The Church WordPress ECOSYSTEM
According to many different sources, approximately 20% of ALL websites on the Internet run on WordPress (that is MILLIONS of sites according to WordPress)! This is pretty amazing seeing that WordPress started and STILL operates as an “Open Source” project. An Open Source project is one that is not “owned” by anyone in particular – it is “owned” by the community and the software itself is FREE. Anyone can download the software and run it anywhere
In my mind, the biggest reason for its success is simply that lots and lots of people use it. Which means there is an entire ECOSYSTEM of people out their that develop, implement, and manage WordPress websites and lots of “related services”.
Here is how this is an advantage to your church:
- There are
hundredsthousands of developers who help develop the WordPress engine itself - There are something like ten thousand developers out there who help implement WordPress websites
- There are hundreds if not thousands of developers and companies who contribute plugins and themes
Plugins and Themes
Ok, let’s talk about plugins and themes. This is another huge reason WordPress is so awesome. For just about anything type of function you want to add to your website, someone has created a “plugin”. Anyone is allowed to contribute a free of “premium” (for a fee) plugin that the general public can just download and use. There are over 10,000 such plugins in the FREE WordPress plugin library!
WordPress was designed so that any developer can write a plugin which can extend and enhance the WordPress system WITHOUT having to add the functionality to the main “WordPress” software itself. This means that any developer can make WordPress do cool new stuff and that code will only get used by people that need that “cool new stuff”…
And then there are Themes – themes are what makes a church wordpress website look like it should for a church versus a business website. The theme is where the graphics design of the website are implemented. WordPress was designed so that anyone can create their own Theme and give it away or sell it. I am pretty confident there are probably over 20,000 themes available in the marketplace.
Much more to love…
Ok, there is a lot more to love about WordPress, but there are a couple biggies… I will randomly add more great stuff about WordPress as we launch our new Church Website Platform soon on WordPress!
Patrick