Joomla or WordPress; Which CMS is Right for SEO

That is exactly the deciding factor for choosing a particular content management system for e-commerce and business websites. You can find a ton of articles, reviews, pros and cons lists and quick tutorials about Joomla and WordPress, because these are easily the two most popular and widely used CMS platforms. Whatever pros and cons there may be about each one is not what is most important, despite the popularity of articles that spell each one out. The best approach to discovering which CMS is best is to review the features, advantages, possibilities, and types of websites most commonly used for each one.

Joomla Overview
The biggest difference between Joomla and WordPress, as stated by many who have reviewed these two content management systems, is that WordPress was originally designed as a blogging platform that later acquired CMS capabilities for more than just blogs. Joomla, however, has always been a true content management system.

Many users and developers swear by Joomla’s potential to basically do anything that a user wants, especially when add-ons are used to their full extent. This isn’t completely true, because there are CMSs with much deeper capabilities, layers and multi-multi-level menus and tons more modules. However, if strictly compared to WordPress, Joomla does have a much, much deeper module core, even in its default, out-of-the-box package.

What webmasters need to know initially is that it is probably not a CMS they can install themselves. Joomla has a learning curve set at a much more technologically-oriented level. In other words, it’s easy for developers and designers to install, but not for just anyone. It can be learned, but it would take weeks or even months for most people without web design, development, or related skills. What this means, essentially, is that while WordPress can be installed by pretty much any webmaster/site owner, those who opt for Joomla will most certainly need to hire a developer to install the CMS initially. Then the webmaster will also need to decide whether or not to keep the developer on board for future add-ons, changes and developments, or whether to have the developer teach the system management for independent self-maintenance. Either way, do not assume because Joomla is open-source and free to install, that there will be no costs associated with it. The costs do not come directly from Joomla, but initial investment and start-up costs will be necessary to set it up. Cost amount will depend upon things like depth of extensions, multi-level applications, source code customizations, etc. There will also be ongoing fees for maintenance and management of site development, with or without hiring a developer on a continued basis.

Joomla Extensions: Functions and Features
Moving onto the most noteworthy features and functions of Joomla, broken down into subcategories. There are four types of extensions in the Joomla CMS. These are the core skeleton of a CMS, and there are four types of extensions