Using Wordpress as CMS for large Websites
-
Is Wordpress good enough to be used as a full fledge CMS for a large website. In particular, I'm talking about a news website. We have been online since 2002 but pretty soon we will have digitized our print newspaper archives of about 60 years. So, my question is, is it OK to use Wordpress for the entire website and if so what are some of the important things that need to be kept in mind.
Cheers!
-
Joomla can be very slow for large sites and drupal requires programmers. I would also recommend looking at the yoast wordpress seo plugin. I use it for all my sites and he has alot of info on how to optimise wordpress.
I am a regular reader of dawn, Good to see they are finally upgrading
-
add a +1 from me for wordpress. As mentioned above, there are several large sites using it effectively.
-
Thanks Barry,
The thing is we've already made the shift to WP but I was wondering thats an OK solution for a popular news website. As for Google news, we're amongst the favorites their when it comes to Pakistan news, as that's where we operate so that's not an issue. Thanks for giving the rest of the pointers!
Best,
Rishad.
-
Well, if the New York Times can use it...
Things to remember though:
- You'll need this - http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-news-sitemap-generator/ - or similar.
If not (and there's no real reason not to) then think about your URL structure, you must use a non-date like number (minimum 3 digits) in the URL. Thus please take into account your permalink structures to include something like %post_id% or other identifier.
-
To be included in Google news you need at least 3 journalists (I think). As you're a newspaper I don't see that being a problem, but make your staff list easily found on the site.
-
Even as a real news site you may initially be rejected from Google news (I'm sure they do it just to weed out the people that don't really believe they should be there). So if rejected submit again
-
Speed. Cache everything - http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/w3-total-cache/
-
Categorization. Make sure you have your site structure down and not just adding things haphazardly.
-
User roles and permissions. If journalists are going to be adding directly, make sure you've set up what they can and can't do.
-
Think hard about going for it. Movable Type is a very good option for news sites as well and is much more secure (this is a fact, I WP, don't jump on me for saying it - http://www.movabletype.com/blog/2008/06/movable-type-a-history-of-secu.html - Although WP is a bit better now :D). MT is updated far less regularly and is usually much more stable as well. So just consider your options.
-
Unfortunately, our techies are just as bad as our journalists. I guess we should stick with Wordpress then, I am aware of the scalibility issues but journos are most comfortable with the platform so can\t decide which way to go because our website is going to get larger and larger in the comng times!
-
Thanks for the resource brother...
-
I would definitely check out other CMS solutions such as Drupal, Joomla and MODx.
I love Wordpress for small sites (less than 1000 pages), but I think the CMS has some problems in terms of scalability - especially if you require lots of different templates - or even worse - multilingual variations.
If you have lots of developers, you obviously have the muscle for massive customizations, which makes it more likely to succeed.
Another criteria to keep in mind is the tech savyness of the journalists. If you aren't too comfortable with IT, Wordpress might be your best bet.
In sum, Wordpress will probably favor the journalists, while Drupal / Joomla / MODx will favor the tech team. Don't know who you want to help out the most
-
If you are looking to engage community I wholeheartedly recommend Buddy Press for Word Press. Plenty of useful plugins for it around.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Does redirecting the existing URLs in the website without reducing our current rankings? The new website runs on the bubble, so it seems there is no provisions to redirect the existing URLs to this platform?
Hi Moz Fans, There are some clarification needed in a website revamping and loosing of current website rank. Please go through the questions and would be great if you like to share some insights on it. 1. We would like to revamp our existing website by joining hands with the bubble visual programming platform. Thus, kindly let us know if there are provisions to redirect the existing URLs to this platform. We would also like to know if this kind of redirecting affects the current website ranking. If yes, how can we redirect the existing URLs in bubble without reducing our current rankings? 2. As a part of the revamping of our website, we would like to enquire about the possibilities of its relaunch via bubble. Does it cause any changes for the current rankings of our website if we redirect the existing URLs via bubble? If yes, is there any provision to redirect the URLs without affecting the current ranking of the website?
Web Design | | OceanAirTravels0 -
How to check if the website has duplicate content?
I've been working with the websites from couple of months and it was always in my mind if there could be a legit way to find if the website have a duplicate content. I've tried couple of websites through google but nothing worked for me. It would be much appreciated if anyone can help. Thanks
Web Design | | rajveer_singh0 -
Link juice passing from a .org.uk link to a .org/uk websites
Hi all, A client I am working on had a CMS built in recently which has resulted in all their canonicals tags being taken off the website, and as such the same page with both a .org/uk and .org.uk/uk domain have appeared in the search results and I am wondering what your guys take is on the best cause of action. For further background: Historically they have always used .org.uk/uk (not sure why) for their UK website and used .org/xxx for other countries (they also have a .org splashpage FYI). Having seen the .org/uk pages, and knowing they have to choose one to avoid duplication, they would like to move their uk website to the .org/uk domain to fit in with the rest of the divisions. However due to the historical use of .org.uk/uk their backlink profile contains links to both the .org.uk and .org domains. My question then: would a canonical tag on all the .org.uk/uk pages pointing to the .org/uk pages be strong enough to pass on link juice to the .org/uk pages (from all links pointing to .org.uk) or would a 301 redirect be required in this instance, or indeed would it be best to stay with the .org.uk/uk domain? Thanks, Diana
Web Design | | Diana.varbanescu0 -
New website and new domain
Hi, We have a domain with current e-commerce site on, about 5 years old. We have a new website being built with a different company and a new domain name. We are transferring our old domain over to new provider and 301'ing the domain to new domain. However, we can not take the current website with us, so we lose all our links/pages etc.. How important would it be to take a wrap of our current website to keep all the pages alive? Is there anything we can do so oldurl.com/brand/tshirt/ doesnt lose its rank? Can we 301 individual pages if we dont have the actual website? Just the domain name. Any help be great. Thanks
Web Design | | YNWA0 -
‘80-90% of SEO already done for you in Wordpress’ Am I missing something?
Hi there, I’m looking for some feedback on a statement made on my Facebook Page re Wordpress and SEO. Please understand I wouldn’t class myself as an expert but I am competent and achieve satisfactory results for clients, more so since becoming a SEOmoz Pro user, I’ve just had some great results for a client using SEOmoz guidelines in ‘On Page SEO Reports’ thank you very much! A comment however made on my FB page has got my interest…. “as you (kn)no(w) google loves WP and will get listed quicker as 80 to 90% of your SEO is already done” Does Wordpress (or Joomla for that matter mentioned in the same conversation) have some SEO advantages that Google loves as the poster would have me believe, can I save time and effort working in word press from an SEO point of view? I use the age old techniques of targeting key phrases and words and distributing them accordingly. Creating internal link structures with ‘key worded anchor text’ etc before embarking on any off page SEO. Do any of you vastly experienced (in comparison to me) SEO folk have any insight into what this statement refers to? I did not gather any references to SEO advantages in Wordpress or Joomla in the Enge and Fishkin et al book The Art of SEO, or any of the other books I’ve read, to develop my knowledge on SEO for the benefit of my clients and of course my pocket. J
Web Design | | JemRobinson0 -
What pluggin translator is the newest and the best to install on wordpress. Thank you very much
What pluggin translator is the newest and the best to install on wordpress. Thank you very much
Web Design | | maestrosonrisas0 -
How to serve a Mobile & Full Site using one URL?
Hello, Does anyone know of any resources or tutorials that outline how to serve a smartphone-formatted website using the same URL as the full site? I know that one solution is using media-queries to serve a seperate CSS stylesheet, but you still have the full HTML source code. In other words, I might want to serve a smartphone & desktop user different content, but under one URL. WP Touch (Wordpress Plugin) is a perfect example of what I mean, but how is it technically achieved? It serves two different sets of HTML for smartphone & full, but using one URL http://www.bravenewcode.com/store/plugins/wptouch-pro/
Web Design | | petecampbell-bmi0