Table of contents:
- What is Drupal?
- Who uses Drupal?
- Why use Drupal for your business?
- Conclusion
What Is Drupal?
Drupal is free open source software that can be used to create and manage different kinds of websites. It includes a content management system and development framework.
- 1.6% of all websites on the Internet run on Drupal. (Source: w3techs)
- The Drupal community has 1.3 million members. (Source: Agiledrop)
- Drupal works in 100 languages. (Source: Twitter)
- 97% of users are satisfied with Drupal. (Source: FinancesOnline)
- Drupal has a 2.9% share of the CMS market. (Source: w3techs)
You can use Drupal to create:
- Personal, corporate, and ecommerce websites
- Blogs
- Portals
- Forums
- Resource directories
Who Uses Drupal?
More than 1,000,000 websites run on Drupal. Drupal is used by business and technology leaders worldwide to create real-world enterprise solutions that empower digital innovation. Some of the popular sites using Drupal include:
- The Economist
- Tesla Motors
- The White House
- Pfizer, Harvard University
- The Government of Australia
- Time Inc.
Drupal is a robust CMS and is more suited to large-scale web development projects that require a flexible and reliable system.
Drupal is an ideal platform for web content management used by governments, large enterprises, higher educational institutions, NGOs, etc. It is best suited for complex, content-heavy, and high traffic websites and used by industries like:
- Retail
- FinTech
- Sports and entertainment
- Travel and Tourism
- High tech
- Ecommerce
- Healthcare
- Media and publishing
Why Use Drupal For Your Business?
With the rapid growth of ecommerce, almost all companies aiming to offer their products online want a robust and modern solution. Drupal is such a robust solution, flexible and modern solution that can give your company an edge over your competitors.
There are many reasons to choose Drupal as the base of your ecommerce platform.
1. Drupal is fully open source
Lots of other software packages that offer an open-sourced community provide certain significant features only for the Enterprise license, while Drupal is a fully open-source solution. Anyone can avail of all modules and features of Drupal. Companies can build complex websites and they don’t have to pay any license fee.
2. Drupal is popular
Drupal is a robust, well tested, and mature platform for building your ecommerce website. Drupal is popular with more than one million websites built on it. Drupal has been in the market for more than 10 years. It has a huge supporting community that produces extra modules and also handles its ecosystem.
Drupal Commerce is also an effective and reliable solution with more than 50.000 stores built on it. There are 12.000 installations in the updated version of the module. Hundreds of extensions created particularly for commerce add extra functions and integrate them with numerous services and payment gateways.
3. Great access to support
Drupal is not only free to use, open-source but the Drupal marketplace lists more than 1000 agencies. Such wide acceptance will allow you to always find a vendor as per the location, size, and specialty needed for your project.
Due to this, you don’t have to stick to just one vendor. You can select and change the service that you exactly need. Some Drupal users usually work with various Drupal agencies simultaneously which allows them to compare and select the best partners.
4. Numerous features ready out of the box
Drupal Commerce out of the box offers numerous functionalities needed by online stores including:
- Many currencies
- Multilingual support
- Product variations with attributes
- A range of Order types with custom workflows
- Tax calculations and handling (including VAT and US sales taxes)
- Multiple stores
- Stock management
- Coupons or discounts
Various functionalities are available out of the box and some as free modules offered by the community.
5. Drupal is secure
Security is important as far as ecommerce is concerned. Every store usually has the data of customers with their addresses and usually handles payment related details. Security is paramount in both of these matters and it is taken seriously by Drupal.
The approach of Drupal towards security is two-fold. First of all, the system is already created by keeping security in mind. Secondly, Drupal is monitored by a dedicated security team which also checks contributed modules for possible security vulnerabilities and helps launch security patches.
The process of security release is so clear that every website can be ready to apply for security releases once these get published. It doesn’t give a potential hacker any opportunity for misuse.
6. Drupal Commerce is flexible
Many approaches and trials were required to create a flexible ecommerce system like Drupal. Building an extremely flexible system that gives a lot out of the box is the result of various commerce implementations as well as feedback from the community.
Drupal Commerce allows you to create a standard online store, sell digital products or create a subscription-based portal or a marketplace.
This flexibility also provides an extra advantage of scaling. It allows you to start small and eventually, with more features, develop your ecommerce into a huge, custom ecommerce implementation which will help you lead the competition.
7. Modern APIs
Drupal after version 8 is made easier to integrate with other services. Its robust RestAPIs enable it to play well with other systems.
It can also work within a bigger ecosystem of tools, portals, and mobile apps, all of which utilize its commerce capabilities.
8. Robust ecommerce on a superb CMS
In addition to being an ecommerce package, Drupal Commerce is also a powerful CMS used by several companies worldwide. It allows you to use one system and do both content marketing and sales with it. Therefore you can have a high-quality blog on your website or also develop compelling landing pages.
Conclusion:
Drupal Commerce is a growing and vibrant platform that is ideal for complex and content-heavy websites. You can manage huge resource libraries and databases with this powerful, flexible, and secure platform.
Brands developing their ecommerce solutions on Drupal can create what they wish while getting all the help from a huge community of Drupal professionals and benefitting from their years of experience.
Deepak Wadhwani has over 20 years experience in software/wireless technologies. He has worked with Fortune 500 companies including Intuit, ESRI, Qualcomm, Sprint, Verizon, Vodafone, Nortel, Microsoft and Oracle in over 60 countries. Deepak has worked on Internet marketing projects in San Diego, Los Angeles, Orange Country, Denver, Nashville, Kansas City, New York, San Francisco and Huntsville. Deepak has been a founder of technology Startups for one of the first Cityguides, yellow pages online and web based enterprise solutions. He is an internet marketing and technology expert & co-founder for a San Diego Internet marketing company.
