We migrated our website to the HubSpot CMS in 2017, from WordPress. We were at the bleeding edge of HubSpot's development of the CMS (Content Management System). It wasn't until 2022 that we developed site for a client using the HubSpot CMS Hub that made me think HubSpot has built an amazing system.
WordPress became our favourite CMS after we [sadly] dropped New Zealand's very own SilverStripe. We started using HubSpot (Marketing Hub) in 2016 for our marketing and HubSpot CRM (Customer Relationship Management) and we kept our WordPress website with the HubSpot Tracking Code embedded. In 2017 we migrated our website to HubSpot CMS. Over the years we redesigned the site three times, ending up with the Custom Theme you see today.
What is a Content Management System?
A content management system (CMS) is software that helps users create, manage, and modify content on a website without the need for technical knowledge. In other words, a CMS lets you build a website without needing to write code from scratch (or even know how to code at all).
Both HubSpot CMS Hub and WordPress can host blogs, website pages and landing pages (for offers and campaigns). With HubSpot Marketing Hub you get landing pages included. Many businesses host their landing pages in different systems e.g. their website on WordPress and their landing pages in HubSpot.
We've tried a lot of Content Management Systems
Over the last few decades we worked with several frameworks and dozens of content management systems. Every system has its pros and cons, and like all software every system has some annoying points. We've compiled some of the best and worst bits of both HubSpot and WordPress to help you decide which suits your business better.
But first, here's a list of the common competitors and why we won't touch them:
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Squarespace – ok for online brochures, but it lacks any professional tools. Squarespace can embed the HubSpot Tracking code to make it more useful. -
Wix – an amateur tool that's only good for hobby websites. Wix is the only CMS that HubSpot Tracking Code doesn't work consistently. -
Webflow – a glorified prototyping tool that is not suitable for anything other than brochure websites. The HubSpot Tracking Code can be embedded in Webflow. -
Umbraco – a dinosaur that's hard to use, inflexible and expensive. Umbraco can be integrated with HubSpot Tracking Code. -
Drupal – open source dinosaurs that are free and expensive because you need a team of developers to maintain and run it. You can integrate the HubSpot Tracking Code but your developers will want to code their own CRM. -
Joomla – open source dinosaurs that are free and expensive because you need a team of developers to maintain and run it. You can integrate the HubSpot Tracking Code but your developers will want to code their own CRM. -
Any system your designer, or developer is pushing that they say is better than everything else for reasons they fail to communicate. Buzzwords are common and so are fads – unless your designer or developer can show you case studies and market validation then beware.
So, now I've offended any designers or developers reading this here's why we use and recommend the HubSpot CMS or WordPress for your CMS.
What both systems have in common
In the lists below we've excluded features that have become essential:
Content Management
Both systems make it easy for marketing teams to manage content including website pages, blog posts and landing pages. Both systems allow you to assign tags to a blog post to group related content.
Mobile friendly
There's no point in looking at a content management system if it's not publishing mobile friendly for website visitors. Google prioritizes and indexes mobile content over desktop content because most people view content on their phone.
Themes
Both have a range of flexible themes to style and layout your content. WordPress themes far outnumber HubSpot Themes but that's not necessarily a good thing.
Membership Sites
While HubSpot has its own Membership Site functionality you'll find WordPress has several different plugins that are more powerful and sophisticated.
WYSIWYG (What you see is what you get)
WYSIWYG is close, in both systems, but we're still not quite there... yet. The drag and drop page editors still need to be previewed to see what's actually going on. Fortunately, both systems make it easy for you to preview pages and blog posts while you're working in mobile, tablet and desktop views.
Website Analytics
Both systems can use HubSpot's Analytics tools, Google Analytics or any other tool you want to use. Beware, the more third party tools you add the more you'll slow down your site.
Privacy
Both platforms have done a good job of implementing privacy practices to comply with Europe's GDPR (General Data Protection Rules).
Plugins
WordPress has significantly more plugins, often free plugins, but that's not always a good thing as I explain below.
Integration with Marketing Hub
Both WordPress and HubSpot integrate with HubSpot Marketing Hub functions including forms, chat, analytics and more.
WordPress CMS
WordPress is the most widely used content management system in the world, with WordPress sites now powering 43% of the world's websites. Originally it was designed as a blogging tool, but for more than a decade it's been much more than a tool to create blog posts. There are several advantages using the world's most popular and some unique disadvantages.
Pros of WordPress
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You can find a vast range of plugins available which makes it easy to install plugins that quickly give you specialised functionality. For example: backups, security, and email capture.
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You can find thousands of themes, meaning you can choose a design without having to spend lots of money on designers (just ensure you buy a theme from a reputable company - see below).
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There are numerous companies that can install, manage and host your site and other companies that can build custom functionality.
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WordPress is extremely well documented and you can find lots of advice online (sometimes too much).
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WordPress is well designed and optimised to work well for your visitors and search engines. And, by installing Yoast SEO you'll get easy to understand SEO recommendations making it easy to optimise your posts for search engines to help you get found.
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A skilled developer can create custom plugins to help you extend Wordpress to fit the unique needs of your business.
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WordPress can display dynamic content customized to the visitor.
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WordPress can easily host ecommerce solutions to run your business online.
Cons of WordPress
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The world's largest Content Management System attracts the largest number of developers good, bad, and ugly. You need to ensure your plugin and theme is produced by a reputable company - sloppy code makes your site vulnerable to attack, some plugins even open special back doors for attackers.
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Because WordPress is so widely distributed it's regularly attacked to try and gain control. Therefore, you must keep WordPress up to date, all your plugins and themes up to date, and install additional security (we offer this with all our sites).
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Unfortunately, despite powering over 810 million websites (43% of the world's websites) WordPress has the reputation of being a security risk. This is because many WordPress developers don't keep their sites up to date which creates opportunities for hackers. Millions of sites use cheap hosting which is slow, unreliable and extremely risky.
Fortunately, with good premium hosting company (we recommend WP Engine) and regular maintenance your site will be secure. -
You need to organize your own website hosting. We use, and recommend WP Engine, a premium cloud hosting environment designed just for WordPress websites.
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All CMS software has annoying points, WordPress is no exception.
HubSpot CMS Hub
We've migrated our entire site from WordPress to the HubSpot because HubSpot CMS Hub combines the power of our Marketing Hub, Sales Hub, Service Hub and CRM all the same place. Yes, you could install a plugin to connect HubSpot to your WordPress site but here's why we switched.
Pros of CMS Hub
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Everything is in one place - your site is fully integrated into HubSpot's system. You can theoretically save money by using several free or low cost alternatives, but, by the time you add up the time and cost it's much easier to have it all in one place with one bill per month.
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Personalization Tokens and Smart Content allow you to create dynamic web pages with personalized content. You can create a dynamic page that targets visitors based on country, device, location or CRM lists (for known visitors).
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SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is built right in. Personally, I prefer Yoast SEO, a free WordPress Plugin, but that's probably just because I've been using it for years.
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Social media built right in. This is another time saving feature where you can create a post, schedule it's publish date, then automate social media publishing.
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Content Delivery Network (CDN) built into the system. A CDN distributes your content over multiple servers around the globe so that when you visit a website the content travels the least distance making the page load faster. Normally, with a WordPress site, you need to either pay for a Content Delivery Network (CDN) or use a host that has a CDN built in (One of the reasons we choose WP Engine).
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You, or your developer, can edit code from inside HubSpot, in a browser. This means you can make quick tweaks, on the fly, from anywhere in the world.
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Premium Cloud Hosting is included, so HubSpot's team take care of server and software maintenance so we can concentrate on tasks that add value rather than operational issues.
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The HubSpot team has been working hard on local development tools. This makes development much easier and adds the essential power of version control.
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HubSpot's Commerce Hub makes it easy for you to collect payments for simple purchases.
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A Certified HubSpot Partner can help you with your website creation and you can find experts in the HubSpot Marketplace.
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CMS Hub can use HubDB (HubSpot's database) to display dynamic content.
Cons of CMS Hub
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WordPress has way more plugins available, even if you remove all the "less than reputable" plugins and the faulty and/or poorly maintained plugins. This means if you're looking for custom functionality we're probably going to have to build it for you. The good news is that means you get what you're after, rather than settling for a plugin than mostly works. However, this can take longer and requires more investment.
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You, or your developer, can edit code from inside HubSpot, in a browser. Super annoying even if it is the best one I've used. Coding Software has come a long way over the last decade and working in a browser is a backwards step for me.
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HubSpot's automated migration made a mess, we ended up manually migrating all of the content.
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You can try HubSpot's free CMS tools, but you'll run into limitations quickly.
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HubSpot CMS Hub Enterprise is expensive and it's required to do any bespoke development with serverless functions (that unlock the power of the HubSpot APIs). If you have CMS Hub Professional you will be able to do everything you need except custom development with serverless functions.
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If you need a full ecommerce system then you'll want to integrate HubSpot with Shopify.
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HubSpot's drag and drop page editor sometimes glitches and you'll need to reload the page to continue working. The autosave (with version control) works well, so this is a minor point.
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All CMS software has annoying points, the HubSpot CMS is no exception.
G2 Grid® for Web Content Management
You can see how HubSpot has progressed to the highest satisfaction with the biggest market presence second only to WordPress.
Source: https://www.g2.com/categories/web-content-management#grid
HubSpot CMS vs. WordPress Conclusion
After more than 5 years designing, developing and managing websites using HubSpot's CMS I can now confidently recommend the HubSpot CMS Hub.
HubSpot's drag and drop editor makes it easy for people to create and manage website pages, landing pages and blog posts in familiar interface. Having everything in the same system makes life much easier.
However, we will still use Wordpress for some of our clients.
The HubSpot WordPress integration is excellent and gives most of the functionality in WordPress. If there's custom development required – and budget is an issue – then we'll probably still recommend WordPress.
Your website and business is unique, so book a time to discuss your requirements with Mike Eastwood.
