Hi,

I need to develop a brand new website for a client. The site will be Professional Brochure Website but will need to be professional and corporate in appearance and will have several pages that will also be updated on a monthly/weekly basis. I was going to code this in XHTML/CSS but based on the expenditure of the site this language would be too costly in the long run and no good as a CMS language.

I have researched forums and other sites and would like to get an opinion at which language is better to use for such a project. I am steering more towards Joomla but Drupal is there if someone can suggest the better platform for this project.

I will point out that the website will aim to get over 50k visitors per month so a strong platform is crucial for the future of this website as well as search engine friendly so the site can get ranked high on Search Engines based on Online Marketing and SEO.

I am confused between the 2 CMS platforms but I will point out:

• the site will expand over time from 50 pages to possibly 500 after several years
• The site has to be SEO friendly
• Is JOOMLA equal in SEO rankings or is DRUPAL better to get a better rank for a website?
• Is JOOMLA as safe as DRUPAL in regard to SECURITY and HACKING

The site will contain the following features:

• It will have about 3 categories which will include articles that will be added per monthly basis.
• It will also include BLOG page with post and no comments
• A Directory feature of approx 150 Contact Details for Businesses and their website links

Example of the categories for the menu (split into 2 menus - horizontal/vertical and the footer):

1. Home
2. Services - 1 to 3 pages
3. Products - 1 page
4. About - several Sub-Categories
5. Contact Us - Contact Form
6. Gallery - 2 to 3 Galleries

7. Recycling Information - Articles
8. Interesting Facts - Articles
9. Resources - Articles
10. Blog - Regular Posts (no comments)
11. Newsletter - Past and Recent Newsletters
12. Recycling Locations - Directory of all locations (approx 150)

13. Sitemap
14. Privacy Policy
15. Disclaimer
16. Copyright

I look forward to your recommendations whether I should use JOOMLA or DRUPAL for this project. Please let me know some strong advantages why you think this platform is better then the other.

The site will be developed by a professional so if you also have at least 3-5yrs of expertise in these languages and can provide a high quality portfolio you might even get the job.

Any suggestions or recommendations are much appreciated.

regards,
elv8.

Joomla will be easier to use for your client. I've not used Drupal other than looking at the demo (which didn't inspire me to look into it much further), but I have used Joomla so I will speak to that.

Both Joomla and Drupal could probably do what you're looking for, but templating for Joomla is extremely simple. If you care about modern table-less design, however, you may have to do some editing with the core. Joomla also has extensions that cover most of the functionality that you're looking for. Most will be free, although you may have to pay for a newsletter extension depending on how you set it up. For your recycling locations, I'd recommend looking into the SOBI component. For Search Engine Friendly URLs, I'd recommend Artio SEF as Joomla will isn't very search engine friendly out of the box. There are also various galleries and sitemap generators to choose from. If you have any kind of ecommerce, I'd highly recommend staying away from the VirtueMart component. You'll lose time and money on it and won't be satisfied in the end unless you really are willing to stick with it and overcome all its bugs.

Any CMS you use has the possibility of security problems, but as far as I know, both Joomla and Drupal are actively developed and release security patches and new versions frequently. Your biggest vulnerability for either will be in 3rd party extensions. To the best of my knowledge, neither CMS has any sort of testing criteria for extensions, so it's up to your developer to make sure that the extensions that are chosen are secure.

Of the two, I'd probably choose Joomla. It has a bigger community, more extensions, and will be easier to use for your client. However, either platform should be able to do what you need more than adequately. In the hands of the right developer, you could probably make the same site on the frontend with either. I hope that helps your decision.

Originally Posted by VirtuosiMedia

I'd recommend looking into the SOBI component. For Search Engine Friendly URLs, I'd recommend Artio SEF as Joomla will isn't very search engine friendly out of the box. There are also various galleries and sitemap generators to choose from.

Thanks VirtuosiMedia for your suggestions and especially for those extensions - SOBI component and Artio SEF.

The website will not contain any e-commerce so thats good. So far you are widening my eyes to pursue Joomla as the preferred choice to get this developed in. Thanks for your input...

I personally like Drupal.

I have created several websites with drupal and so far I am very pleased. Haven't tried joomla yet!

There has been an even amount of suggestions to either go for Joomla or Drupal. I have decided to go with Joomla since I have operated this once before and have a bit more knowledge then Drupal (at all). However, I do intend to use Drupal for my personal projects as I have also heard a great deal of good things on these forums about it. Thanks to all that have added their personal feedback.