life, but also a key factor in business development. The Internet plays an essential role and is a great help to companies in doing business and its development, gives bread to programmers, and is also an excellent means of communication for all people. But what would the Internet be without the so-called virtual information space? This space is made up of millions of websites.

Whether you're a beginner with no knowledge of website building or a seasoned pro, you can become part of the virtual world by creating a website. There is only one big question - how? Naturally, you can hire a team of professional designers, programmers and SEO managers to bring your idea to life, or you can use CMS (content management system).

Of the huge mass of websites that fill the Internet, about 31% use CMS. Below is a graph showing the historical evolution of the share of websites on CMS from September 1, 2011 to September 19, 2012. The graph shows a clear positive trend towards an increase in the share of sites with CMS, and all because these tools make your life easier. There are many CMS, and you can choose the most suitable for you, depending on the goals and specifics of your website.

Figure 1 The dynamics of the use of CMS in websites for the period from September 1, 2011 to September 19, 2012.

There are many reasons to create your own website. It can represent your business (corporate website), serve as an online store, be a social network, information portal, gallery, blog, forum, and so on. At the same time, as we have already said, there are many different CMS, each of which can be more or less useful for each type of site. It is worth mentioning that today the so-called open source CMS, that is, free ones, have become widespread. As a rule, these systems have quite powerful communities that ensure the constant development of CMS and filling them with various "features".

In this article, we intend to tell you about the advantages and disadvantages of the five most popular CMS.. It is possible that this information will help you make the right decision when you want to create your own website. So...

Figure 2 Percentage of use of different CMS

The diagram shows the market shares of various CMS at the present stage. As we can see, over half of the CMS sites use WordPress. And now you will understand why.

WordPress: Rules the Internet!

It's hard to say something new about WordPress. This CMS initially established itself as an innovative blogging platform with high usability. But the development of the system's functionality has ensured its high popularity among other website formats as well. Today, the web design industry is backed by a high demand for WordPress development services. WordPress is used everywhere from personal blogs to e-commerce sites.

Advantages:

• This is the most popular CMS: more than half of the users prefer WordPress. Perhaps this statistic is already strong evidence for the advantage of this system;
• The widest set of plugins, themes, widgets for galleries, forums, multilingualism, various catalogs, stores, and so on;
• WYSIWYG editor will make life easier for those who have problems with HTML markup and other languages;
• Technical experience is not required. The admin panel is much simpler than in other CMS: PHP and CSS files can be edited directly in the admin panel. For example, you can easily paste text from any text editor, unlike Drupal or Joomla;
• Also WordPress is a pretty strong tool for developers and designers who create websites for clients.

• The system gives a huge field for choice, so the main problem is how to use all its features correctly? This CMS will work much better if you customize the settings correctly;
• If you are a beginner, you may encounter some installation problems, despite the popular belief that the installation process is the easiest.

This CMS might be the best option if you need an easy to administer website. Using this system provides a wide, but at the same time simple functionality. WordPress is ideal for news sites or blogs, but as we have already written, it is used for other types of sites as well.

Joomla: cute but small, like your brother's girlfriend

Joomla the next most popular CMS, which is used by 9% of users. It's somewhere between the rich features of developer-centric Drupal and the simplicity of WordPress, but with more development options. Despite this, Joomla has a user-friendly interface.

Advantages:

• Although simple compared to Drupal, Joomla is a complete development tool;
• Support for access control protocols (OpenID, LDAP, Gmail.com);
• The presence of a convenient admin panel with a wide range of functions: templates, styles, menu management, and so on;
• Easy installation process for inexperienced users;
• And it's impossible to miss the fact that this CMS is quite beautiful.

• The system is rather superficial and weak, despite all its versatility;
• More paid plugins and themes than WordPress. Be prepared to pay;
• For inexperienced users, it may seem that Joomla has a lot of unnecessary features, and for advanced users, it is too simple.

Joomla is the best solution if you are looking for a CMS with advanced features and functionality. It provides a richer and more flexible website structure than WordPress.

You can use Joomla to create a corporate, community or e-commerce website.

Drupal: Strength and power!

About 7% of users prefer Drupal. Developers love its all-encompassing power and developer-friendly interface that allows you to create complex websites. And, like other "cool" tools, Drupal requires some technical skills that you could do without using Joomla or WordPress.

Advantages:

• The presence of so-called hooks (hooks), which allow you to avoid almost any problems in the system;
• The CCK and VIEWS modules allow you to construct arbitrary data types and display them;
• With each new release, Drupal is getting easier to use;
• This system is known for its Taxonomy module, which allows you to organize content by levels, features and categories;
• Drupal has an active and large community;
• A huge number of modules that will allow you to add a lot of features to the site, such as user blogs, OpenID, forums, profiles, and so on, increasing functionality.

• Because of its complexity, Drupal is definitely not suitable for the inexperienced user. In order to customize modules in Drupal, additional programming skills are required. But you can hire a specialist for these purposes.
• Drupal requires state of the art technical hardware, otherwise some performance issues may arise. So you need to make sure that your servers can handle the load of such a complex system.

• It's a good but technically complex tool for building highly functional, versatile and rich websites.
• Typically, Drupal is used for sites that require complex data organization: for forums, online stores, web blogs, corporate websites and communities.

vBulletin: Bull power for your forum!

This CMS is preferred by about 4% of users. But speaking of popularity, it is worth noting that this system has been losing its market position in recent years. vBulletin provides the user with tools for creating and administering forums and blogs.

Advantages:

• vBulletin is an advanced and innovative solution for creating forums;
• Wide range of blog plugins;
• - Lots of skins and clean code;
• Simple and nice admin panel;
• A high level of security, thanks to which a large number of forums have been created on this platform;
• Lots of SEO components.

• This CMS is not free;
• The system has a lot of options, which can be a problem for an inexperienced user;
• If you need to import data from other bulletin boards, you will need to install a separate modification patch.

vBulletin is an advanced forum creation and content publishing tool. This is definitely a good solution if you decide to make a forum on your blog. vBulletin makes it easy to manage your website.

TYPO3: last but not the loser

TYPO3 used by 2% of websites using CMS. Demand for this system has grown significantly since the release of version 4. It is a professional and powerful tool, rich in various features and options.

Advantages:

• The system provides a wide range of features that can be customized or extended;
• Easy to install;
• Effective management of content and graphic elements;
• Improved login for users and administrators;
• You can easily add content, pages, documentation, images, even if you are an inexperienced user who knows nothing about HTML and web markup.

• Requires good hosting as the system is large;
• TYPO3 is pretty hard to learn;
• There are many holes in the code that the developers suggest to eliminate by hashing, but in fact this does not solve the problem in any way.

The time of "pure" html and css is long gone, but in any case, basic knowledge of these languages ​​will not hurt - for example, in order to test yourself, you can make a couple of the simplest sites, as they say, in a notepad. More serious projects can no longer be created using a notepad and basic knowledge of html and css - knowledge of server programming languages ​​perl, php, asp, etc. is required here. After such statements, many beginners immediately hang their heads, because they think that knowledge of languages ​​is required to create a professional site programming. They are more desirable than required.
It is not necessary to learn languages, because there are already written content management systems. True, choosing the most suitable CMS can be difficult, but there is nothing unrealistic here.

Engines can be distributed free of charge and for a fee; at the same time, free of charge here does not at all mean that they are simpler and worse.

Both paid and free (the most popular) options are regularly updated, a huge number of templates, extensions, etc. have been written for us. If the theme of your site is non-commercial, then in most cases free systems are suitable (even for creating an online store).

What to choose: Joomla or WordPress?

Many novice webmasters are wondering "which is better Joomla or WordPress?". Both of these content management systems are good in their own way, they are used not only by beginners, but also by professional administrators. But they have many differences, which is primarily manifested in the direction (as in the case of Modx vs WordPress - they are not analogues). So, WordPress/Wordpress is best for creating blogs; if your goal is to create a professional blog, then this CMS is your choice!

Joomla / Joomla, in turn, is used to create large Internet portals, online stores, etc., because Joomla / Joomla is designed for such solutions. You can also create an online store and even a social network on WordPress / WordPress by installing plugins, but all this is not as highly developed as in Joomla. That is, the first and fundamental difference between Joomla / Joomla and WordPress / WordPress is their focus (they are not analogues).

It is worth understanding that now you can do anything and on anything. If you order the development of a site with certain functionality from a professional studio, then employees will be able to make a professional portal or online store on WordPress / WordPress. But on Joomla, it will be somehow easier to make such sites yourself. It also seemed to us that at the moment there are more templates and plugins released for WordPress than for Joomla / Joomla.

The WordPress admin area is easier to understand for beginners, but the Joomla admin area will have to dig a little until it becomes clear what is there. For example, menus in WordPress/Wordpress can be made in several ways, just like in Joomla/Jumla, but in WordPress/Wordpress this process is as simple as possible. It would not be entirely correct to use Joomla for a blog, although it would be quite realistic to implement it. Moreover, if you plan to create a blog, then most of the functionality of Joomla will simply be idle.

What else can be said about Joomla? One of its main advantages is the modular builder, thanks to which you can see all Joomla modular positions for the menu, slider, main area, footer, breadcrumbs, search, breadcrumbs, etc. To see all this, you need to add the following code in the address bar after your site: /?tp=1. WordPress / Wordpress does not have such an analogue.

You can not go past the templates for WordPress and Joomla. It seemed to us that most of the WordPress templates that are really functional and attractive are distributed on a paid basis, but you can always find/choose something worthwhile among the free ones. For Joomla, a lot more free premium templates have been released. Summing up the results, it must be emphasized that comparing these two systems is not entirely correct, because each of them is tailored for its own purposes, and the high functionality of Joomla and WordPress is achieved by installing additional modules and extensions. That's why:

• if you need to make a blog - choose WordPress without even thinking;
• if you need to make an online store or a large portal, Joomla is worth choosing.

Many webmasters do just that: they install WordPress to run their blog, and use Joomla to create large sites.

DLE content management system overview

DLE is a content management system engine that was originally honed for creating news resources, but in fact DLE has been very often used on pirated sites with books, movies, and music. The main disadvantage of this engine is its payment. It will not be difficult to find a pirated version, but this option will not work for a serious portal - you will have to buy a license, however, this can be done at any time. Most of the add-on modules for DLE are also paid.

If you configure DLE correctly, you can create a really large site on modest server resources (a small load will be created). Installing and configuring DLE is problematic for many, but if you spend a little time on this business, you will get what you needed. If you prefer the DLE engine, then you need to monitor the emergence of new vulnerabilities, as well as the release of patches that close them.

DLE is not a lightweight system, but it offers impressive functionality. The main drawback of DLE is the very unusual admin interface: everything looks strange here - from adding materials to the site to installing add-ons (comparison with many other CMS, as if they did it at least “somehow”, there are definitely no analogues). But, of course, it's just a matter of time and habit. There are many add-ons for DLE and, of course, to create a full-fledged site, you will need to install some of them.
DLE developers regularly release new versions of their engine, which indicates the need for constant updates. On the one hand, this is good, as it speaks of correcting errors, but on the other hand, it needs to be updated with “handles”.

Overview of the Drupal / Drupal system

Drupal / Drupal is a content management system written in php and using MySQL databases for storing data. Drupal / Drupal acts as software that is distributed free of charge, protected by the GPL license and created by the joint efforts of developers from around the world. Some perceive the system as an analogue of Joomla.
Drupal / Drupal has a unique architecture, which gives the system the ability to create sites of various types - from simple blogs to news sites and company portals. Drupal/Drupal has a standard set of modules such as: blog, forum, file uploads, news collector, search, voting, etc. Modules that can significantly expand the capabilities of Drupal/Drupal can be downloaded from the developer's official resource.

Features and advantages of Drupal / Drupal:

• one categorization for all content (forum, news articles);
• nesting of categories of any depth;
• the ability to search the site;
• dynamic menu;
• support for XML formats;
• short links;
• changeable themes (there are analogues from other CMS);
• translation of the interface into other languages;
• mechanism to limit the load on the site.

Among the shortcomings, it is worth highlighting the poor use of php design capabilities (Drupal / Drupal practically does not use OOP features). Another disadvantage of Drupal / Drupal is the active use of the database, which indicates the creation of a large load on the server (however, on small sites with traffic of several hundred or even thousands of visitors a day, many resources are not required). But still, we note that it is better to choose hostings specially tailored for Drupal / Drupal work: for example, nginx 0.6.31 + php5-fcgi.

Bootstrap 3 - as an alternative to many CMS

Bootstrap 3 is a framework that allows you to quickly and efficiently create websites and applications for the web. In other words, this is a free toolkit that can use html, css, javascript in "big strokes". Note that you can work with regular static html code using Bootstrap features, but you can also create a template, for example, for Joomla 3, and you won’t need any special knowledge in css and html.

You can view the portfolio of sites created on Bootstrap on the page: http://expo.getbootstrap.com/

Now you can download Bootstrap version 3, which has a number of significant advantages over previous versions:

• Initially, Bootstrap was created for mobile devices, so the grid of the new framework is designed in such a way that the design is first adjusted to small screens, and only then deployed to widescreen devices. Bootstrap 3 has already received a grid system, which received a large number of grids of various sizes;
• Bootstrap works with vector graphics, thanks to which it will be possible to change the color and size of fonts on the fly;
• Bootstrap 3 no longer supports older versions of Internet Explorer and some other browsers (may display "somehow").

1C-Bitrix: Site Management

Bitrix is ​​a professional system designed for project management, development and support.

Suitable for creating:

• corporate sites;
• online stores;
• communities;
• information portals;
• social networks and other similar projects.

Wix is ​​another website building platform

Wix is ​​a free website building platform that offers you to install one of the templates and start building a website from scratch. Note that Wix does not require any knowledge of programming or installation of additional programs; Wix is ​​also well indexed by search engines. Building websites on Wix is ​​free, but there are also advanced Wix Premium plans, thanks to which you can get more server space, more traffic, no ads on the Wix website, and the ability to add your own domain.

That is, Wix is ​​great for people who do not even want to bother installing system files on hosting and attaching a domain to it. Wix is ​​a good option for beginners, which allows you to make good platforms of different directions (Wix in this case is like a “lifeline” for them).

Adobe Muse CC - visual editor for creating websites

Adobe Muse allows you to create sites of varying complexity and functionality - for example, business card sites, portfolios, multi-page sites. All it takes to create a new site is to open Adobe Muse and get started; regardless of your skills, in just a couple of hours you will have a ready-made website, which can then be uploaded to the network. It will take no more than a couple of days to master all the features of Adobe Muse.

Features of Adobe Muse:

• Adobe Muse is free;
• high speed and wide functionality;
• Adobe Muse makes it possible to make websites for mobile devices, which makes it possible to reach even more users;
• Adobe Muse supports html5 and css3, which indicates the possibility of placing interactive elements like parallax, animations, etc.;
• Adobe Muse is an independent CMS system (not an analogue), which makes it possible to work with materials through any browser.

True, the full functionality of Adobe Muse is available after purchasing the full version. But in any case, the developers managed to create a tool with which it becomes easy even for an amateur to make a website.

System for creating your own online store Opencart

OpenCart is a modern and free system for creating an individual online store. OpenCart works on the MVC principle and can be installed on any server with php and MySQL support. The OpenCart community now "consists" of more than 46 thousand users from all over the world, thanks to which more than 9 thousand different extensions are available.

More features:

• OpenCart allows you to create an unlimited number of products and categories;
• OpenCart support for physical and virtual goods;
• OpenCart makes it easy to copy and restore data;
• OpenCart keeps statistics of goods and customers;
• OpenCart supports many languages ​​and currencies.

Did you know that 40% of users leave sites with poor design? Why lose profit? Choose and install right now one of the 44 thousand premium website templates. The perfect choice for your business!

Top 10 online store CMS rating 2016 is a review that many of our readers have been waiting for. We have prepared it especially for those who are interested in the top CMS for an online store and in choosing the best platform.

E-commerce is gaining momentum every year not only around the world, but also in Russia. And although the growth rate of electronic sales in our country is not as frisky as, for example, in the United States, this growth still does not slow down. There is a serious boom in the field of e-commerce, so many serious businessmen are trying to invest in the creation of online trading platforms. In other words, they create online stores.

To create a store, you need an engine, that is, a platform. Choosing the right platform depends on many factors, including individual requirements and needs. To make it easier for you to understand, we decided to prepare a ranking of CMS online stores in the US and Russia for comparison, to give you a general idea of ​​the popularity of using different solutions. We will also briefly talk about each of these platforms. You will learn what are the advantages and disadvantages of each of them, and you will be able to make the final decision.

Before moving on to a direct comparison of the popularity of CMS platforms, we would like to give some statistics for the e-commerce market in the US and Russia.

The US is the second largest e-commerce market after China. The market volume for 2016 here amounted to $349 billion. Russia ranks 9th in this rating with a market size 17 times smaller - $20 billion. At the end of 2015, the share of online sales in the Russian market was 3.5%, while in In the United States, this figure was almost three times higher (9%). Despite this, in Russia every year there is an increased interest in Internet products. Thus, in the period from 2008 to 2014, Internet commerce in Russia grew by more than 40% annually, even during the crisis. There are quite serious prospects for further development in the Russian e-commerce market.

US and Russia Online Store CMS Ranking 2016 – Comparative Charts

We specifically decided to compare the popularity of CMS for an online store between Russia and the USA in order to show what solutions are used overseas. Thanks to the analysis resource Builtwith, we can provide you with interesting charts that clearly show the general trend.

As you can see, the ranking of the most popular CMS in the two countries is seriously different. WooCommerce tops the top 10 in the US, outperforming other platforms like Squarespace Commerce, Shopify, OpenCart, Magento, and Prestashop by a wide margin. The share of stores created on the basis of WooCommerce is 36% here; the total share of other platforms is not even close to this indicator.

As for the statistics in Russia, here WooCommerce outpaced OpenCart by a small margin - 37% versus 22%.

Top 10 online store CMS rating USA vs Russia 2016

To somehow clarify the situation and help you answer the question: “Which CMS is better for an online store”, let's look at the most popular CMS systems for online stores.

1. WooCommerce (36% USA, 22% Russia)

WooCommerce is a powerful plugin that plugs into the world's most popular CMS platform. It is available absolutely free. It uses open source code, so anyone can modify it to suit their needs. Additional flexibility is provided by the possibility of full customization through a convenient WordPress control panel.

For WordPress sites, in particular for WooCommerce online stores, there are simply an incredibly large number, so you can choose the most suitable one for yourself and adapt to your needs. For any kind of online store there is a WordPress template/theme/template. Each template has a responsive design and works confidently with mobile devices. . There are many additional extensions for WordPress WooCommerce, including free ones, so your store will have unlimited functionality.

The WordPress platform provides a high degree of reliability, but you can additionally use third-party solutions. Security is never superfluous, especially for an online store.

1. OpenCart (5% - USA, 38% - Russia)

The OpenCart platform, specially created for online stores, appeared not so long ago as WordPress (in 2012), but during this time it has already managed to win the recognition of many online entrepreneurs. In Russia, as you can see in the chart above, it is ahead of WooCommerce, although WooCommerce is well ahead of all other CMS platforms for online stores in the .com domain zone, including OpenCart.

Just like WordPress WooCommerce, OpenCart is a completely open and free shop CMS. New updates are constantly being released to it, which means it is also reliable. On OpenCart you can find a lot of useful modules at an affordable price. One of the most important advantages of OpenCart is the support of a large number of payment systems, including Webmoney.

You can find paid OpenCart templates.

We have already compared these two platforms with each other before. You can read an article on this topic at the link.

1. VirtueMart (<1% – США, 12% – Россия)

VirtueMart is an e-commerce solution based on Joomla CMS (similar to WooCommerce for WordPress). Although Joomla is not a specialized platform for ecommerce, by installing one of the components for an online store, you can get a full-fledged online trading platform. One such component is VirtueMart. There are many modules available for it that will help expand the functionality of your store. Built-in analytics and marketing capabilities are supported. The disadvantage is that the platform is rather complicated to work with, so it will not be as easy for beginners to work with it as, for example, with WooCommerce.

What CMS online store to choose?

The choice of CMS is a purely individual matter. It all depends on the specific tasks, requirements and scope of your project. We believe that WooCommerce has - on a par with other solutions - and will soon rise in popularity in Russia from second to first place due to its rapid development and wide popularity among WordPress fans.

This is the best solution for those who want to get a powerful and reliable online store with good functionality and expandability at an affordable price. In addition, there are many cool templates for WooCommerce. To make our online store CMS rating even more interesting, we will present some of these templates as an example.

WordPress WooCommerce Template Examples

Fashion Plus - template for WordPress CMS clothing store

The Fashion Plus template was created specifically for a clothing store. Includes three ready-made demo themes, several store page styles and headers. Supports the Slider Revolution plugin for slideshows and Visual Composer for fast page creation.

XStore - Responsive Universal Template

XStore is a great example of a template that has ready-made solutions for almost any type of store, whether it's an eyewear store, cosmetics store, engineering equipment store, furniture store or bike store. Several unique mouse hover effects are available. The template has high page load rates. There are several options for mega menus and blog layouts.

Electro - Flexible WooCommerce Electronics Store Template

On the basis of Electro, you can create a simple CMS store for electronics and home appliances. Included is a special Electro Extensions plugin with extensions for a drop-down mega menu, a product carousel, special offers and an improved live search (Live Search). The template also supports working with plugins from the platform

In addition to the regular menu, the template also has a special menu for mobile devices. To organize the products in the catalog, you can use the tabs with categories. Products can be displayed in a list or a grid. Supports Quick View Items and Deal of the Day. Drop down basket. There are cool icons for decoration.

Mega Store - WooCommerce template for various stores

Mega Store comes with six pre-made homepage layouts. You can choose from several header options to organize a convenient product catalog and footer. For each store page, you can customize the structure, position of the sidebar and add various effects. The product grid supports one to six columns.

We really hope that our comparison of CMS for online store was useful for you. We have prepared the top 10 CMS rating for online stores not only to show dry statistics, but also to help you answer the question: “Which CMS to choose for an online store?”. Whatever your decision, the main thing is that it suits you.

If you don't know what it takes to create a successful commerce site, read the separate article dedicated to this topic. To create an online store, you will also need high-quality hosting. For an online store, this is especially important. If you decide to choose a WordPress WooCommerce solution, read the article about . We wish you good luck in choosing a platform and creating an online store. High conversions and successful sales to you!

Alexander is the founder of the Web Lab of Success website project, created to support beginners and continuing Internet entrepreneurs. He is a convinced workaholic with professional experience in managing the editorial office of an online magazine, creating and managing his own online store. Main occupation: promotion of businesses (including online stores) through Facebook and Google Adwords. Main passion: website monetization through affiliate marketing tools and Google Adsense. Personal verified records: 3 million blog visitors per month.

Hello, dear readers of the blog site. Today I want to talk about such a thing as a site engine or, speaking “scientifically”, CMS (content management systems).

In fact, these are programs for a web server that greatly simplify the creation and maintenance of the site. Well, the website itself will allow you (if you create it yourself and will not spend money on its promotion).

If you want to add your resource to this rating, then do not use the corresponding button on the right above the table.

By the way, if you think that it will be difficult for you, you can look at web studio rating located on the same resource. There you can see the projects created by this studio by clicking on the link in the "Works" column.

Something like this looks like statistics on the engines used by Runet users (here not only Joomla, but in general all popular CMS) in the context of which version of the CMS is used - new or outdated:

On Joomla, in addition to ordinary sites, quite a lot is created, thanks to the existing store extension called .

Probably the easiest free engine to learn is WordPress. Of course, it is mainly used for a rather narrow niche (creating and introducing blogs), but if you wish, you can implement websites, forums, and galleries on it. But first of all, WordPress is a very functional blogging CMS.

the site is running exactly under the control of WordPress (but this is a secret, because the engine used and its version must be hidden, judging by the advice of Yandex voiced above). I wrote and continue to write about the subtleties and nuances of working with this engine in the section, and about extensions for it - in the section.

Judging by the CMS speed chart above, WordPress races, but I personally did not feel it. In general, WordPress can be made to run fast and not create an outrageous . True, it will take a little time to do this, but your blog can become very fast and very easy. I wrote about the increase in the heading of the same name.

Now my blog is hosted on and with a load of 20-25 thousand visitors per day, I am still satisfied with the speed of WordPress, especially after finalizing the template and optimizing everything that can be optimized. Although when using a large number of plugins, without and without additional optimization, WordPress becomes quite a heavyweight monster.

It is clear that there are still a lot of free CMS that are used for one purpose or another. This is still the same Drupal or DLE (DataLife Engine), and in many cases their use will be justified, because the ideal CMS does not exist, but WordPress and Joomla mentioned just above are the most popular. The reason may be their rather simple device and clarity for novice users.

Which of the paid engines are the most interesting

As a not very expensive and fast enough paid CMS, one can cite as an example S.Builder. To understand how to create sites on this engine, most likely, it will not take you very much time, because. it has a fairly low entry threshold (as they say, intuitively understandable). This system was written for the end user, who is absolutely unprepared and has no experience in webmastering (it knows how to work in Word, okay).

S.Builder is quite flexible and you can do almost everything with it, but, say, unlike Drupal (on which you can also do almost everything), you can do all this on S.Builder without getting into the code at all (there is a powerful module constructor for your needs).

Well, and as I mentioned, this CMS is one of the fastest engines and holds the load quite well, although it is also written in PHP. This is most likely due to the good cleanliness of the code (it was written from scratch) and the good work of caching.

S.Builder is free to try both online and offline. In the first case, you will need to go to the "Demo version on-line" page and a temporary site will be created for you on this CMS, where all the modules for "testing the pen" will be available. If online testing does not suit you, then you can download from the page "Download CMS" a fully functional and absolutely free offline version of this engine (as if you) - "Trial version of CMS for installation on a local computer".

Finally, I want to give you the opinion of a professional optimizer from the very well-known Seo company Ashmanov and Partners, who gave a rather detailed answer to the question - Which CMS is better:

P.S. Sometimes there is a desire to know what kind of engine does this or that site work on. It turns out that this can be done quite simply and elegantly. In the article, I just mentioned such a plugin - Wappalyzer. A very curious thing.

We continue to acquaint you with the choice of engine for the site. The last article was about how to approach . Today, Natalia Rumyantseva continues to talk about CMS: you will learn the features of different systems and for what purposes this or that platform is best suited.

Any project should start with a goal. You must clearly understand why you need a website. What kind of results do you want to get with it. This alone will largely determine the choice of "engine".

Site types

Sites can be divided into the following categories:

1. Blog.
2. Portfolio.
3. landing page.
4. Website of a company, brand (business website).
5. News site.
6. Internet portal or information portal: in addition to news, it offers various services, forums, voting, etc. (for example, Mail.ru is a public portal).
7. Online store.
8. Online service (bank, ordering something, ordering services online, service aggregators, etc.).

What CMS does your website need?

In principle, all CMS are more or less universal, but the functionality of some is designed specifically for creating online stores (for example, Opencart, Prestashop, 1C-Bitrix).

This does not mean that you cannot make a store on WordPress, it means that it is much more convenient to make it on a special CMS for stores. But, for example, making a news site on Opencart is completely stupid (although there are cases when a Landing page was made on Opencart, but this can only be considered as curiosity).

Let's start with an introduction to each of the systems. We look at how the admin panel looks and works, what sites are made on this “engine”, what templates exist, etc.

Popular free universal CMS

• WordPress
• Joomla
• Drupal
• MODx

WordPress

Initially, WordPress CMS was created as a blogging platform, and its first release took place back in 2003. What WordPress has evolved into now is as far from the original version as a carriage from a car. It is by far the most popular CMS and the reason for its popularity is its ease of use.

WordPress is famous for its “5 minute install” with a few simple steps. What's more, some hosting companies have introduced the "WordPress CMS pre-installed" option.

The admin panel is very convenient and has an intuitive interface. For WordPress, there are already a huge number of templates (themes), extensions, applications, and new ones are constantly being created.

Pros:

• Easy installation.
• Intuitive interface.
• ​ To manage content, knowledge of the html language and layout skills are not required.
• ​ A wide range of plugins, themes, widgets, add-ons, extensions, including those for creating online stores.
• The theme can be changed in one click, its setup is very simple.
• Support for a large number of languages.
• ​ Ability to edit PHP and CSS files through the admin panel.

Minuses:

• ​ Vulnerability

This is due to the fact that the developers of templates, plugins and other products for WordPress are third-party companies and individuals. A developer can easily hide malicious code in a template and then gain access to the site, start sending spam or generate links for the so-called "black seo".

Download templates only from trusted developers with a good reputation(which is true, by the way, for any open source CMS). You should not chase free ones, because it is in a free product that something malicious is most often added. The second way is to check with the help of special services that scan the site for dangerous code.

Practice shows that open source CMS are more secure, as they are developed by specialist communities. Millions of users around the world quickly find and fix weaknesses, while only a few experts work on closed-source projects.

Joomla

Joomla is the reincarnation of the once well-known CMS Mambo. The first release took place in 2005. In 2008, Joomla was the second most downloaded website after WordPress. But unlike the latter, to create a site on Joomla, you need to be a specialist. If you are a regular user, you will not be able to not only make a website on your own, but even deal with the admin panel.

The reason for the popularity of Joomla is that for developers it is a convenient, affordable and free tool that allows you to create a site with wide functionality. On this engine, you can make a store, and an information portal, but almost anything. For small sites (business cards, blogs), Joomla will be somewhat redundant, and for large-scale projects - that's it. In addition, there are many ready-made modules, applications, add-ons and plugins for Joomla.

Pros:

• ​ If you have a good Joomla specialist nearby, you can create anything.

Minuses:

• Complicated, not at all intuitive interface. To work with Joomla, you need to know exactly how to work with it.

Drupal

CMS Drupal is focused on developers and allows you to create sites of any complexity. This is a professional engine., it is more complicated than Joomla, but for a competent specialist it is a tool that gives the widest possibilities. Drupal has a powerful taxonomy (methods for classifying information - approx. ed.) and the ability to categorize complex content. Drupal is chosen by large companies such as Sony Music.

Pros:

• Wide possibilities.
• Community support for users and developers.
• A large number of extensions and modules.

Minuses:

• ​ Redundancy for simple sites.
• Difficult to master for non-specialists.
• ​ Too minimalistic, not in everything user-friendly interface of the admin panel.

MODx

CMS MODx appeared back in 2004, initially the developers laid the idea to allow users to edit content without special knowledge. And this idea, I must say, was a success. The engine has a very convenient admin panel with an almost intuitive interface. Not as intuitive as WordPress, but much more user friendly than Joomla.

Roughly speaking, a non-specialist will not be able to completely make a site on his own, but it is quite possible to fill it with content. In general, MODx probably has one of the most convenient interfaces specifically for the content manager. The arrangement of pages in the admin panel repeats the structure of the site - this is very convenient. In addition, MODX has very good optimization tools: you can easily set up keywords, there is a special section for this.

Pros:

• ​ Convenient interface, easy to work with content even without special knowledge.
• Convenient tools for SEO-optimization.

Minuses:

• Few ready-made modules and templates.

Popular free CMS for online stores

• Opencart
• Prestashop
• Magento

Special CMS for stores are somewhat similar. In addition to the usual options, they are equipped with advanced functionality that is not visible to the user, but available to the admin.

As soon as the buyer has made a purchase, all information about the order is sent to the admin. An order status message is sent automatically.

There are options for categorizing orders by type, based on the terms of delivery, the availability of goods in stock, the type of goods, etc. It is possible to connect payment systems. Many convenient tools and options are also provided for working with the product catalog, it is possible to simultaneously import and export a large number of products from user files. As a rule, already in the pre-installed CMS for stores, they are equipped with a personal account for the buyer.

But most of these CMS have a rather controversial design, and you will need the help of a specialist to install the template. You can't do without knowing the code, and setting it up will take time, knowledge and skills. It is important for you, as a customer, to understand that such a service as installing a template requires different labor costs and qualifications from the contractor, depending on which CMS you are working with.

An example of an online store on the Opencart platform

Popular Paid CMS

• ​ 1C-Bitrix
• UMI.CMS
• NetCat

1C-Bitrix

1C-Bitrix is ​​a development of the domestic company 1C, known for its software product for offices and accounting. It is the most popular among ready-made paid CMS for online stores.

Pros:

• Integration with all necessary products of the 1C company.
• Good tech support.
• Ability to add functionality as needed.
• The presence of a built-in system for monitoring the performance of the site.
• Good site security.

Minuses:

• Significant volume, which requires a large disk space, and, as a result, leads to an increase in the cost of hosting.
• Difficult to set up, you may need the help of programmers.
• High price.

UMI.CMS

Universal CMS from the Russian developer Yumisoft. On its basis, you can create anything: from business card sites to online stores and portals.

Pros:

• User-friendly interface with a set of additional tools.
• ​ Visual Drag-and-Drop editor.
• Website adaptation for mobile devices.
• A SaaS platform that allows you to purchase ready-made websites.

Minuses:

• Difficulty installing additional features.

NetCat

NetCat appeared back in 1999. This is one of the first domestic CMS. NetCat is multifunctional and suitable for sites of almost any type, in addition, it has the ability to integrate with various databases and third-party services.

Pros:

• Ability to manage several stores at once from the admin panel.
• ​ The administrative part is divided into separate interfaces for the user and the developer.
• High level of security.

Minuses:

• Unusual, in some places inconvenient interface.
• Few ready-made templates.

The next stage is the formation of the structure, concept and choice of template

When choosing an engine, you should immediately decide whether your site will be multi-page or single-page. Single-page scrolling sites are recommended for landing pages, promotional pages, brand presentations, or event announcements, or if you expect your target audience to predominantly browse the site on a mobile or tablet.

The structure includes pages, main and secondary menus, navigation logic, internal and external links. Any site should have such important elements as the name of the company (or the name of the author), a description of the activity and contact information.

The structure is largely determined by the content: you need to understand what must be on your site without fail. What information should the visitor receive? How to make it interesting and convenient for him? Yes, it's convenient. After all, if a person came to the site for some purpose, then he should have quick access to the information he is looking for.

To develop the site structure or, in other words, create a prototype, there are many convenient services, for example, moqups.com, where you can work interactively, share with other project participants, and “try on” certain solutions.

Website prototype example at moqups.com

It is important to understand industry specifics . You know the specifics of your business and the needs of your customers better than a website developer. You can consult, consult, but it is you who must formulate the task. And the developer, in turn, will tell you where and how best to place it.

Choosing a template for the site

Template (site theme)- this is a collection of files for CMS, which is an already formed image of the site, design and structural elements. The user only needs to fill the template with his content.

Most templates can be changed, and over a fairly wide range. The user can upload his texts and images to the pages, as well as change the font and its size, the colors of some elements, such as menus, buttons, etc., upload a logo and favicon, add and remove elements.

Templates, like CMS, are paid and free, and the quality does not always depend on the price. It is important to consider how the template is changeable and whether you will have to buy a template and then contact the developers again to adapt it.

You should also pay attention to whether the author of the template provides technical support, whether the Russian language is supported, for which version of the CMS the template is suitable. If the versions do not match, you may experience problems with the installation. It is also important to understand that installing a template on different CMS is different.

For WordPress, for example, installation is done directly from the admin panel, and this is done in just two clicks. A template (or, as it is commonly called in WordPress, a theme) can be installed, activated, tried on, if you don’t like it, deactivate or delete it completely. But for Opencart, installing a new template is a laborious process, and you cannot do without knowing the code. Therefore, the price for such work will be very different.

Appearance and concept of the site

The appearance of the site is largely determined by the location of the elements and content. Even within the same template on the same CMS, you can create different sites beyond recognition. Now the trend is minimalistic sites, where the main element is a stylish HD photo or video. Replace the photo, and the overall impression of the site will also change. In addition, for each CMS there are tons of plugins, applications, add-ons, etc. that will allow you to customize your site as you like.

What can be compared with the modern approach to creating websites? I think this analogy is close.

Previously, in order to get dressed, you had to go to the tailor, and the most important thing was his ability to sew with high quality, and you can come up with your own design. Now creating a website is more like the work of a competent stylist: you need to understand what image you want to get, what ready-made elements this image can be assembled from and where to buy these elements.

I hope that I was able to orient you a little in the variety of options and help you make your choice. Happy shopping on the Internet!

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