Best CMS Platform of 2024: WordPress, Squarespace & HubSpot
Are you planning on setting up a website for your business or any kind of project you’re up to? You’ve probably been wondering which CMS platform would fit best taking into account the content and the goal of your future site, so we’re here to shed some light on this matter and make a review about three of the most popular CMS platforms of 2024: WordPress, HubSpot and Squarespace.
This isn’t exactly about the best CMS platform of 2024 itself, but which one is best for your business in particular. That said, take your time to think about what you expect from a website, what’s your budget and, especially, your commerce goals so that you can choose wisely.
Features To Bear in Mind
In order to make it even easier for you to decide which CMS platform is best for your business, we should be discussing which are the features you need to think about when making a choice between platforms such as WordPress, Squarespace or HubSpot. These are some of the most important ones:
Now is your turn to start asking yourself questions including what does your site need, how do you want it to look like, if you need marketing features or not and many more aspects you’ll need to settle on before starting this journey. Let’s go!
Cost
What kind of budget do you have? You should know by now there’s going to be some services which are inevitable — the domain, for example — and, therefore, you should be choosing a CMS platform that fits both your needs and your budget. Let’s see what are the rates for each one of them when it comes to their pricing tiers or extra payments for certain features.
HubSpot
We should begin with HubSpot as it’s one of the best CMS platforms for beginners, starting with its Content Management System Free Plan, which can get you a small but secure website in a week. You’ll then have access to the free CRM (Customer Relationship Management), as well as integrations with mail automation platforms and a marketing functionality.
Nevertheless, in case you’d like to have extra features or, for example, go beyond the 25 website pages limit that offers HubSpot’s free plan, you can also upgrade it to the Starter Plan. This costs from $23/month and includes, among other features, around 1,000 marketing contacts and several Hubs (commerce, sales, service, content and operations).
WordPress
This one can brag about powering over 40% of websites globally speaking and being the most popular open-source CMS, but what does WordPress have to offer? Although it’s a free, open-source software — meaning there’s no pricing tiers —, you do have to pay for hosting, which can start from $2/month depending on your needs. Moreover, there are some plugins or certain features that also need to be paid before using them.
That said, there’s something you also need to take into account when choosing WordPress as your CMS platform, and that’s its difficulty in terms of building a website. If you’re not willing to spend much time doing so or you don’t have that kind of skills, there’s a chance you may need to outsource that work and, therefore, end up spending more.
Squarespace
Regarding Squarespace, this is also one of the best options for someone who needs to do a small investment and doesn’t need endless features. Their cheapest subscription starts from $16/month and you’ll have access to hosting as well as basic security features. In case you need to launch your website with a tight budget and as soon as you can, Squarespace may be your best choice for that.
Maintenance
Did you think it was all about building a website? Unfortunately, we’re currently living in an ever-changing world that will require from you to stay up to date in terms of information. This means you’ll need to make updates on your website from time to time, so you should pay attention to how any of these CMS platforms allow you to make changes and updates.
HubSpot
We don’t want to seem like we have a favorite, but… HubSpot really knows how to keep it simple when it comes to maintenance and content updates. It offers a drag-n-drop editor that makes it really simple to edit, add or remove content you want to modify, see the changes before uploading them to the website and save them automatically. What else can you ask for?
WordPress
As you can imagine, WordPress is not that simple regarding maintenance, mainly because it’s a more technical platform and it’ll all depend on your skill level — unless you outsource this work as we mentioned before. Without a function like the drag-n-drop HubSpot offers, editing content in WordPress has to be made with Elementor, its own plugin for design matters.
Squarespace
If we have to choose a design feature that Squarespace stands out for, that’d be its beautifully designed templates, which are user-friendly and easy to edit for beginners. This means you won’t need to hire someone for designing your website and, with just a bit of patience, you’ll be able to get a pretty good result.
Customization
What’s the idea behind your website? What color palette fits better with it? Let’s see how much these platforms let you express your thoughts.
HubSpot
Although HubSpot doesn’t have the variety of themes that you may find in WordPress, the truth is you still can choose from a wide range of themes which also have a built-in guide to guide you through the process. You can also include forms and other modules or UI elements to diversify your content, as well as visiting the HubSpot’s Module Marketplace if you feel like you need something else.
WordPress
We’ve slipped it before, but we’ll tell you again: WordPress’ theme library is nearly endless. You can find both free and paid ones that will allow you to include blocks for text, video, images and any other elements you want to share with your audience. However, if there’s anything you can’t find on those themes, don’t forget to take a look at plugins, something this platform is really famous for — although sometimes it can get a bit annoying the fact of using a new plugin for every little detail or feature.
Squarespace
Last, but not least, Squarespace has its own pre-designed templates where you can change elements such as font and background colors on one page of your website or all at once. The only disadvantage you may encounter is the fact of having to embed a form on every single page you want it to be, as these templates don’t apply it site-wide.
Time to Mull Over
And that’s a wrap! Although there are other features you should also take into account when choosing the best CMS platform for your business, such as security or client support, we really think these are a good starting point. Now it’s your turn to think about your goals and needs and decide between WordPress, HubSpot or Squarespace for your project.