Design
Marketing
Healthcare
Pharma
Development
Business

WordPress alternatives for your medical business: Strapi

by Bench Accounting
by Bench Accounting

Despite the popularity of WordPress, there are worthy alternatives. Is Strapi a good choice for your digital health-related product?

Strapi: a robust headless CMS

Since its release in 2003, WordPress has evolved from a simple blogging tool to one of the most powerful and indisputably sought-after CMS platforms, becoming the basis for more than 40% of the sites in the Internet space [1].

With a 64.5% total market share [2], WordPress is more likely to be your number one choice when picking an online medical business engine. And you will not be disappointed. WordPress has great functionalities and offers extensive support, which will help with any problem you encounter while setting up a site. What's more, it's free, SEO-friendly, and widely customizable. Also, it provides social media instruments, blogging, and e-commerce site customization functionality. With its arsenal of widgets, plugins, and themes, WordPress has become an all-in-one solution for businesses of any level, where both developers and marketing teams can take part in the setting up and advancement of the digital product.

Total market share WordPress

Why consider alternatives to WordPress at all?

When choosing any tool to develop a medical product, it is important to look for one that can meet the needs of your particular business. There is no such thing as a perfect one. In the case of WordPress, it also has its pitfalls, just like any other instrument. While some medical companies may not be particularly affected by certain shortcomings, others may experience significant difficulties.

For example, here are some of the disadvantages of WordPress:

  • If you're just starting in business and haven't previously dealt with building your website, the platform may seem complicated at the beginning. 
  • If you want to fully manage your future solution and customize it by yourself, then WordPress may not be the best option.
  • It is prone to a significant number of vulnerabilities, where about 90% of them are related to plugins [3].

Whether it will be WordPress or another CMS, it is advisable to ask yourself a few key questions so that you don't make the wrong choice:

  • What is your budget?
  • Does your budget allow you to hire developers to launch and run the site?
  • How often do you plan to update your content and add new pages?
  • How much control do you want over site setup and management?
  • Which is most important to you: speed, security, or performance. Or all of the three?
  • Do you prefer a hosted platform or opt for local hosting?

Is Strapi a powerful alternative to WordPress?

Strapi is the leading open-source Node.js headless CMS [4].

The open-source feature allows developers to use and modify the code according to their needs. Furthermore, the headless option lets you separate the backend from the frontend, so you can create multiple interfaces connected to the backend via APIs. In other words, you and your team members can create and manage content and then access it via any device and across all your apps through APIs. It gives you full control over your solution and the ability to build a customized API at the same time.

Headless CMS

The headless approach, with its separation of presentation and logic layer, stands at the base of creating future-proof systems from scratch or expanding your tech-enhanced legacy product with additional features if needed.

Can Strapi be an “alt-verse” to WordPress?

Among all the Strapi's characteristics, the following are especially noteworthy:

  • Flexibility as a must-have in contemporary business realities

With Strapi, you can end up with a simple website, a mobile app, or a feature-rich e-commerce platform. Just select a template and tweak it to fit your organization's needs. Strapi has also provided an option for those who like to build everything from scratch. 

The platform can be integrated with well-known frameworks such as Next.js, Flutter, or Gatsby.js and have a vast database list to pick from (SQLite, MongoDB, MySQL, PostgreSQL). 

However, keep in mind that, unlike WordPress, instead of shared hosting, you will need to use a node environment or your server.

  • Advanced customization options for a unique solution design

The platform is completely out-of-the-box. At the same time, it is easily customizable. For example, you can change the API and data structure in the code editor or simply use plugins to adjust the product for specific functionality. In addition, the lack of web hosting allows you to customize the system on your servers, further extending the ability to "spice up" the future medical product and, more importantly, making it more secure.

  • Faster time-to-market for gaining an edge over competitors

The opportunity to quickly develop a bug-free and secure product seems to be valued above all else today. Thanks to some technical specifications, in particular, Strapi's modular architecture, it is possible to speed up the engineering process. It is easily scalable while still being able to handle a lot of potential traffic. Moreover, it only processes the code requested by a client, which saves time and resources. At the same time, the integration with Koa and Joi allows faster validation of the data, resulting in better site performance and throughput.

The main Strapi advantages:

  • The open-source nature makes it possible to tune the code to specific needs without significant costs.
  • Extensive and flexible customization options for creating future-proof and scalable products.
  • Local hosting enables the creation of a reliable site with data protection per the GDPR standard).
  • Using JavaScript language facilitates the developers' workflow. 

It is free and simple to kick off.

Is it worth using Strapi?

In short, yes.

If you want a fully customized and scalable system where every detail is taken care of, Strapi can be a good option. However, the realization of the aforementioned characteristics will require more time and developer expertise. Nevertheless, Strapi provides a wide range of plugins, tech toolkits, and a pleasant JavaScript experience, which is often a priority for developers.

However, if you need to quickly set up a simple site without going into too much code detail, WordPress, with its numerous support forums, can also be a ​​ worthy variant.

Do you need help choosing technology for your future medical product? Or are you ready to proceed with the development and marketing campaigns launch? Drop us a lineand we'll discuss the best way to give your project a boost.

Let's talk

References:

  1. Financesonline, WordPress statistics, https://financesonline.com/wordpress-statistics/, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
  2. Ibidem.
  3. WPScan, WordPress Vulnerability Statistics, https://wpscan.com/statistics, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
  4. Strapi, Features, https://strapi.io/features, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
  5. Strapi, Strapi vs. Wordpress, https://strapi.io/wordpress-alternative, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
  6. Stackshare, Strapi vs. WordPress, https://stackshare.io/stackups/strapi-vs-wordpress, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
  7. Medium, Strapi Headless CMS, https://medium.com/citrusleaf/strapi-headless-cms-top-pros-and-cons-e69ed009c0de, [last accessed: 05.07.2022].
exit icon

Necessary cookies

Necessary cookies enable core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility. You may disable these by changing your browser settings, but this may affect how the website functions.

Analytics ON OFF

We'd like to set Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager and Hotjar to help us to improve our website by collecting and reporting information on how you use it. We collect information in a way that does not directly identify anyone. For more information on how this works, please see our Cookies page.

Advertising ON OFF

We’d like to set Facebook Pixel to give you the latest information about Brandmed services by Facebook. For more information on how this works, please see our Cookies page.

Accept Close
We use cookies. Read more on our Cookies page.
Decline all Settings Accept
exit icon