Obviously I am a big fan of WordPress, seeing as this site uses it. I have been using WordPress since its early days as a blog platform. It has always just taken me mere days to design and launch a site using it. Customizing page elements has never been too much of problem, although I know enough PHP to be dangerous. In the past couple of years, the CMS admin system has become more and more robust. I find that with all the controls and features now found in the system, I hardly have to touch the PHP files at all.  Since version 3 of WordPress, it has really grown up to be more than just an open source blogging platform. It is now a fully fledged CMS, capable of providing the backbone for any website.

The design layer has become more flexible and with such a large community of designers supporting it, having a custom theme is quite cost effective.  In the past year or so, I’m seeing larger brand names and publications turn to WordPress for an enterprise solution.  You might ask – What about secure hosting for enterprise sites? Well, now that there are services like WordPress VIP, security is no longer the big concern it once was.

The attitude towards open source platforms has really changed in the last three years. Enterprise vendors are embracing open source products such as Drupal and WordPress and offering it as the other half of their custom business solutions.

Serious news publications are starting to find out how easy it is to use the CMS compared to what they’ve been struggling with on their legacy systems.  Most importantly, businesses are learning that using open source platforms will save them time and money in the development and deployment of web products. Web products have always depended on a speed-to-market strategy. Because you’re only making money while you’re the flavour of the month, products have to constantly offer newer and better features to stay competitive.  It is now becoming apparent that you can do more with a smaller web team and get to market faster than ever before.

Here are some great resources and articles from the WordPress community:

Designing your own themes:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crWNonVaHKM

http://psd2cssonline.com/

Word Press VIP Hosting: http://vip.wordpress.com/

Popular Brands Using WordPress: http://www.wpbeginner.com/showcase/21-popular-brands-that-are-using-wordpress/

As web professionals, it’s easy to get caught up in the web-centric business world where we are constantly trying to do everything online. We forget that there are many entrepreneurial opportunities where you can apply new web and new marketing strategies. This is too broad a topic for me to single out just one business channel  but you can apply your experience and thinking to almost any channel that hasn’t fully taken advantage of innovative thinking to fortify a position in a given market space.

For the purpose of this article, I’ll use the example of an ice cream shop. There are many ice cream shops, most of which are big chains such as Dairy Queen or Baskin Robbins.  If you do your home work and look within a given geographic area, you might find that the ice cream shops that exist may not be offering the best service. They may not be offering new or innovative products that could create buzz in that local market.

You could try the ice cream at different shops within a certain area and get an idea what people are willing to put up with to get some ice cream or just how far they have to go to get good ice cream. Entrepreneurs in local markets can and will make outrageous claims and embellish the truth about their product. Some of them may just get lazy and take for granted that they’re the only ice cream shop within a ten mile radius and so they feel secure that the public in the local market has fewer options. They may continue this way until public attention shifts to a new ice cream shop that does it better.

Now imagine if you take what we’ve learned over the past fifteen years in online business and applied that strategic “click” thinking to a brick and mortar business.  You’ll suddenly find a new world of opportunities. There is still a major disconnect between web and traditional businesses and somewhere in between is innovation and the ability to create a new market. Online users are very demanding and less tolerant of a bad experience because there are simply more choices on the World Wide Web. Consumers in a given local market will put up with a lesser product or lesser service because it’s a local market and the choices are limited. If you can apply the savvy from your online strategy to a local brick and mortar business, you’ll find that you’re already driven and motivated to keep up your game and play at a higher level.  This is the advantage of having fifteen years of web strategy and e-commerce learning behind us. As web professionals, consider your future business opportunities in the lazier local markets and take that opportunity to innovate and push the envelope.