Nonprofit hack: Which website platform should you choose?
When we were planning this website, we realized there are SO many development options to choose from, between Squarespace, Wix, Weebly, Wordpress, etc. I personally have been working in the digital space for almost 10 years, and website development has evolved so much over that time. And continues to evolve at lightning speed. So I did some research before jumping in and wanted to share what I found.
The good news for nonprofits and purpose-driven businesses is that there are excellent budget friendly, “no code” development options. So building your own website has never been easier with options like Squarespace or Wix, which have beautiful templates and a ton of features and flexibility. These all-in-one solutions include hosting, domain names, and integrations with marketing and mailing campaigns.
But open source solutions like Wordpress and Drupal are still important options if you are looking for content management systems (CMS). In other words, if you have a LOT of content that you need to organize, store, publish, etc, that’s when you’d want to use a CMS. There are some excellent, user-friendly Wordpress themes out there that make it easy to put together a site, like the ones listed here. But for more complex functionality, chances are you’d need to work with a Wordpress or Drupal developer unless you have those skills in house.
In order to make this decision, it’s super important to put together a plan, including considering:
What do you want your site to achieve, and who do you want to communicate with?
What kind of content do you want to place on the site? How often will you be adding content? Does each type of audience see the same kind of content?
There’s so much more to putting together a thoughtful strategy - and it’s worth doing the work! Because it will not only help you make the decision about which platform to use, but clarify what kind of pages and navigation and design you’ll want to have.
There are a lots of head to head comparisons of the different platform options available online. But sorting through the comparisons can be overwhelming.
So if you’re thinking of revamping your existing website or creating a new website, get in touch with us and we can help you sort through what to consider in your website strategy and design.