What's the Difference Between a CMS, a Blog, a Web Editor and a Site Builder?

Content Management System vs Blog vs Site Builder vs Web Editors


What's the Difference Between a Content Management System (CMS), a Blog, a Web Editor and an Online Site Builder?

by Christopher Heng, thesitewizard.com

One of my visitors recently asked me about the difference between a Content Management System ("CMS") and a site builder. Unfortunately, it's not as easy to answer this question as you think, since when people on the Internet use the term "site builder", they sometimes mean different things. Still others have asked me about the difference between using a blog and a web editor for a website. I will try to deal with all variations of this question in this article.

Incidentally, please note that this page only deals with this particular set of queries. I realise that if you're reading this article, you're probably thinking of starting a website. If so, after reading this answer, you should probably go on to How to Create a Blog if you want to set up a blog, or How to Create Your Own Website for any other type of website. Those articles contain practical information on how you can actually go about setting up a site.

What are CMS, Online Site Builders, Blogs and Web Editors?

When people create and update websites, they can do it in one of many ways.

So Which Do I Choose?

Sometimes, the more you learn, the less you feel you know. I'm sure some of you, at this time, probably feel like giving up the idea of starting a website altogether. ("There are just too many things to decide. And so many unknowns!") Don't worry. Everybody feels that way when starting out in a completely new field. It gets easier as you go along. Really.

Although there are no hard and fast answers as to which method you should use to create your website, here are a few pointers that may help you narrow your choices, and hopefully make the decision more manageable.

Of course these things aren't really set in stone. You will want to factor in your own personal preferences and style of working as well, possibly giving priority to those even over the points I mentioned above. There are no fixed rules for such things. Everybody does as he/she sees fit. And you are not stuck with the choices you make now. You can always change your mind, and use something different (say) months down the road if you find you dislike the current way of doing things.

In the end, if you can't decide, just use a web editor. From my experience with teaching newcomers, a web editor provides the least steep learning curve, while giving them greater control over the visual appearance of their site (something most new webmasters rightly expect to have). Changing to another method after learning a web editor, in my opinion, is also easier. You gain a broad base of knowledge (and skills) when using a web editor that continues to be relevant even when using a CMS or blog.

For those who are ready to get started, please proceed to How to Create a Blog for those using a blog or CMS software, or How to Make / Create Your Own Website if you want to use a web editor. The whole process is actually simpler than you think.

This article can be found at https://www.thesitewizard.com/gettingstarted/difference-cms-site-builder.shtml

Copyright © 2011-2019 Christopher Heng. All rights reserved.
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