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Five Most Promising Content Management Systems for Website Designers

April 2, 2012 - Last Modified: March 29, 2014 by Alexandra Brian

A few years before, building a website by using HTML/CSS was not a big deal, but these days, there is a whole wreath of Content Management Systems, or CMSes, out there, that are making the jobs of the developers much easier. Many content management systems are difficult to understand and may require suitable programming knowledge of languages such as of PHP.

Criteria for Selecting A Simple CMS:

Every designer wants to use a CMS, which does what is being asked for without getting overly bloated and is simple to use. In selecting such a system, a CMS should be:

Easy to learn
Have simple functioning techniques, should not require advanced PHP, and have a simple HTML and CSS language
Must be easy to use
Have an intuitive Control Panel
Have a good documentation and a strong community

The quality options regarding the extensible content management systems is growing more and more with each passing year. Consequently, it is important that the designers must know about these systems and make their work easier.

Top Five Content Management Systems for Designers

Take a moment and look over the list below to know the top five content management options available for every website designer over the web.

1. ExpressionEngine:

One of the most favored systems is this one. ExpressionEngine is said to be one of the best ones for designers due to its simplicity and usability. Here are some of its more benefits:

Expression Engine Content Management System

This CMS uses its own templating language that is similar to HTML
With limited template tags, it is easier to understand
You can create any type of static html template you want, and easily drop it into the system
Any html template is an ExpressionEngine template
You can also create a completely static website and have it in ExpressionEngine
You can easily wrap the template tags around the content you want to allow others to edit or to become dynamic
The documentation in ExpressionEngine is good. In addition, the community is active and helpful as compared to WordPress or Drupal, and is smaller
ExpressionEngine offers customer support via the forums

The only complaint about this CMS is that it is not an open source. You have to pay per license of the software.

2. MODX

MODX is the closest open source alternative, which resembles to ExpressionEngine in many ways:

It completely control your html and CSS templates
Consists of a similar control panel, called the Manager

MODX also have a lot more intuitive than other CMSes like Drupal. If you have proficiency in HTML and CSS, you can learn this CMS in a few weeks.

3. Concrete5

It is another open source CMS. Although there is no templating in Concrete5, it is easier than the other two CMSes.

It is most efficient in making editing the content for clients super simpler. With this, you can do everything from the front end of the website.

4. WebPop

WebPop is a very different from others and is a cloud based, hosted CMS. To work on this, you have to buy an account and pay a monthly fee where they host the website, the data, and the Control Panel. You have an option of just buying a couple different levels of accounts, instead of paying per website. This option may seem a bit pricy at first, but would actually cost less than individual hosting plans.

WebPop is also the best solution for a freelance company who builds many little static websites. However, there are a few things lacking in WebPop. There is no community or any kind of documentation available.

5. WordPress

WordPress is the most widely known CMS there. It used to be a blogging platform before but worked its way and today you can find most things you will need as a plugin. The reason behind its success is the ease of use and the premium templates it offers.

A few drawbacks of WordPress include its lacking in the CMS department as it does no templating very well as the others mentioned above.

In summation, the above stated top five content management systems will be perfect for the any web design services provider firms or designers and the clients alike. If you want to move your website in the greener pastures, in minimal time, you should apply one of these CMSes to your website.

{ 8 Responses }

Carsten says:

Before I creatd my new website I have tested several CMS like Joomla, Typo3 and Drupal. For my blogs and smaller websites I use Wordpress. but for my corporate website I have decided to use Drupal which is rather easy to learn and to design. You can use Drupal in a small site as well as for a big comprehensive website. Typo3 uses its own code for the theme and you need to hire a specialist for theming. This is not for me because I want to be able to do at least smaller updates and redesigns by myself.
Mark Steven says:

Content Control (http://www.contentcontrol.com) is an excellent solution for designers on the Java stack: very similar in structure to MODx, but goes a few steps further in offering template, script, CSS (all code in fact) editing within the CMS. Which means no FTP connections required, no need for local edits and commits. Plus there's versioning on every asset. A new designer starting in on version 7 was raving about how the learning curve was "almost totally flat", compared to Drupal which was off the chart, and WordPress, somewhere in between.
Sara says:

A certain criterium , for me in order to use a CMS, is to be easy to use it and to learn it.I haven't explore the others CMS and that's why I use WP.Plugins as you say, are really helpful indeed!II liked your presentation and I think I'll search the others a little deeper.
Becca says:

I was not aware of that CMS. I don’t ever think I have been looking for it, but it give some nice opportunities for sure. Thank you once again for learning me a new CMS.
Bishwajeet says:

You forgot some of the free and robust open source CMS like Joomla and Drupal.
Trung Nguyen says:

I only have heard about these CMS such as Wordpress, Joomla, Dupal before, and I will check these CMS you shared on this post, looking for what makes them difference. Thanks for share.
Mike says:

Thanks Alexandra, I've been looking for alternatives to Wordpress for my clients. I love Wordpress but I think it's so freely available that its difficult to recommend for professional use. I've used Joomla in the past but found it really clunky to work with, will have a look into these.
Alex Hub says:

I am using Wordpress but what if I would like to switch to some other platform that you have mentioned above is there any disadvantage of changing the platform?

Five Most Promising Content Management Systems for Website Designers