While most of us focus on functionality and usability, understanding market share is also important when selecting your mission-driven organization’s content management system. 

CMS market share represents the stability or fragility of the platform you’re selecting, as well as how easy or difficult it’s going to be to find people to build your website and work on your solution as well as maintain it long-term. CMS market share can also be a key indicator of overall satisfaction with a particular platform.

The Current State of CMS Platforms 

Let’s start with where we’ve been. Traditional CMS platforms like WordPress and Drupal have been the foundation of digital content within the nonprofit and government space for years. These platforms were designed to provide an all-in-one solution, content management, site building, and publishing, all wrapped into a single system.

While these platforms have served organizations well, they do come with limitations — particularly in terms of flexibility and scalability. In response to these challenges, headless CMS platforms have emerged and gained wider adoption, particularly in certain sectors of the nonprofit space like arts and culture that warrant more immersive experiences. 

These platforms separate content creation from content delivery, enabling you to build custom front-end experiences while still leveraging a powerful back-end CMS. Platforms like Contentful, Sanity, Strappy have all gained traction because they provide a flexible API-first approach and allow for the creation of much more immersive and interactive experiences. However, headless CMS often require greater investment in development expertise.

Key CMS Trends in the Nonprofit and Government Space

So, what are some of the key trends and shifts we’re seeing in the CMS market within the government and NGO space? In short, while Drupal and WordPress remain dominant players, they’re seeing a steady decline year over year while other platforms like Sanity and Payload are seeing a rapid increase in adoption. 

A More User-Friendly Drupal

Drupal has long been the go-to choice for high-security, large-scale government and nonprofit websites. Its open-source nature, robust security features, and flexibility make it an excellent choice for complex content governance needs.

However, Drupal is seen as big, complex, and expensive. One of the biggest challenges with Drupal has been its learning curve and the need for specialized development expertise. This in turn often leads to an increased total cost of ownership. To address this, initiatives like Drupal Starshot and Drupal CMS are working to improve the user experience and simplify workflows. Drupal is also working to refocus a developer-centric tool to one focused on what they’re terming the “ambitious marketer.” 

The real question is, will things like Drupal CMS have a significant impact on Drupal’s declining market share? Or is it too little, too late? It will probably be somewhere in between.

One area where Drupal does not seem to be going anywhere is in the federal government space where they’ve essentially doubled down on the platform. So while we anticipate Drupal continuing to be used less on the NGO side, we do expect it to keep a strong foothold within the government.

Unrest at WordPress

WordPress has traditionally dominated the small to medium-sized organization market, offering a user-friendly interface, a vast plugin ecosystem, and a much lower barrier to entry. 

However, there have been a lot of recent challenges over the last several months in the WordPress ecosystem, particularly the growing divide between Matt Mullenweg, Automatic, and companies such as WP Engine. That’s raised concerns about long-term platform stability as well as the stability of the overall WordPress community. This comes at a time where WordPress is  looking to be seen as a more secure and robust enterprise-level system.

So while we don’t yet know how things are going to shake out when it comes to the rift and actions taking place in the WordPress community, it’s certainly something to keep an eye on if you’re invested in that ecosystem or if you’re evaluating it as a potential CMS option. Now may be the time to look at other options in the evolving and emerging CMS market if you’re looking in that space.

Sanity is API-First

One platform making its mark in the emerging CMS market is Sanity. It is a headless CMS that prioritizes structured content, real-time collaboration, and developer-friendly APIs. 

Sanity has seen strong growth and adoption in the nonprofit space, particularly within arts and culture organizations, which suggests that more flexible and API-driven architectures are becoming more important for organizations looking to provide more immersive experiences.

Sanity’s appeal really lies in its ability to integrate seamlessly into a composable ecosystem, giving organizations more control over content distribution, while at the same time doing it at a lower price point than more commercially-focused offerings such as Contentful or ContentStack. It’s certainly a platform to evaluate if you’re looking in that space.

Payload is Emerging as a Disruptor

Another interesting entrant onto the CMS stage is Payload — and it’s one we’re keeping an eye on. While still relatively new, Payload has quickly gained recognition as a developer-friendly headless and open-source CMS. Unlike most headless solutions, which are SaaS-based, Payload offers the additional benefit of being open-source. 

It is also built on modern JavaScript frameworks, Next.js. That means that if you have a team of JavaScript developers, it’s the same language and stack to work on both the backend content management system and the frontend stack. You don’t need to staff teams that know two different languages in order to work across your stack. It offers a strong API-first approach with deep customization capabilities.

One of the biggest advantages of Payload, however, is its built-in authentication and access control, which makes it a good option for organizations requiring more granular security controls, but who want to look in that headless space. 

Payload is still growing its ecosystem, and may not yet be up to the task of building a large-scale enterprise-level solution. Still, its open-source nature and extensibility do make it an exciting platform to keep an eye on, and we certainly recommend you can start trialing out for smaller projects.

What Does CMS Evolution Mean for Your Organization? 

Understanding where the CMS market is going ensures that your organization selects a platform that will be around for the long haul. It’s all about adaptability and future-proofing. Organizations need to assess their current and future needs carefully. If you need a highly-structured API-first approach, there are a lot of new options that are worth exploring, such as Sanity. 

If security and governance are your primary concerns, Drupal remains a strong choice. And if easy use and rapid deployment matter most, WordPress is still a viable option. There are things like Webflow and the low-code space that are now things you should look at as well.

Forum One helps organizations navigate technology selection by evaluating your long-term needs and ensuring you’re leveraging the right platform for your goals. Whether it’s migrating to a more scalable solution, adopting a composable approach, or optimizing an existing CMS, we’ve done it all. If you’d like to understand how Forum One can support your organization’s mission and CMS needs, feel free to reach out.

This article is part of a series on The State of Digital Experience.  For more information, be sure to access our complete report here.