As an Engineer I installed WordPress many times, facing issues such as performance and security. When you host WordPress on your own, security is a headache because it’s a super known tool with lots of exploits so you receive strange HTTP requests all the time, trying to take advantage of some vulnerability.
To delegate is something you learn over time and to host the things you build is maybe the first thing you should think to delegate.
WordPress.com offers the possibility to host your instance and depending on your business you have different plans that give you more or less flexibility. I will describe 5 reasons that I consider when I need to implement a CMS (Content Management System) solution.
1 – Popularity
One of the first questions many people (including myself) asks is “who is using it?” And the answer is a lot of people! That means that many sites you visit on a daily basis use WordPress
If you google “WordPress market share” you will get different numbers such as 30%, 40%. I don’t know exactly but at least 1% means a lot of sites.
And why is so used? Well, continue reading…
2 – Flexibility
- Host by your own: you can download a zip file, upload to your host, edit a config file and that’s it.
- Host in wordpress.com
- Free and paid themes: you can change how your site looks like with just one click. And the most important: most of the themes are mobile-friendly.
- Total control when you host it since you have access to the source code
- Plugins. There are literally one plugin for everything you need and most of them are free or at least a free entry-level.
- Monetize. Paid or self-hosted you can install ads to monetize your site. In my case my plan allows me to add ads with more or less flexibility.
3 – SEO
You may write awesome content but will be kind of hidden if searching bots can’t read your site properly. The good news is most of the themes are SEO friendly so you won’t have to worry about that.
Anyway, standards and the way Google scans your site changes over time so it’s a good practice to be updated once a year what are the new tags / best practices to be implemented.
4 – Free and paid plans
You can have your WordPress site just for free. Just create an account at wordpress.com and start writing your content. Paid plans allow you, among other things:
- Monetize
- Your site under your own domain: example.com
- Install more advanced plugins
- Edit layouts by adding pre-built widgets
5 – Awesome editor
To write content is a pleasure, the Gutenberg editor is awesome!
You don’t need to touch HTML to make your magic like in old times.
See more about Gutenberg editor at https://wordpress.org/gutenberg/
