During my “Car Shopping for a CMS” webinar, I leaned heavily on that metaphor to describe the difference between a handful of CMS choices: Craft CMS, WordPress, and Wix/Squarespace. A great conversation topic arose around another option: HubSpot CMS. What does it do and how does it fit into the car lot?
After examining arguments by impartial authors, and some others who, perhaps, have more of a stake in the game, I’ve concluded that HubSpot’s CMS (CMS Hub) is the brand-new leased car; except, you can never own it outright.
Let me explain. HubSpot is an all-in-one, hosted solution with the ability for a blog; to make landing pages; robust SEO suggestions and tips; site analytics; A/B and multivariate testing; and Multi-Language capability. All of this and a bag of chips! This smorgasbord of digital delights comes at a (minimum) cost of $3,240/yr for a website that will always belong to the car dealer.
It also relies on a proprietary coding language (HUBL) which is based on a language not as widely used as PHP, so your mechanic (i.e., developer) choices are limited when you want to customize or expand.
One of the pro-Hub articles mentioned that the available templates have come a long way and provide a unique brand experience, but many of their examples look like they could be easily replicated in WordPress.
WordPress (WP) fans out there know that when you start with WP, you can add on, customize, and theme to your heart’s content. CMS Hubbers would have you thinking that your WP site, with all of those pesky plugins and themes, is inherently a security risk, but we know that’s conjecture and we know how to keep your site safe.
While hosting a WordPress site, paying for themes and plugins annually, and a little custom development work here and there comes with a cost, I can say with absolute confidence that ongoing maintenance, licenses, and hosting won’t be $3k a year. An experienced partner can integrate SEO tools, A/B testing, Multi-language support, and even HubSpot’s plugin into your WordPress site, the rights to which are yours and that you can take anywhere, to any developer worth their proverbial wrenches.
As with any business decision, you get to weigh the timeline, budget, flexibility, long-term needs, and goals; and having your digital partner by your side to help, will get you closer faster.
Earthling can do WordPress, HubSpot, and almost everything in between! Make contact.
