Here are more Australia social media statistics for 2020 in Civic Web Media’s now traditional breakdown of the most popular platforms and what this means for digital marketing in the year ahead.

Most popular platforms by number of unique monthly visitors – January 2020

1. Facebook – 16 million
2. YouTube – 15 million
3. Instagram – 9 million
4. WhatsApp – 7 million
5. Snapchat – 6.4 million
6. WordPress – 5.8 million
7. LinkedIn – 5.5 million
8. Twitter – 5.3 million
9. Tumblr – 3.7 million
10. Tinder – 3 million

Statistics compiled by SocialMediaNews.com.au for January 2020. Source: Vivid Social – Social Media Agency. Figures correct as of 31/01/20.

Social media statistics 2020

• Social media in Australia continues to grow at a significant rate, the number of users increasing by 5.9% in 2019 (Talkwalker)
• Young adults aged 18–35 account for more than 75% of Australian social media users (Talkwalker)
• Image and video sharing platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat are the fastest growing (Roy Morgan)
• Chinese social media apps such as WeChat, RenRen and Weibo are also growing rapidly in Australia’s Chinese community, with WeChat poised to enter the top 10 this year (Roy Morgan)
• Google Plus was closed down in 2019, though it never had much of a following in Australia

Top 10 social networks in Australia 2020

1. Facebook

16,000,000 unique active monthly users

Despite a campaign to “delete Facebook” after the company was involved in high-profile data scandals, more Australians continue to sign up for the social network, which has now reached 16 million active users (up from 15 million in 2019).

60% of Australia is on Facebook and 1 in 2 people check the site or app at least once daily.

Facebook’s user base is strong across all age demographics, but especially among 25–39 year olds. Teenagers are the most likely to shun Facebook for younger alternatives.

With such a huge audience, Facebook is usually the first port of call for businesses getting started in social media marketing, with 9 in 10 Australian businesses having Facebook accounts. Facebook posts with videos have the highest rate of engagement.

2. YouTube

15,000,000 unique monthly visitors

The world’s biggest video sharing platform is also the most visited website in Australia after Google, according to Alexa.

While it takes second place to Facebook in the social apps, it’s the number one for Generation Z Australians (aged 14–27), according to the most recent Roy Morgan Single Source survey. Use of YouTube generally declines with age.

Between Facebook and YouTube, video marketing is one of the most engaging types of content that brands can create. In 2019, the top 5 search queries on Facebook in Australia were: Songs, Music, Fortnite, IT and Kids.

3. Instagram

9,000,000 active monthly users

After rapid growth in 2019, Instagram has stabilised as Australia’s third favourite social media site in 2020.

Like YouTube, Instagram users are more likely to be younger. More than two thirds (68%) of Generation Z and over half (52%) of Millennials use the image-based platform, compared to less than one third (32%) of Generation X (Roy Morgan Single Source).

Instagram users are more likely to follow brands than Facebook users, as long as those brands post worthwhile content. Almost half of Australian businesses (46%) use Instagram, according to the most recent Yellow Social Media Report.

Instagram made drastic changes in 2019 when it removed Like counts and made follower counts less prominent to reduce social pressure on users. It also launched Instagram Checkout, to make transactions easier, and Creator Accounts, to support the lucrative influencer marketing industry. It remains to be seen how much of an impact these changes will have on Instagram marketing in 2020.

Want to start or grow your Instagram account in 2020? Find out everything you need to know about hashtags.

4. WhatsApp

7,000,000 active users

Since it was acquired by Facebook, WhatsApp exploded in popularity but now remains stable with approximately seven million Australian users per month in 2020. It’s the country’s second most popular social media messaging app after Facebook Messenger.

5. Snapchat

6,400,000 active monthly users

Another non-mover, Snapchat has matured at a stable 6.4 million monthly users. More impressively, 4.5 million people use the app every day, averaging 36 times per week.

Around half (49%) of social media users aged 18–29 are on Snapchat, the app being used less by older audiences. Like Instagram, it’s used by more females (55%) than males (45%).

6. WordPress

5,800,000 monthly users

Australia’s favourite CMS platform for creating websites and blogs, WordPress hasn’t gained or lost substantial users in 2020. It remains the top choice for its ease of use, customisable features and, most of all, the fact that it’s free.

7. LinkedIn

5,500,000 active monthly users

The first change in the social media ranking for 2020, LinkedIn has now overtaken Twitter with around one million new users year on year. The website reports that around 10 million Australians have registered accounts on LinkedIn, though just over half are active every month.

The B2B platform is used by 73% of large businesses but fewer SMBs. Users are more likely to be male (53% vs 47%).

8. Twitter

5,300,000 active monthly users

It continues to drop in the rankings, but Twitter gained more than half a million users in Australia in 2020. The site is overwhelmingly male, with almost 1.8 males to every female, and is mainly used by people in their 30s. Australian users say they check Twitter 23 times per week on average.

While it may not be the most effective platform for reaching your target audience, the speed and brevity of tweets makes Twitter popular with large businesses, which are more likely to use Twitter marketing than small businesses (60% vs. 14%).

9. Tumblr

3,700,000 monthly users

After losing users last year, following the introduction of stricter rules such as the ban on adult content, Tumblr is stable in ninth place for 2020. The image sharing and blogging site is mainly used by women, and around two-thirds of users (66%) are under 35.

10. Tinder

3,000,000 users

The world’s most popular dating app, Tinder was downloaded more times than any other app in Australia last year and is used by an estimated three million Australians every month.

While business accounts aren’t permitted on the app, advertising is. Depending on your product or service, you may find a suitable audience here.

For more industry news and online marketing tips, follow the Civic Web Media Blog.

After finding out the scope of the job, Civic Web Media quickly made the required changes, detailing how the work was done and fixing up a couple of other issues we noticed while working on the site.

With this completed, Dani also asked for the site to be migrated to a new domain. Civic Web Media carried out this task and worked with Dani and ProSocial Communications’ webhosting service to iron out teething issues such as SSL certification.

In the end, the ProSocial Communications website was fully updated to reflect the rebranding of the business, with the website moved to a domain that matched the new business name.

Dani Redmond, a director at ProSocial Communications, said: “Civic Web Media understood the brief straight away and was fast and responsive in doing the work. Oliver identified solutions to issues that arose, provided great advice and was always clear and upfront about what was involved”.

Find out more in Civic Web Media‘s annual breakdown of the most popular social media sites in Australia as we begin 2019.

Update: Australia’s most popular social media sites 2020

How many Australians use social media in 2019?

The latest Yellow Social Media Report released in June last year found that almost 9 in 10 people (88%) have a social media profile in Australia. This figure is up from 79% in 2017 and 69% in 2016, showing remarkable growth over a relatively short period.

The average Australian now owns 3.5 internet-enabled devices, with most preferring to use their smartphones to access social media. 60% of people say they use the internet more than five times per day.

How do customers interact with businesses on social media?

The Yellow report found that 44% of consumers follow brands on social media. This increases to 52% for females and 65% for people aged 18-29.

More than 50% of social media users say they value brand interactions on social networks and are more likely to trust a business if it offers engaging and relevant content on a regular basis.

Discounts (62%) and giveaways (51%) are the most popular reasons people follow brands.

Top 10 social networks in Australia 2019

Statistics compiled by SocialMediaNews.com.au for December 2018. Source: Vivid Social – Social Media Agency. Figures correct as of 31/12/18.

1. Facebook

15,000,000 unique active monthly users

Facebook’s dominance and popularity have remained stable since this time last year, despite the organisation’s high-profile data scandals in early 2018 that saw users worldwide being urged to ‘Delete Facebook’. Around 60% of the Australian population has a Facebook account and around 1 in 2 people check it every day.

According to Yellow, 91% of Aussies who use social media are on Facebook, which includes more women than men (95% vs 88%). The average user spends almost 10 hours a week on the platform and more than a quarter (28%) watch live streaming videos on Facebook Live.

More Australian businesses use and advertise on Facebook than any other social platform – around 9 in 10 SMBs and large businesses. This connects them with Australia’s biggest online audience.

2. YouTube

15,000,000 unique monthly visitors

More than half of the population (53%) watches videos on YouTube. This includes slightly more men than women (56% vs 50%) and 65% of people under 30. 46% of people share videos or photos on social media.

Video is one of the most engaging types of content for consumers, but most businesses are still hesitant to produce video content due to the time and effort involved in making it look professional.

3. Instagram

9,000,000 active monthly users

Instagram is still Australia’s favourite image-sharing website, retaining a stable user base over the past 12 months after having doubled its users the previous year. The site is more popular with women than men (44% vs 34%).

Instagram users are more likely to follow brands than users of other social networks at 44% (compared to 39% of Facebook users). Formerly more popular with SMBs, the number of large businesses advertising on Instagram has more than doubled in the past year from 20% to 46% according to the Yellow survey of Australian businesses.

Read more: Hashtag hacks: Everything you need to know about hashtags

4. WhatsApp

7,000,000 active users

Steadily rising through the ranks – gaining two million users each year for the past two years – WhatsApp is Australia’s second most popular social media messaging service after parent company Facebook’s own Messenger.

5. Snapchat

6,400,000 active monthly users

Snapchat is once again the fastest growing social media app in Australia, rising two places from last year’s count. As well as its high monthly user base, more than 4.5 million Australians use Snapchat every day – around 36 times per week on average.

Snapchat is more popular with younger demographics, with almost half (49%) of 18-29 year olds on social media using the platform. It’s also used by more males than females (28% vs 17%).

6. WordPress.com

5,800,000 monthly users

Australia’s favourite CMS platform had a modest gain of 100,000 users over the past year. Its free business model, ease of use and extensive customisation makes WordPress the go-to option for many bloggers and SMBs creating websites and blogs.

7. Twitter

4,700,000 active monthly users

Twitter is gaining popularity in Australia, rising from 9th place and 3,000,000 users this time last year. Unlike most social networks, Twitter is most widely used by people in their 30s. It’s also much more popular with men than women (26% vs 13%). Aussie Twitter users check the site 23 times per week on average.

Twitter’s speed and ease of use make it popular with large businesses, of which 60% advertise on the platform. Small businesses are much less enthusiastic however, with use dropping to just 14%.

8. LinkedIn

4,500,000 active monthly users

Dropping down the ranks, but still gaining users, the “Facebook for professionals” is notably more popular with men than women (28% vs 17%). LinkedIn reports that approximately 8 million Australians have signed up for LinkedIn accounts, which means that just over half log in to their account regularly.

Naturally, LinkedIn is widely used by businesses. It’s the second most popular social media site after Facebook for large businesses (used by 73% that use social media) and medium businesses (48%). It’s less popular with small businesses though, which are more likely to use Instagram.

9. Tumblr

3,700,000 monthly users

The only site on this list to lose rather than gain users over the past year (though only by around 100,000), Tumblr’s slow decline continues. However, the microblogging site retains a loyal user base.

10. Tinder

3,000,000 users

Just holding on to 10th place, Australia’s most popular dating app has an estimated 3 million users. This has remained stable over the past year, after increasing in 2017 when premium paid services were introduced.

Hot on Tinder’s heels in 11th place is WeChat with around 2,900,000 active monthly users. Hugely popular with Australia’s Chinese community, WeChat and other Chinese social networks such as RenRen and Weibo are expected to increasingly challenge traditional social networks in the coming years.

For more industry news and online marketing tips for your business, follow the Civic Web Media Blog.

There really are no secrets. You only have to look at the world’s most successful websites and the sites you use every day to see examples of great design right in front of you.

Finding out what these sites have in common, and why they’re doing what they’re doing, you’ll have all the knowledge you need to design a website that reflects well on your brand and makes it easy for your site visitors to find exactly what they’re looking for.

We’re not saying every website should look exactly the same. But if you’re looking for ways to express your uniqueness, don’t do so at a cost to the user experience.

Whether you’re designing your site from the ground up or using a template, make sure your website is:

Visually appealing

What do people want to see? That should be your priority when designing the look of your website, rather than, how can I show off my artistic skills? Artistic design has its place when it’s used appropriately, but most of the time, your website users are going to be happy with a page that’s easy to read and doesn’t overload their senses.

You can give your website any colour scheme you want, but think about those sites you use every day: what do they have in common? The vast majority of them (if not all) feature black sans serif text on a plain white background.

Research has confirmed time and again that this is the combination people find most comfortable to read, and you should make sure all elements of your typography are easy on the eyes: font sizes, spacing between lines and the number of characters per line.

Think about how sites like Facebook and Amazon have created iconic looks with their simple colour schemes and user-friendly layouts. Most of the time, these sites still follow the black text, white background rule.

Easy to use

After visual appeal, navigation is the second biggest influence on what people think about your website (and consequently your brand).

Make it as easy as possible for your site visitors to find exactly what they’re looking for with menus that are clearly signposted, products and services organised into sub-categories, a search function and SEO-friendly URLs.

Every page on your website needs to have a clear goal and a clear Call to Action (CTA). For a multi-purpose page like your homepage, you should have a clear first action to help out new visitors, but you can also include other targeted CTAs that users are likely to be looking for.

The best way to check the usability of your site is to spend a little time searching and clicking through. If you were a customer, is it easy to find what you’re looking for, or frustrating?

Free from clutter

Image: The World’s Worst Website Ever

This goes hand-in-hand with visually appealing, but it’s worth stressing: your web pages should only include what they really need, with absolutely no filler.

Images are essential, and video can be great if it’s used sparingly. But when you clog a page with excessive pictures and videos, this will distract from the text, make it harder for users to complete actions, and cause longer loading times for users with slower connections – one of the biggest sins of web design.

Use your social links sparingly too. You should let people know if you have social media profiles, and you might want to include recent updates from your Twitter feed, but these logos shouldn’t be the most prominent features on your website. Otherwise, you’re just giving people more opportunities to leave you. (The exception to this is social sharing buttons on your blog posts and other marketing content, as you’ll want these to be shared as much as possible).

As for giving your website background music and spinning logos, these were annoying even in 1998.

Up-to-date

Even the best websites get stale if they aren’t updated frequently. User demands and preferences move quickly, and if your site is more than a few years old, certain aspects of its design will already be lagging behind.

There are other occasions when you should consider giving your website an overhaul. Maybe your business priorities have changed, your audience has changed or your brand’s profile has changed. A clean slate always delivers better results than bolting new features onto an outdated platform, and you won’t have to lose your old content.

Mobile-friendly

If you’re using a template to design your website, make sure it’s responsive. This means your pages will load in a special mobile-friendly layout when they’re accessed on phones and smaller tablets, or in their original size when viewed on a larger screen.

You can’t afford to ignore mobile users. Today, more searches are performed on mobile devices than desktops, and 35% of e-commerce transactions in Australia are made using smartphones (and rising). You can check whether your site is responsive using this tool from Google.

What’s the easiest way to make a great website?

You don’t need any training or experience in web design to put together a user-friendly, professional-looking website. You can either:

1. Pay someone to build your custom website, or

2. Use a template.

Template websites are the more affordable option. This involves buying a readymade theme that you can tweak to your preference to suit your branding. We recommend WordPress for its simplicity and flexibility, but you can try any of the popular CMS options.

Let us help

At Civic Web Media, we’ll help you create a modern and professional website that suits your business, whatever your budget. We’ll help you get started with website software and we can help you register your domain name and arrange hosting for your site.

In this three-part guide to business blogging for dummies, you’ll find out how to get your blog off the ground, how to write a great business blog and how to share your blog with the world to build a loyal following and convert leads.

To start you off, here are the key questions you need to ask yourself when making a business blog part of your content marketing strategy.

Why are you writing a business blog?

Like any other undertaking, the ultimate purpose of your blog will be to boost your business. Focussing on the specific aims you want your business blog to achieve will help you achieve success.

Your blog might be an introduction to your business, a content marketing tool, an information resource for your customers, a hub of thought leadership, or all of the above.

Think about what you want your readers to do, not what you want to do. Don’t focus on driving traffic to your website, increasing subscriptions or making sales, but on creating engaging content that will encourage your readers to share, to subscribe and (eventually) to make a purchase.

Who are you writing for?

Your blog is a conversation between you and your readers, so first you need to know who they are.

Carry out research into your target audience and develop a suitable tone of voice to make sure the content you create and the language you use are the right match for those demographics.

What will you write about?

Your blog should cover topics that your target audience is interested in and answers their questions, even before they have them.

You can find out what people are currently searching for using tools such as Google Keyword Planner or by analysing your own site’s search history.

By focussing on a small range of topics that you are an expert in, you can work on establishing yourself as an authority in your industry.

What blogging platform will you use?

The most important practical decision to make when getting started with a business blog is choosing where your blog will live.

If you don’t host your own website, the best free platform to use is WordPress. It’s easy to use, it offers everything a small business needs and it’s easy to customise to match your brand and the rest of your site.

In fact, almost a quarter of all websites make use of WordPress services in some form according to W3Techs.

What will your blog be called?

If you don’t give enough thought to your blog’s title at the onset, you’ll probably regret it later. Simply using your brand name is fine, as long as the title gives readers an idea what to expect.

If you are hosting the blog on your own website, the URL should be straightforward: yourname.com.au/blog or blog.yourname.com.

If your blog will be an independent entity, it’s important that you register your own domain name rather than using the free URL provided by your hosting platform. Not only does a default domain name look unprofessional, but you also won’t have as much control or access to support in the event that something goes wrong.

Who will write your blog?

You don’t have to write all your blog content yourself, unless you prefer it that way. Your business blog can have a single author or multiple writers, who can all write anonymously under your brand or use their own identities to keep your content varied and personal.

If you don’t have the resources to write your own blog in-house, you can hire a professional blogging service to keep your blog updated with fresh content on a regular basis. As you become more established, you can invite other bloggers in your industry to write guest posts in exchange for exposure.

What type of content will you create?

Blogs don’t have to be all about words. If you want to discuss a topic that would be more suitable as a slideshow, video or podcast, these can also be published to your blog.

How often will you publish?

Starting a business blog is one thing – keeping it going is another.

The more often you can update your business blog, the more you will be rewarded. However, as a small business you may not have the resources to update your blog every day, not to mention the risks of burnout and running out of fresh topics.

We recommend publishing a new blog post at least once a week.

Now that you’ve got your business blog up and running, next time we’ll look at how to write your first blog post.

Using tools such as Google Analytics and features offered by your Content Management System (CMS) and social media, you can get a clear picture of how content marketing helps SEO, generates leads and drives sales.

Why are these insights important?

Analysing the impact of all the marketing content you put out, from blogs to videos and podcasts, will reveal what type of content is working for you and what isn’t.

Don’t forget that content marketing is all about helping you achieve your business goals. Finding out which content is most successful enables you to focus your marketing strategy on what works, producing more valuable content and avoiding wasting time and money on less successful content.

If you’re not already using Google Analytics, that’s the best place to start to gain insights about how content marketing is working for you. But it shouldn’t be the only tool you use.

What are the most important metrics?

Analytical tools let you measure your content’s success from so many different angles, it can be overwhelming at first. Not all of these metrics are equally important however, and narrowing your focus to what is important will give you a clearer picture of how your content is performing where it matters.

These essential metrics can be broken down into four categories, answering the questions:

• who is consuming your content?
• who is sharing your content?
• how does content marketing generate leads?
• how does content marketing drive sales?

1. Consumption metrics

These are the simplest metrics to measure, because it usually comes down to a number – how many people clicked on your blog post, watched your video or downloaded your file.

If you are publishing content to your own site, your CMS will inform you how many people viewed each piece of content. Many popular CMS platforms like WordPress also provide a more detailed breakdown of your audience, such as their location and the search terms that brought them to your site.

If you are publishing content to other sites, these often provide tools that can give you similarly detailed information on who is consuming your content, like YouTube Analytics for videos and Slideshare and Scribd for documents.

2. Sharing metrics

Measuring the success of content marketing doesn’t end at counting page views. You also need to know if people are sharing your content, as this will help it to reach a much wider audience and bring more traffic to your site.

Google Analytics is still the best tool for monitoring how your content is performing in the wider world, but you can gain more specific insights into the behaviour of your users by signing up to the social media sites where they are most likely to share your content.

If you’re not sure where your content is being shared, you can track inbound links through your CMS to find out how people are arriving at your site. If you’re new to social media, see our guide to Australia’s most popular social media sites for ideas where to focus your attention.

All the major social media platforms have tools that allow you to see how many times your content has been Liked, Retweeted, Pinned or +1’d, and you can encourage users to share your content by adding these social buttons wherever it’s published.

Of course, when it comes to encouraging people to share your content, the most important thing is to make sure you’re producing quality content that people will actually want to share.

3. Lead generation metrics

Content marketing isn’t a popularity contest, and it doesn’t matter how often your content is being shared and consumed if it doesn’t produce leads for your business.

Your CMS should include lead generation metrics that let you see how many people took further action after consuming your content, such as completing a web form, signing up to your newsletter, downloading an eBook, leaving a comment, subscribing to updates and other trackable activities. Google Analytics can provide further insights into less obvious ways your users’ behaviour can lead to conversion.

Comparing the conversion rates of your content marketing to your overall conversion rate will make it clear which types of content are the most successful and which are not performing.

4. Sales metrics

Finally, metrics can also tell you how content marketing is driving sales and making you money. Your ecommerce platform should make it simple to track the origin of online sales, and your CMS could also reveal what content users consumed before completing offline sales.

An effective way to trace sales back to individual content pieces is to include a unique Call to Action (CTA) and URL for each piece you publish. If you want to know whether more of your sales come from new or existing customers, you can offer your existing customer base exclusive or first access to content and monitor how it performs compared to public content.

Is content marketing helping you achieve your business goals?

Success is relative, and even if you are seeing leads and sales as a result of content marketing, you can evaluate whether this strategy is achieving the level of success you need by measuring its ROI.

This will tell you whether the investment you’re making to produce regular content is delivering as you hoped, or if your content marketing strategy needs an overhaul to help you reach a wider audience and convert more customers.

Read our crash course in content marketing to find out how to write winning content that will benefit your bottom line.

WordPress.com and WordPress.org sites share a lot of similarities, but there are also a few key differences to consider when setting up your site (or trying to fix a problem). Knowing those differences can prevent a lot of frustration further down the line.

Price

Both versions of WordPress are free to use for your website, but things such as your domain name, hosting and add ons may cost extra. On WordPress.com, free sites come with ads (with revenue going to WordPress, not the site owner).

While the basic, and most common, form of WordPress.com is free, you can also pay for Premium ($129/year) or Business ($399/year) plans too. These allow you to have extra functions on to your site, but nothing that you can’t get for free with .org.

Domains

With .com sites, you have two options for your domain. You can choose to pay for a domain of your choosing, or you can sign up for a free account that follows this basic structure: civicwebmedia.wordpress.com.

For .org, there’s only one choice and that is that you need to pay for your own URL.

Hosting

WordPress.com includes free hosting when you sign up, as well as automatic data backup. For WordPress.org, you need to arrange your own hosting which can cost anywhere from a few bucks a month to hundreds a year, and you need to create backups to your site yourself.

Themes

Both versions of WordPress work with themes, where you install a ready-made site and then customise it to fit your needs.

WordPress.com themes are more limited in a few ways. Firstly, by number. Currently there are 375 themes to choose from (194 are free, 181 are premium – or paid – themes). While this gives a bit of choice, it pales into comparison with what’s available for .org sites – ThemeForest, a popular marketplace for templates, has more than 21,000 premium themes available.

WordPress.com themes are also a lot more restrictive. While you can still add your logo and change the colour scheme, with .org themes you can do a lot more. For more experienced users, you’re able to edit the theme coding directly – meaning you can make small tweaks or huge changes to the way your site looks. You can also install plugins, which can dramatically alter your site’s appearance and performance.

Plugins

Plugins are only available for .org sites, and they give users a lot of power. There are currently more than 40,000 plugins available, and most of them are free or have a free option.

Plugins can be used to make your site do almost anything. Whether that’s improving your SEO, cutting down spam comments, creating an online store or adding in a reservation system. Almost anything you can think of for your site has already been created, and most plugins can be installed and set up in just a few clicks.

WordPress.com does offer some of these options, but only if you pay the recurring annual fee.

Conclusion

Overall, WordPress.org is the better option for businesses. While you do have a small fee to pay upfront for hosting, after that you have a lot more control over your site and a lot more flexibility in what you can do.

WordPress.com offers a great service for people setting up personal blogs or photography portfolios, and because updates and security are handled for you, it makes things simple. However, because of its limitations (and its high price to upgrade) it might not have quite the same power to create exactly the type of site you want.

WordPress is by far the most popular content management system today. According to W3Techs, almost a quarter of all websites and 59% of websites with a CMS use WordPress.

The greatest benefit of using WordPress is the flexibility it offers. It can be used to create simple blogs, content-rich websites, e-commerce stores, forums and more. Because it’s open source, people can add their own tweaks to improve sites and there is a wide range of templates and plugins to help customise and improve your site.

WordPress is fairly easy to pick up. Pages and articles can be added, edited and formatted easily and with more than 31,000 free plugins to choose from it’s simple to add functionality to a site. Because it’s so widely used there are plenty of resources online to help if you get stuck, including the official help files and sites like WPBeginner.

Used by: Civic Web Media, TechCrunch, Time, Wired.

Behind WordPress in usage is Joomla, with around 7% of all CMS sites and 3% of the total web. Joomla isn’t as intuitive as WordPress but for those who are tech savvy the system can be learned quite easily, with many tutorials online to help overcome small problems. Once you know how to use Joomla you can make sites that are a bit more powerful than those on WordPress but still aren’t too hard to manage. If you’re creating a social media site or e-commerce store there are lots of benefits to using Joomla and plenty of community help available for each.

Of the three most popular sites, Joomla has the fewest number of free themes and plugins, meaning you may have to do a lot of the work yourself.

Used by: Guggenheim, Harvard University, Linux, UNRIC.

The third most popular CMS at the moment is Drupal, with 2% of the web and 5% of CMS-enabled sites. It is the hardest of the three to learn, often requiring a lot of web experience and knowledge, but it’s capable of creating more complex sites than either Joomla or WordPress. It’s not usually recommended for small businesses setting up their own sites, but for bigger organisations that want a more advanced website and are happy to pay someone else to make and look after the site, it can have huge benefits.

While WordPress and Joomla come with standard admin systems, to make edits easily to a Drupal site a system needs to be created or installed. As there’s no official choice, ease of use will vary from program to program.

Used by: Australian Government, Bruno Mars, Oxfam, The Prince of Wales.

Rounding off the top four is Magento, a CMS that powers more than 1% of the entire internet and around 3% of sites with a content management system. Like WordPress and Drupal, Magento has been increasing in popularity recently.

Magento is purely for e-commerce sites as it lets you set up an online store and cart system. The community version of Magento is free but the enterprise edition, which has more features and functionality, has a fee to use.

Many people talk about a steep learning curve when beginning to use Magento but once you get over the initial hurdles it can be straight forward to use and update. For businesses expecting to make sales in multiple countries, Magento is a great choice as it offers multiple languages and currencies.

As a guideline, some say that unless you’re expecting to make at least $1m a year in sales then Magento is not the right choice for you. Unless you’re tech savvy it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to set things up yourself and the company only gives support to those with the paid option – which costs more than US$14,000/year. Because of the size of the software you’ll also need a dedicated server to handle things smoothly.

Used by: Bing Lee, Liverpool FC, Nike, Olympus.

While each CMS has its benefits, for small businesses that don’t have a dedicated IT specialist or a huge budget for web development, WordPress seems to be the best choice.