Ahead of The Winding Curve: Drupal Must Press On As A Top CMS
While Microsoft and Starbucks execs can sleep peacefully tonight with little threat to their considerable empires, there is no such security in the world of Content Management Systems (CMS). Vegas odds-makers make a living in the gambling world by setting the odds of success for “the favorite” versus “the underdog” in a given competition. A “push” indicates that there is no advantage for either opponent, and therefore the outcome is a complete toss-up.
Generally, a big win for Vegas means that the public has a flawed perception of the competitors. That is, people are not generally evaluating the most important criteria for head-to-head performance when placing their bets. These principles apply to predicting where CMS usage is headed this year.
Name recognition and brand awareness builds momentum for a product to be given the nod as a favorite in the public eye. However, a slide to sub-par performance can quickly erode that name recognition advantage and cause P.R. problems for a given CMS.
Top 3 open source CMS platforms
According to this LevelTen whitepaper, WordPress, Joomla and Drupal are three open source CMS platforms that carry a distinct advantage with consumers. They are the most widely used among CMS options and have the most support available. Drupal stands out as LevelTen’s CMS of choice for a variety of reasons. But even Drupal started out as one of the “little guys” with a mountain to climb and a host of opponents.
The challenge of growing while remaining efficient is now at hand. For now, Drupal ranks at the top of user satisfaction reports, provides a powerful platform for non-profit organizations, and projects to be scalable and reliable enough to meet enterprise demands. All of that is just fine, but future success is contingent upon Drupal remaining innovative and keeping up with user and programmer needs through more development.
Those who favor Drupal expect it to continue on as an industry leader, exceeding the performances of other emerging CMS options. A commitment to further innovation will make the underdogs continue to chase Drupal and eliminate some factors that create "push" or toss-up outcomes.
