In the digital world of websites and content management systems you don’t get much bigger than a WordPress website.
The latest stats show that over 34% of the entire web is run on the WordPress platform and that their share of the CMS market is currently hovering around 60 per cent. To put that in perspective consider that Apple is reported to have a 15.8% share of the phone market in the fourth quarter of 2018 and that Amazon is only just now pushing 50% of the US e-commerce market.
Add to that mind-blowing stat the fact that WordPress is not only the biggest CMS but also the fastest growing. Five hundred websites are reportedly built using the platform every single day and 17 posts are said to be published using its technology every second.
Yes, WordPress really is that big.
And yet, some doubt remains. In the fast-paced, oft-cutthroat world of online business there is a lingering sentiment that a WordPress website is for the amateur. For the mom and pop corner store or the stay-at-home blogger. If you have ever attempted to pitch a website or CMS to a large, traditional organisation you may have come up against this opinion firsthand. Else, you might believe it yourself.
So, what’s the deal here? Is WordPress a platform for small budgets and casual businesses? Or does it have a place amongst the digital movers and shakers of the world?
Read on to see a list of websites using WordPress and get an idea of just what sort of businesses harness its power to build their online vision (spoiler: you’ll be pleasantly surprised).
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 200,000
It shouldn’t be top secret that Britain’s most famous MI6 agent uses WordPress for his site. Or, rather, the dedicated team of people behind the site do. Using a combination of clean design and clear navigation visitors can stay up to date on future productions, read star interviews and even source unique Bond-related merchandise. In April 2019 it received over 202,000 visitors from across the world, making it one of the largest websites dedicated to a fictional film character on the web today.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 40,000,000
As far as publisher news sites go, they don’t come much bigger than the Metro. You might know it from the free papers on the bus on the morning commute but the Metro website has almost 40 million unique visitors per month. Combined with page views a rough estimate is 80 million monthly impressions (music to any advertiser’s ears). Must not be using any amateur platforms with those kind of numbers, right? Nope, just WordPress. The power of the WP platform allows the journalists and commercial teams alike to build and maintain a reactive, powerful distributor of content that reaches mind-boggling amounts of eyeballs.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 3,100,000
The spiritual home of style, culture and bleeding-edge trends uses WordPress? That’s right. The clean design and trademark minimalism of the Vogue website is by and large down to its choice of CMS. And it is a choice that has paid off. As of April 2019 Vogue UK had almost 3.5 million monthly visitors, no doubt looking for some seasonal style inspo (stats: SimilarWeb). And the simple, robust infrastructure of the WordPress CMS allows the talented creatives and photographers at Vogue to show off their work in all its glory, easily and at scale.
NOTE OF INTEREST: The Vogue WP design is so popular there is a ‘Vogue’ theme available in the WordPress theme directory.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 6,000
M&S is one of the UK’s best known and well loved retailers and it has transferred its reputation for crisp, elegant fashion to its website. One of the first things you notice is that this is definitely NOT a blog – the word that has been haunting WordPress for almost as long as it has been around. The M&S Corporate website has a defined goal in mind, and that is to generate leads regarding business gifts and incentives. It uses a nice combination of copy and visuals to achieve this – a trademark of good WP design – and keeps the flag of the famous British retailer flying high.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 700,000
The people who are still holding onto the belief that WordPress is a one-trick pony only have to look at the Network Rail website to see how wrong they are. Talk about multi-functionality! From this site alone you can view updates, search careers, explore the Network Rail Community and browse information on investors. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. You can also navigate to the website managing ticket prices and bookings, creating a powerful content hub that can add real-world value to the business and its customers.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 1,500,000
When high-budget entertainment is your game and viewer expectations are high it’s important to have a robust website to broadcast your content. That’s why, when the BBC were choosing a platform for their operations in the US, they chose WordPress.
The site boasts bright, explosive visuals, full TV episodes and cleverly positioned social buttons to make the sharing of content over Facebook and Twitter easy. The sidebar in the top left corner makes navigation extremely intuitive and it shows in the audience numbers – over 1.75 million unique visitors stopped by in April 2019!
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 3,500,000
The Mercedes Benz brand is tailor-made for quality content. Like its cars, the website is fast, sleek and stylish, with the eye-catching visuals of 90k motors prowling a city skyline, as expected, in the prime real estate. Aside from the photos, however, the website has a great depth of content, encompassing different types of media (video, in particular), to showcase the history of the brand, coming events, the innovation lab and the overall ‘lifestyle’ the brand attempts (successfully) to encapsulate and sell. And like a finely-tuned German engine, WordPress purrs in the background, doing its job at 110% capacity without you ever noticing. Do you think WordPress Websites could be a trend for luxury brands in 2020?
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 24,000,000
The WordPress disbelievers tend to think of it as a platform that is only good for blogs. In this particular case, they are right. TechCrunch is a blog. A blog with almost 50 million impressions per month and a reputation as the foremost resource for startups, apps and gadgets on the internet. Not bad, eh? It’s readers don’t seem to think so. And neither do its investors. In the last decade it has been acquired by Verizon Media (formerly Oath, who acquired AOL), which has revenues of 2.1 billion as of Q4 2018.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 5,000,000
It’s fair to say you can stop doubting a business when the White House itself decides to use it. As of right now the digital home of the President of the United States is powered by WordPress (though, I guess, you could argue the digital home of Donald Trump is Twitter).
The site is used to provide key information on the economy, national security, jobs and immigration. It has a robust search functionality and a clean layout, making it easy for visitors to find the topics and pages that most interest them. A testament to great WP design in what could easily be a jargon-cluttered and muddled experience!
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 1,000,000
That’s right. The freaking Walt Disney Company uses WordPress. You know, the home of The Lion King, The Little Mermaid, and more recently the billion-dollar Star Wars and Marvel empires. How big can you get?
The goal of The Walt Disney Company is to “develop the most creative, innovative and profitable entertainment experiences in the world” and to promote their most powerful corporate visions – their social responsibilities, environmental efforts, philanthropy, investor reports and job openings – they trust the WordPress platform to be their silent partner as they seek to succeed at their global mission..
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 700,000,000 (microsoft.com)
Just when you think no company bigger than Disney will be on this list you realise that Microsoft (yes, that Microsoft) has a WordPress website.
And, just between you and me, I don’t think Mr Gates and co are in the habit of making or partnering with dud businesses (yes yes, Windows Vista wasn’t very good).
WordPress is used to power the official Microsoft blog, which means all of the world’s cutting-edge technology news – you’re talking AI, intelligent cloud systems, billion-dollar earth-shaking partnerships – is passing through the world’s most popular CMS.
Not bad for a platform that was once called “unscalable”.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 5,500,000
The Angry Birds series of video games is the most downloaded of all time, with over three billion downloads as of 2015. It was one of the first (and best) examples of viral gaming and spawned a TV show, merchandise and two feature films (don’t worry, we’ve never seen them either).
When the creators of Angry Birds, Rovio Entertainment, picked WordPress for the Angry Birds website it was no surprise. One thing a WordPress website is known for is sleep design and impactful visuals and as a partner to the brightly coloured and clever game franchise it would have been a no-brainer.
As of right now you can download games, learn about characters and buy merchandise all from the Angry Birds store, which showcases the multi-functionality of the WordPress universe for those willing to dig a little deeper.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 1,000,000
If you need one example of what WordPress can really do when pushed to its potential look no further than the Toyota website for Brazil. Not only is it fully loaded with content it boasts a build-your-own-model function, a “nearest-dealer” maps functionality and the ability to book tests drives without picking up the phone. All of this with no confusing menus or weird dead-ends that are unfortunately familiar on complex websites. A real tribute to the robust practicality of the WordPress back-end and what can be achieved with the right developers.
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 3,000,000
A little like the example above, Renault really went all in on their WordPress use and it shows: in the clear navigation, bold design and intuitive flow to the website that makes for a pleasant experience on both the eyeball and the brain. In April 2019 it received almost 15 million impressions, putting it in league with some big publishers. Good work for just a WordPress website, don’t you think?
ESTIMATED MONTHLY UNIQUE VISITORS ON AVERAGE: 150,000
As a music powerhouse with revenues nearing a billion dollars on its streaming service alone, Sony Music needed a trustworthy platform to deliver its corporate message and showcase its talent to the wider world. WordPress is used here in perhaps its most natural form; a minimalist, tidy design that strikes the right balance between style and substance. One thing’s for sure: in a blisteringly fast-paced industry Sony will not have to add a terrible website to their list of problems to fix.
After going through a list like that it’s really difficult to maintain the belief that WordPress is somehow small-time. And do you know what the crazy thing is? That list is only the beginning. There are tons of famous WordPress websites out there. From Walmart to GoDaddy, Harvard to Home Depot, these businesses are maintaining their formidable position through the use of fast, easy to use technology whilst other organisations fuss about whether it’s right for them. Trust us, it is.
Do you know what the issue is? It’s the fact everybody starts with that first “Hello World” post. It’s a level playing field, and businesses that are used to winning don’t like that.
Don’t be one of them. Start your WordPress website today, yesterday, if you can. If you do need help from a professional agency simply contact us today.
