Picking the Right CMS - WordCamp Toronto 2014
Transcript of Picking the Right CMS - WordCamp Toronto 2014
PICKING THE RIGHT CMSALAN LOK - WORDCAMP TORONTO 2014
THE ANSWER IS SIMPLE!IS IT NOW?
My client is asking for a site…
that is editable
with a blog
that can collect email address for newsletter
with great SEO controls
that increases social presence
with an events calendar
that sells products
to interface with third party APIs
with a membership portal
that can sell tickets for events
with a CRM
with forms and survey capabilities
that is multilingual
that has a Partridge in a Pear Tree
and by the way, it must be in…
Liferay
Drupal
Joomla
WordPress
TYPOlight
Plone
SharePoint
Concrete5
Alfresco
dotCMS
Radiant
Magneto
TYPO3
ExpressionEngine
and I have to host it at
A tier 3 datacenter with Windows 2003 server and IIS 6
Amazon AWS
Rackspace
GoDaddy Shared Hosting
Microsoft Azure
Google Compute Engine
My cousin’s basement
I need it
for $200in 3 weeks awesome
and it must look
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/design_hell
GATHER CLIENT INTELKNOWING IS ONLY HALF OF THE BATTLE
Answer these questions
Whois your client
Whatdoes your client want
Wheredoes it need to be hosted
Whendoes it need to be live
Whyis your client looking
Howit gets done
Who is your client?
Is the client tech savvy (or self-sufficient)?
Can your client afford your solution?
Will updates be required often?
Who is the client’s intended audience (type and size)?
What does your client want
What is the end product? A bird? A plane?
Is there an site that you are migrating from?
Is there a proposed information architecture?
Any sites similar to your current client’s domain to base this work on?
Where does it need to be hosted
Where will the website be hosted?
WordPress requirements:
PHP 5.2.4+
MySQL 5.0+
mod_rewrite (or equivalent)From: https://wordpress.org/about/requirements/
When does it need to be live
Set proper expectations
Consider commercial templates
Hosting location
Don’t forget the domains!
Why is your client looking
Why does your client needing a CMS?
Educate your client
How it gets done
Will you do all or part of the work?
Will it be done in phases?
Do you need to work with the client’s IT team and/or previous site maintainers?
Delineate responsibilities in your quote
MOST IMPORTANT CLIENT
PROJECT
DATE CLIENTNOW
CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMSKNOW YOUR COMPETITION
Versions: 3.3 (STS), 2.5 (LTS)
Platforms: LAMP
Strengths: relatively big commercial component market, mature OSS component / extension community
Drupal
Versions: 8 (Beta), 7 (STS), 6 (LTS)
Platform: PHP, MySQL/PostgreSQL/SQLite
Strengths: Symfony-based (Drupal 8) for easy plugin development, great workflow management, versatile database backend
What to watch for: A few enterprise-level hosting/support services are available, all independent of Drupal (http://www.quora.com/GetPantheon-vs-Omega8-vs-Acquia-pros-and-cons-of-each)
WordPress Joomla DrupalInstalls Worldwide
http://trends.builtwith.com/cms 12.7m 2.8m 730kActively Maintained Extensions
34,451 https://wordpress.org/plugins/
8,596 http://extensions.joomla.org/
14,688 https://www.drupal.org/project/
project_moduleSEO Yoast SEO sh404sef SEO Tools
Calendar The Events Calendar jEvents Calendar
Community BuddyPress Community BuilderJomSocial Organic Groups
Event Registration Events Manager DT Register Entity Registration
Shopping Cart WooCommerce GetShopped
HikaShop, Virtuecart j2store Drupal Commerce
Newsletters MailPoet ACYMailing MimeMail/SimpleNews
Forums BBPress Kunena Forums (Core)
Gallery Gallery, NextGEN Gallery Phone Gallery (Core - content type)
Forms Formidable, Ninja Forms Chronoforms Webform
CDN/Acceleration W3 Total Cache, Super Cache CDN for Joomla CDN
i18n See Matt Smith’s slides! (Core) (Core)
Enterprise Web CMS
SSO/SAML
PaaS/SaaS integration
Commercial LTS services
Content staging
Gartner WCM/ECM reports
CLIENT STORIESIT’S NEVER SO BLACK AND WHITE
Low budget website (non-profit)
Original State:
Static HTML site with SnippetMaster editor (PHP-based) for fragment content editing
Designed and deployed by someone initially for very cheap
Client was looking to add an events calendar and blog.
Client possesses basic HTML skills
Proposal:
Move static site to WordPress
Install plugins to provide gallery and events calendar functionality
Convert existing template via off-shore service
Migrate content to WordPress and preserve existing URLs
Low budget website (non-profit)
Result:
Client rejected proposal (cost)
There was a potential hosting change to Windows/IIS/MSSQL
Continued to service client to maintain HTML/JS/CSS files that are restricted by the fragment editor
Retrospect:
Client didn’t need WordPress or its powerful features
Total money spent after 3 years is still less than the WordPress proposed
Activist Website(case courtesy of GrassRiots.com)
Request:
Originally in Drupal
Single shared host at Bluehost
Client needs simpler edit interface
New digital team to take over existing site
Internationalization required in 6 languages
Solution:
Converted to WordPress and extended with custom plugins and taxonomies
Migrated by starting in a subsection and slowly expanded to a full site
Scaled out using Amazon AWS
I want my blog back in my domain
Request:
Client has a Joomla site
Set up a wordpress.org blog with content and bring her blog hosting back in her domain
Solution:
Created WP blog in her subdomain
Backed up and restored WP blog to new subdomain site
Used RSS module to pull newsfeeds from blog to Joomla site
Doctor’s Website
Request:
Doctor has Office 365 Enterprise subscription
Owns a domain with GoDaddy
Wants a simple website
Solution:
Used SharePoint (part of O365 subscription)
Selected a simple template
Added a contact us form
High traffic retail site
Request:
New API Integration to a SaaS platform
Strong workflow management and content staging/scheduling
Requires enterprise support, but hosting to be done by the retailer
Internal Proposals:
Deciding between WordPress or Drupal as a development base
Need stable base for module development to this SaaS platform, which libraries are provided in PHP
HOW DO YOU PITCH?MY APPROACH TO TALKING WITH CLIENTS
Research your client
Domain:
Understand the client’s domain
Study the competition
Assess the kind of plugins and components needed to complete the job
Client:
Tech savvy
IT team in the way?
Qualification process? EOI? RFQ? RFP?
Size of company = relative cost/complexity
My pitch - the meeting
Allow the client to discuss needs and woes
Present your capabilities
Provide an ROI for why it needs to be done
Be prepared to offer other solutions
Why WordPress?
Easy-to-use interface
Extensive plugin library to increase functionality
Wealth of themes for clients who are looking to lower cost
Supported by most hosting companies
Name-drop on big companies using WordPress: CNN, Time, Global News, Rogers Digital Media
Because you love WordPress!
THANKS!Web: wlx.ca Twitter: @alan_lok