Drupal or WordPress? Which CMS is right for your business…

We run into this question on a weekly basis with at least one client wanting the right CMS solution, but not sure which one out of the two they should choose for their business website.
Having spent years with our developer’s project managing both for Drupal and WordPress, they are both exceptional CMS platforms (Content Management System) that use Open Source development.
Most of the time, I will say WordPress is the solution for your business website and for a good reason, it’s fast to build, flexible, easy to update content and it’s relatively easy to upgrade the site and plugins to the latest version.
However, we do see companies and businesses that are either already using the Drupal platform or who require the platform as their requirements lend themselves to it.
Examples of this include a client who is a large medical publisher with a suite of websites and applications that required the Drupal framework. With a growing content of over 5,000+ pages and a complex content structure of medical terminology, it made sense to use the rich content structure of what Drupal offers, utilising complex taxonomies, content nodes and blocks.You just can’t get this level of detail with WordPress, but do you need to?
WordPress single site has 5 user roles, more than enough for most companiesThe complexities of Drupal make it an expensive platform to choose, and we recommend our clients to choose the best platform based on their needs and budget.
If you require a brochure website up to 50 pages, you don’t need to use Drupal, if you are a medium to large size organisation that relies on critical applications or has 500 pages of content that need to be categorised then Drupal could be the choice.

Even older websites that are already on the Drupal platform, using Drupal 6 (Now Obsolete) or D7 need to consider should they upgrade to D8 or start fresh elsewhere.

Its a big decision for any Drupal site owner, and not one to be taken lightly as it will be a big financial expense and the upgrade might create a number of functionality issues especially if some of your modules have not been ported.

With Drupal costs on average 3 – 4 times more than that of a WordPress site, the budget also dictates your choice platform and future maintenance fees.
With a 10k – 15k budget you can have an entry level Drupal website or the same budget could get you a robust WordPress site and a 6-month online marketing budget to direct traffic to your website and generate the leads you require.Most small to medium sized business we work with want to see a return on their investment with a combined website development and a marketing strategy package.What are your experiences using either WordPress or Drupal? – let us know.