Yet I know some small business owners who feel they must get their own “special” content management system for their particular needs. Of course, you can have anything you want in this world – you just have to pay for it.

And that’s why WordPress works as an optimal, flexible and extensible solution for any start-up business, or a small business getting off the ground, or indeed a home-based business.

In short, no other content management platform (for me at least, and that includes Drupal and Joomla!) comes close to WordPress for offering an optimal solution for managing web site content.

Here’s why:

1. It’s free, open source software.
2. It gives you complete control of content – something which is really important for search engine optimisation
3. You don’t have to use it as a blog. You can use it to build a site.
4. You can install it with the click of a button from almost any hosting control panel
5. It’s developed by communities of developers meaning it’s robust, and at any time, anywhere in the world, you can have thousands of developers working on solutions to common bugs, problems and hacks.
6. If you have a problem, just Google it. Someone, somewhere will have experienced exactly the same problem and solved it. That means solving problems faster, and less time employing developers to research and fix intractable problems
7. There are thousands of “plugins” which you literally “plug in” like lego to customise the functionality
8. There are thousands of free and paid-for themes meaning you can plug in simple designs
9. Want to change your whole site design? Just find a developer and get her to develop a new theme for you – no downtime, no messing about with static pages
10. It is AWESOME for search engine optimisation – especially if you’re a small business and you can’t afford the big fees the agencies charge for SEO.
11.  It is infinitely customisable. So it has all the benefits on squillions of people using it (support being one) and yet you can always make it your own.

This site is powered by WordPress. I also know a few other companies using WordPress. They include:

• Sony
• Ford
• Ebay
• The New York Times
• The Wall Street Journal
• Ben & Jerry
• Cambridge University Press

Just a bit of food for thought before you ask your design agency to build you something “special”. Chances are you’re going to be paying the price for a long time to come…

Agree? Disagree? Leave me a comment or retweet…