Joomla vs Wordpress vs SEO component

[Curtis SWN]

I am told that out of the box Wordpress is better for SEO than Joomla 1.0 or 1.5.

If I employ an SEO component, would this basically bring Joomla up to the level of Wordpress?

Curtis

[instance]

I've been told that aliens abduct people for diabolical medical experiments.

The level of search engine friendliness is driven by the template you use, so it's possible that "Joomla!" is both better and worse than others "out of the box". J! 1.5 uses a variety of well documented techniques to make things nice for search engines, SEF URLs being one of the most important. I'm sure a SEO component can take some of the manual work out of the process, but I haven't looked at any of them in detail. I would look at what they do carefully though. Search ranking algorithms change constantly and a "trick" that works today could be penalized as trickery a few months later.

The best way to gain good search engine ranking is to provide good, useful content. If you're saying the same thing as 50,000 other sites (ahem, say for example you're in the web hosting business ) then no amount of SEO tweaking is going to get you at the top of the first page for long and you'd better find another marketing strategy.

[PavlovaPete]

Hi Curtis SWN,

I think instance is right - the SEO differences between J! and WP are unlikely to have a significant impact on your site's performance in the search engines (and more importantly, your users).

If you studied and implemented http://www.seomoz.org/article/beginners ... timization I'm sure you'd find some useful insights.

Cheers

[flashgordonweb]

Although WordPress has a lot of plugins for making it SEO friendly, I don't think it has a big advantage over Joomla SEO. If you use all of the meta fields in the Joomla article page, and use search engine friendly URLs, then there is no difference in my opinion. It comes down to what kind of site you want I'd say rather then whether WordPress or Joomla has a better SEO setup.

[trichnosis]

as i know moho blog component 0.17 version uses the joomla urls with all wordpress features

[davidtowers]

Curtis SWN, after installing the right extensions, both Joomla and Wordpress are similar in terms of search engine optimisation.

I have recently spent some time researching this and yes Wordpress is better out of the box (i.e. without extensions), but once you install the right seo extensions for Joomla, you will have a CMS primed for SEO that is as good as Wordpress. It's worth noting by the way, that in order to get Wordpress primed for SEO, you will also need to install an SEO extension, so don't be deceived by the idea that Wordpress is perfect.

[kukujang]

My opinion for Joomla & Wordpress to this is
- If you are going to be the person customizing and extending the system and then using it, I guess its easier to start with WordPress, because by the time you’ve learnt about the templates and the template tags, you are already ready to customize WordPress into whatever you want out of it.

- If you’ve got an expert to create and build the CMS base for you, and you are only the person managing the content, I still feel that Joomla does a better job.

However i think Wordpress is the best for SEO friendly.

[davidtowers]

Yeah I'd agree with that kukujang

[adamos46]

There are so many things to consider for SEO. There are many interesting articles to read how to optimize your SEO ranking. A cms will not make you hit #1 in google. Remember, your website have to be human accessible first and not bot accessible. Use the default sef for joomla and disable google from picking up the .php?option=etc in robots.txt. Read how to define correct keywords in your content. Update your content regularly and your ranking will go up. There is no out of the box solution.

btw someone told me bush is a smart guy

[nowal]

I think both WordPress and Joomla are excellent open source application.

In terms of SEO WordPress has an edge. Search Engine Friendly (SEF) is built-in in wordpress in the form of Permalink. You can customize it in few seconds, no need to install any additional plug-in. It's simple as 1-2-3. When we talk about SEF in Joomla I am sure it's possible but not as easy as WordPress.

In terms of meta tags, both WordPress and Joomla offer couple of extensions which are quite useful. Thanks for the open source

In my opinion WordPress has an edge over Joomla in terms of SEO.

[yangpinyan]

Joomla is a very robust system. It is designed in the concept of components and modules which make the creation of websites very easy.

Joomla unlike wordpress that is almost SEO friendly out of the box, I mean “almost” because in the time I have been using wordpress I have noticed and read from authority sources that Wordpress creates a lot of duplicate content, and URLs are not so friendly out of the box. But compare to Joomla wordpress is way ahead in the SEO game. Joomla out of the box comes with crappy URLs and a lot of duplicate content. Even though there are very good components like sh404SEF which is the best free SEO component currently in the Joomla community to fix SEO issues, still there are problems. Broken permalinks, Titles not search engine optimized etc..

[Chicago123]

I am new to Joomla and haven't taken the leap just yet. I do use wordpress and it's very easy to setup and the all in one seo plugin is logical and works pretty well.

As mentioned before, if you're planning on blogging, go with wordpress. If you're planning on building out a professional business site with better design capabilities, a content management system, blog, and pretty sweet ecommerce integration you may want to consider Joomla.

SEO for wordpress is easy and it's probably the same thing with Joomla. I would not base your whole decision around just seo.

[Arcadia]

Wordpress is better for SEO out of the vox but I think you can do a good work by installing plugins on Joomla...

[Greg_NST]

I'm pretty sure that the only difference between the two comes down to navigation. 'Out of the box', Wordpress is designed almost perfectly for search purposes - loads of content, with links to categories and archives. Thing is, it does not take much work to make Joomla just as good....

It all comes down to design. A good search marketer can make any tool perform.

[stayhungry]

I am newbie for joomla, but wordpress have a lot seo tools.

[compass]

There is no difference.

In fact, on my blog I just offered $399 to anyone that can prove otherwise!

[ogormask]

Absolutely no difference its all dependent on you to do the SEO work. WP is not better out of the box as you have to install plugins just as you do with Joomla. If you dont know how to do SEO then you arent going to know how to do it with either one. You have to write the content and write the title tags etc yourself. Nothing comes out of the box with 100% unique content per your subject.

[jake11]

Joomla with some SEO plugins will beat Wordpress on SEO, I wish that joomla make SEO built in and not need extra plug ins

[fifthhouse]

I don't know if anyone has considered this or not, but I just ran into a problem with my joomla site that doesn't happen in wordpress:

When i move articles in my joomla site, the old article menu item no longer appears in the google search engines. So if that article had a high rating and i move it to a new category on my site, that rating is lost.

To me this is very problematic, because as my site develops over time I will frequently need to rearrange my site navigation to reflect the changeing needs of my audience. How can I do this if I can't move articles?

Joomla is a content management software, but if I can't manage my content without affecting SEO, this in my opinion brings joomla down on the SEO discussion. Wordpress doesn't have this problem at all. I can freely move articles wherever I want, the location of the article on the site has no effect at all on how google access the article.

I may be missing something and maybe there is a way to move articles in Joomla without causing this problem but so far I don't see a reasonably easy solution that would allow me to move articles at my will without causing confusion and alot of extra work for me.

[harika123]

I am told that out of the box Wordpress is better for SEO than Joomla 1.0 or 1.5.

If I employ an SEO component, would this basically bring Joomla up to the level of Wordpress?

Curtis

well it is hard to say that bring joomla up to level of wordpress .. word press have lots of seo plugins and joomla have only 1 percent compared word press .. may be directory submission and social bookmarking will increase joomla SERP. Compared to word press joomla seo is bad

[sdalgl72]

This is an interesting article. It has found that SEF links take longer to be picked up by Google.

http://totalreachwebdesign.co.uk/search ... links.html

[Darren-E]

My personal opinion is that it's not the plug-ins that make the product more SEO friendly. I have used Wordpress and I use Joomla! extensively- I would say that no plug-in product out there compares to well written content.

Just like Google says, "Google ranks by quality over quantity"

[mykhaelo]

I don't believe there is a major difference upfront. But, if there was you could easily supplement it with all the current plugins for both platforms.

[kolkataseo]

actually wordpress have a ping list were it would help wp blog more crawl able ..

don't know about joomla .. i'm new with it

[webdesignct]

I personally implement both when designing for clients. I think they go well hand in hand.

[Kualaho]

I searched this subject a lot, and my take on this debate is that SEO will depend more on the webmaster skills and keyword-rich content.
Wordpress is NOT BETTER than Joomla in term of SEO.Full stop!

[Kualaho]

My opinion for Joomla & Wordpress to this is
- If you are going to be the person customizing and extending the system and then using it, I guess its easier to start with WordPress, because by the time you’ve learnt about the templates and the template tags, you are already ready to customize WordPress into whatever you want out of it.

- If you’ve got an expert to create and build the CMS base for you, and you are only the person managing the content, I still feel that Joomla does a better job.

However i think Wordpress is the best for SEO friendly.

--------
I disagree. The beauty of Joomla is that anyone can make a solid website out of it without the need for an expert. I am a living example, I started working with Joomla without having a clue about html, CSS, php...and I believe I did a relatively pretty job with the help of firebug and other free tools.

With regards to SEO friendly, I understand that this mean friendly urls and how easy it is for SE bots to crawl your site, and that will depend on your template and menu layout which does not depend on the platform be it joomla or wordpress.
Rgrds

[slinky]

I found that running articles on Wordpress was much easier to input and use. With regard to SEO, I found that Wordpress was much easier to administrate, enter info and just get out the door. Once out the door, many more places seemed to pick up my feeds, etc. and the results were much better placements in search engines than I had with my Joomla site. I use Joomla only when there is a template that works for me for a site and I don't need SEO or many pages, like small company sites. Also use Joomla if there is a specific component that may work.

Maybe things have changed but Joomla was always a much heavier object, took way more resources and my results were better with wordpress. Ask me to prove it? My site results are better including on articles. I know this from experience but an offer like that is impossible to prove and more of an attempt at a traffic draw.

[MCNX]

In my opinion, if you are looking for blogging software WordPress is the best option. Now, if you are looking for a solid content management system with blogging options, you are better off with Joomla. SEO: both are good.

[goodel]

I think Wordpress is better than Joomla because is easier and faster.