Articles - Page 133

Agentic AI for Agencies in 2026

bmckeiver

This year’s winner of the People’s Choice Award for Best Website Builder goes to <a href="/products/squarespace/">Squarespace</a>!
<img style="max-width:252px" title="best website builder" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/squarespace.png" alt="best website builder" />
Congratulations to the <a href="/products/squarespace/">Squarespace</a> team for their awesome work.
Squarespace's mission is to provide creative tools that power the future of the web. From designers creating the next generation of web and mobile experiences to anyone managing their own online presence for the first time, Squarespace provides elegant solutions that set new standards for online publishing.
Since 2004 Squarespace has offered a fully-hosted environment for creating and maintaining a website. Known for its sophisticated yet easy-to-use interfaces, Squarespace's do-it-yourself tools allow creative professionals, businesses, bloggers, and web developers to quickly and easily create and maintain professional, high-quality websites.
Our runner up for Best Website Builder for this year was <a href="http://gutensite.com">Gutensite</a>, which fought a hard battle and did a commendable job of making Squarespace work for their win.
This isn’t the end of the awards, however, as the Critic’s Choice portion of the awards which will be selected by CMS Critic will be announced soon.
<ol>
<li>Squarespace</li>
<li>Gutensite</li>
<li>YikeSite</li>
<li>Virb</li>
<li><a href="https://www.weebly.com/">Weebly</a></li>
</ol>
Thanks to all for really driving hard for the votes and don’t forget to stay tuned to our site to find out which of our five shortlisted competitors below takes the <a href="/cms-critic-awards/">Critic’s Choice Award</a>, to be announced soon.

People’s Choice Winner for Best Website Builder is…

mike-johnston

<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/macbook-667280_1280-1-e1472221090906.jpg" />
Some of America’s most lucrative business locales draw commercial real estate costs that capitalize on the wealth companies bring to these regions: Seattle, Silicon Valley, and Utah’s Silicon Slopes, to name a few.
In result, many of the companies (particularly fast-followers to the industry giants) are looking for new ways to cut spending to drive innovation.
Although there are numerous ways to achieve this end, one needn’t look further than the collaborative technologies many of these companies have created to justify nixing office space altogether.
Smaller organizations in manufacturing, healthcare, insurance, financial advisory services, and accounting stand to benefit most from doing away with commercial real estate and the unnecessary costs it brings—all thanks to <a href="http://www.efilecabinet.com/efilecabinet-online/">document management software</a> (DMS).
Although few large organizations have followed suit in implementing cloud-based document management software to enable the remote working and reduced operating costs of document management software, they can look to their smaller counterparts for inspiration (and proof) that working remotely no longer interferes with the collaboration efforts that many once believed could only be facilitated by an in-office team environment.
For instance, The Wall Street Journal reports that 85% of small businesses will increase their spending on software within the next five years, and for good reason: SMB thought leaders are scaling back on office costs by eliminating the need for filing cabinets, and, therefore, office space.
For example, manufacturing company <a href="http://www.efilecabinet.com/success-story-north-carolina/">North Carolina Mutual Wholesale Drug </a> retired 25 filing cabinets through document management software, freeing up office space and drawing into question whether they could relocate to a smaller office, or eventually overthrow the need for an office entirely.
Here are four ways a DMS helps cut down on costs for commercial real estate agents.
<h2>1. Remote Collaboration</h2>
But office size aside, another important factor to consider is whether document management software offers the kind of collaboration that an entirely remote workforce would demand. Not only does it provide this, the security levels of in-office work create many potential non-compliance costs. With document management software, file sharing of sensitive information with bank-grade encryption leaves no room for security hiccups, and given that document management software conquers the perils of workers bringing their own devices to work, also called the <a href="http://www.efilecabinet.com/conquering-byod-phenomenon-dms-slideshow/">BYOD Phenomenon</a>, document management software provides not only the security needed for workers to work remotely without the organization’s IT personnel losing sleep over it, but also the accessibility of information that great collaboration demands.
Still, some suggest that removing the physical office from the workforce’s equation is a bad idea, as it will only impinge collaboration—even with sophisticated technology to replace its walls. However, Psychology Today reports that meetings, often viewed as the first-rate form of collaboration for in-office environments, merely <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/wired-success/201204/why-meetings-kill-productivity">kill productivity</a>. Although many employees swear by meetings, the reasons for doing so may have more to do with getting a “break” midday than they do gaining ground on projects. Sure, some may view working from home as a place rife with distractions, but that doesn’t mean one can’t venture to a nearby library or other remote space with little distractions. In fact, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/03/opinion/sunday/working-from-home-vs-the-office.html?_r=1">The New York Times</a> reports that employees are more productive when they work from home.
<h2>2. DMS Makes Information Highly Retrievable</h2>
What’s more, the conversations we have in office over “finding information” are what document management software precludes. We oftentimes feel we need to work in office so we can collaborate over items that may seem otherwise confusing via email, but with the organizational capacity that document management software brings to organizations, these “what the heck is going on?” conversations and searches for certain files are eliminated entirely. Document management software takes what would otherwise be a conversation requiring physical, in office-presence, and simplifies it into a quick email (in the worst case scenario).
Confound this with the fact that the post office is a dying service, which businesses no longer rely upon as frequently as they used to, and the necessity of office walls is further proven to be a faulty premise. With the exception of shipping and purchasing trade show materials for marketing purposes, businesses needn’t rely on the post office to transact business. In fact, over the last 5 years, reliance on the post office has been reduced by 22% according to Gizmodo.com.
<h2>3. DMS Facilitates the Accountability Bosses Need from Remote Workers</h2>
One of the greatest fears many organizational leaders have with going remote and doing away with an office (even if to cut costs dramatically), is that remote workers will not actually work, but rather dawdle away their time. Document management software, however, makes it much easier to identify and track workers’ contributions through workflow cycles, role-based user permissions, and the number of mediums on which the software is available: Macs, mobile phones, and desktop computers with various operating systems.
<h2>4. DMS Help Cut Salary Expenditures &amp; Boost Workers’ Quality of Life</h2>
Not only has cloud based document management software received positive feedback for being more environmentally friendly as it requires far less electrical input when compared with typical computing and on premises solutions—it also offers the potential to no longer need in-office work and the myriad costs associated with it, and it all starts with reducing (and potentially eliminating) employees commute to work.
Employees needn’t be paid as much to accommodate commuting costs if they are no longer commuting to work. Given that the average worker spends anywhere from $1,500-$2,000 annually on gas commuting to work, small organizations with 15-20 employees can let HR managers entertain the possibility of reducing payroll costs by $20,000-$40,000 without cutting into employees’ standard of living. Many small businesses could leverage this extra cash flow to accomplish much in the way of innovation and reduced operating costs.
Thus, this has the potential to improve public image of SMBs by way of reduced environmental footprint that vehicle emissions would otherwise contribute to. Not only are emissions bad for the environment—but cities are incentivizing carpooling efforts to accommodate the commute to offices. What’s more, the majority of psychological research concludes that commutes (especially when they are long) drastically detract from quality of life and therefore, workers’ productivity.
It also stands to figure that if we save time spent on commuting, we can spend that extra hour, half-hour, or even 15 minutes working on something that actually contributes to the success of our organizations. Although it may seem like a little bit of time in one day, when compounded over the course of a year, these time slots can add up to massive increases in productivity, output, and profit. sitting in traffic and commuting to work.
Sure, some may view working from home as a place rife with distractions, but that doesn’t mean one can’t venture to a nearby library or other remote space with little distractions. In fact, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/03/opinion/sunday/working-from-home-vs-the-office.html?_r=1">The New York Times</a> reports that employees were are more productive when they worked from home.
<h2>Has Document Management Software Helped Your Business?</h2>
With all the above benefits of having a DMS to hand, I'd like to know how much of an impact document management software had on your business. Share your story in the comments section below!

How to Cut Commercial Real Estate Costs With a DMS

There's a quiet battle raging within a relatively young niche.
Thanks to the huge demand for regular unboxing experiences, plus the emergence of success stories <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/Entrepreneur/comments/2h1mlt/the_inner_workings_of_a_subscription_box_company" target="_blank">like the one of Wet Shave Club, found on Reddit</a>, subscription box businesses have been sprouting up everywhere, catering to every interest, taste, hobby and profession.
<img style="max-width:552px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/cardboard-314504_640552x0-is.jpg" />
There are now monthly boxes for <a href="http://www.beardbrand.co.uk/" target="_blank">beards</a>, <a href="https://meowbox.com/" target="_blank">cats</a>, <a href="http://www.candyclub.com/" target="_blank">candy</a>, and even <a href="http://writercrate.com/" target="_blank">writing</a>. You name it, and there's probably a subscription box out there geared towards it.
The interesting part? This growing niche has given two new content management systems the chance to emerge. And they're battling for a slice of this scrumptious subscription pie.
<h2>CrateyJoy Vs Subbly</h2>
If you want to start your own subscription box business, you'll want to take a long hard look at both <a href="https://www.cratejoy.com/" target="_blank">CrateJoy</a> and <a href="http://www.subbly.co/" target="_blank">Subbly</a>. At the time of writing, they're the two platforms dedicated to starting up subscription box businesses.
<img style="max-width:300px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/cratejoy-share-fb300x0-is.jpg" />
CrateJoy was launched in 2014 by Co-Founders Amir Elaguizy and Alex Morse, out of Austin, Texas. The platform came out of beta at the beginning of 2015, but has already gained traction as one of the best subscription box CMS solutions.
<a href="http://www.subbly.co/" target="_blank"><img style="max-width:325px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/bb2b387f4e3635439c11563666eb4566.png" /></a>
Subbly was launched halfway through 2014 by Stefan Pretty and his team, and has been closely competing with Cratejoy every since.
Both platforms offer relatively similar solutions.
In a nut shell, they help you get your subscription box business off the ground with a SaaS (Software as a Service) approach, ready-made templates, design customization, analytics, and a whole bunch of other typical eCommerce functions. And of course, subscription billing is built in as standard.
Their pricing structures differ, though.
Cratejoy offers one “All Access” plan costing $39 per month. However, they impose additional transaction fees for subscriptions.
Subbly on the other hand, charge based on subscriber counts. For example, their cheapest plan comes in at $24 per month, but only supports businesses with ten or less subscribers. All their higher plans come in more expensive than Cratejoy's solitary “All Access” package. However, <a href="http://www.subbly.co/pricing-comparison" target="_blank">Subbly argues that, in the long run, you stand to make a saving</a> thanks to the lack of additional transaction fees.
My experience with the two was relatively similar. The user experience doesn't differ much between the two platforms, but I certainly felt that Cratejoy had more to offer. The customization interface is slightly easier to use, and they also offer more themes which are ready to import and play with. Plus, I thought Cratejoy's themes were of a higher quality.
So, for me, Cratejoy is edging the battle – for now.
Perhaps my biggest gripe with both platforms though, is that they don't support PayPal at all. They opt for a Stripe-only approach, instead.
<h2>The Alternatives</h2>
Technically, the subscription box niche is a two horse race. But alternatives do exist.
Shopify, for example, is a platform that can be leveraged to enter into the subscription box industry. Various subscription apps exist, including <a href="https://apps.shopify.com/shopify-recurring-payments" target="_blank">ReCharge</a> and <a href="https://apps.shopify.com/paywhirl-recurring-payments" target="_blank">PayWhirl</a>. They seem to work quite well, but ReCharge comes in at $19.99 per month, with an extra 1% charge per transaction. PayWhirl has a free offering, but charges an extra 2% per transaction, dropping to 1% when you dish out $49.99 per month.
WooCommerce makes up the other alternative. The WordPress eCommerce plugin offers “<a href="http://www.woothemes.com/products/woocommerce-subscriptions/" target="_blank">WooCommerce Subscriptions</a>“. The name says it all really.
Apart from an upfront fee of $199.99 with no free trial period, the only “problem” is that it's essentially a branch of a WordPress plugin. So, you would be forgiven for think that it's not really a convincing solution. Furthermore, there's no real added functionality aside from managing subscription payments. It's a bare bones option.
Personally, I'd rather stick to the dedicated subscription platforms. Cratejoy and Subbly are both good solutions right now, and with subscription boxes being their main focus, merchants looking to enter that niche are better off relying on them, rather than anybody else.
What are your thoughts on the subscription box niche? Is the competition healthy enough, or is there room for more platforms to join the battle? Let us know in the comments below.

CrateJoy vs Subbly: Battle For the Subscription Box Niche

Squarespace, like most vendors, is constantly adding updates to improve the functionality of their product and bring new and useful features to their customers. Recently, they introduced a couple of new features that are now available for Squarespace customers to add to their websites.
The first new feature is the addition of a Mobile Information Bar. Here's how it works:
When the Mobile Information Bar is enabled, visitors accessing your site from mobile devices will see a simple shortcut bar that helps them quickly find your most important business information: your address, email, phone number, and business hours (see below).
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/static_squarespace_com.jpg" alt="squarespace mobile information bar" />
In addition to the mobile information bar is a new Announcement Bar. For those of you who are familiar with WordPress, this is similar to products such as Hello Bar and other similar plugins / addons.
The Announcement Bar can be used by site owners to announce major news on your site. The Announcement Bar has a range of potential use cases: everything from highlighting a major promotion in your store to announcing a major business deal. When enabled, the Announcement Bar shows up at the top of your website.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/announcementbar980x0.jpg" alt="squarespace announcement bar" />
So there you have it. Two handy new features for those of you running Squarespace. If you aren't running it yet and would like to try it out, they offer a 14 day free trial with no credit card so I strongly recommend you give it a shot (if only just to see how it works). <a href="http://www.squarespace.com">Click here to try Squarespace for free.</a>

Squarespace introduces new features: Mobile Info Bar and Announcement Bar.

My choice for Best Enterprise CMS for this year (and the one that will be my #1 recommendation in this category until next years awards) is the one and only, <a href="http://www.adobe.com/products/cq.html">Adobe CQ</a>!
<img style="max-width:383px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/adobe-cq5_5-xumak.png" />
Adobe CQ offers exceptional functionality for enterprise customers and Adobe is one of the few vendors in the enterprise space that continues to innovate year over year. Not only is a force to be reckoned with on it's own but when combined with the other products within the Adobe Marketing Cloud, CQ becomes a solution that beautifully fits with any enterprise marketing strategy.
Adobe has come a long way since their <a href="/adobe-acquire-day-software/">purchase of Day Software</a> back in the day and has truly become the top dog in the enterprise market place.
As my choice for this year, when asked to offer suggestions for a best of breed enterprise CMS, I will point to Adobe CQ.  They will receive my recommendation from now until next year’s winner is announced.

Critic’s Choice for Best Enterprise CMS goes to…

<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/softwareexp2-1-e1471869265706.jpg" style="text-align:center" />

Last week, <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/software-explorer/" target="_blank">I launched Software Explorer</a>, the YouTube series dedicated to exploring business software.
Today, I'm very pleased to present episode one, where I walk you through the free desktop-based website builder, <a href="https://mobirise.com/">Mobirise</a>.
So without any further adieu, enjoy!
<iframe allowfullscreen frameborder="0" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/M9Xr9yFMLLY?feature=oembed"></iframe>
You can find out more about<a href="https://mobirise.com/"> Mobirise via their website</a>, as well as through my <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/mobirise-review/">Mobirise Review</a>.
Do you want me to feature a particular business software on Software Explorer? Let me know in the comments section below!

[Video] Software Explorer Episode 1: Mobirise

In case you are wondering why I haven't written on my own site in a while, it's because I've been incredibly busy traveling and visiting CMS and eCommerce vendors across the globe. As you know, we've already met with over a dozen vendors in North America and Europe alone and I'm now working on visiting a few more in the US region.
For instance, I just came back from visiting with <a href="http://www.ingeniux.com" target="_blank">Ingeniux</a> at their offices in Seattle, an experience I wrote about on the website I share with my wife, <a href="http://karlynnandmike.com" target="_blank">karlynnandmike.com</a>. 
I'm now scheduled to fly out to San Francisco visit with the popular website builder company, <a href="http://www.wix.com/" target="_blank">Wix</a>, on Wednesday and Thursday of this week. I'll be doing a tour of their offices, interviewing one of their execs and getting the inside scoop on some upcoming news. Stay tuned to <a href="http://twitter.com/cmscritic" target="_blank">my Twitter account</a> to see the goings on during my trip where I'll be sharing pics of the cities I hit, the people I meet and of course, their offices. From San Francisco I'm off to Encinitas, California to meet with the eCommerce company, <a href="/ecwid1" target="_blank">Ecwid</a>. I'll be touring their offices and meeting with their execs as well! 
Upon my return from California, I'm off to Ontario for some consulting work with a client and then, at the end of November, you can catch me at the Liferay Symposium in beautiful Chicago, Illinois where I'll be covering the event in all it's glory.
All in all, this tends to be my view of things lately:
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/img_0182800x0-is.jpg" />
Rough life right? Believe me, I'm grateful every day for what I get to do. 
For more pics of my trips, keep an eye on my other site, <a href="http://karlynnandmike.com" target="_blank">KarlynnAndMike</a> where I share the personal side of things including travel and food related stuff. Of course, if you have something you want me to ask any of these companies while on site, drop a note in the comments and let me know.
See you on my travels,
Mike

Seattle to San Francisco to San Diego - I'm on the road again

Power your CMS on AWS

Manage your websites & apps in the most trusted cloud.

#ffffff

<img alt="streamlined-updates" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/streamlined-updates-1-e1471435122911.png" />
<a href="https://wordpress.org/news/2016/08/pepper/">WordPress 4.6</a> is finally here, and <a href="/wordpress-4-4-beta-bare-bones/">this time</a>, it actually has some features that are worth updating for.
Named ‘Pepper' after the musician Pepper Adams, WordPress 4.6 improves theme and plugin management by allowing you to update, install, and delete directly from the Plugins and Themes interfaces.
It also boasts native (and thus faster) fonts, a better content recovery feature, and an automatic inline broken link checker. Not too shabby, WordPress.
<iframe allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen" frameborder="0" src="https://videopress.com/embed/GbdhpGF3"></iframe> 
<h2>Theme &amp; Plugin Management and Inline Link Checking</h2>
The ability to update and delete plugins and themes without leaving the Plugins and Themes interfaces makes it a lot easier to manage your site. I'm a big fan of this feature, because it's those extra few seconds that were taken up by page redirects that made WordPress so tiring to use at times.
As for the automatic inline link checker, WordPress now alerts you to the fact that you have inserted a broken link into your page or article. A small, but intelligent upgrade to the inline linking feature introduced in version 4.5
<h2>Better Content Recovery and Faster Fonts</h2>
In the case of a lost internet connection while writing a post, WordPress has been saving and recovering work for a while now. But with WordPress 4.6, the platform now stores unsaved work to your browser, making data loss ever rarer.
Finally, WordPress 4.6 now uses fonts that your browser already has to hand, meaning that pages load (fractionally) faster. I doubt this will impact the average WordPress user at all, but when it comes to speed, every little helps.
Is this a mind-blowingly awesome WordPress update? No – but it isn't a bad one either.
<a href="/how-not-to-show-your-support-for-wordpress/">I ruffled a few feathers</a> when I spoke out about the <a href="/wordpress-4-4-beta-bare-bones/">lacklustre nature of WordPress 4.4</a>, but I can already see the benefits emanating from the new features found in WordPress 4.6, so kudos to the WordPress dev team and community for this one.
For more information, <a href="https://wordpress.org/news/2016/08/pepper/">check out the official announcement</a>.

WordPress 4.6 Improves Theme & Plugin Management

The recent shortcomings of the healthcare.gov website may have put health information management (HIM) in the United States in a particularly uncomfortable spotlight – but the truth is, managing content for the vast and vital systems that the healthcare industry requires is a constant and enormous challenge everywhere across the globe.
Industrialized nations worldwide have legislated a myriad of regulations to help ensure that healthcare records be confidential and private, while at the same time ensuring their availability for those who need access for the sake of patients' health and lives.
Such legislation includes Canada's PIPEDA (Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act), the European Union's Data Protection Directive, and Japan's Personal Information Protection Act (JPIPA), among others.
Technology increases our ability to make the goals of ready and secure access to information a reality for hospitals, physician groups and health plans; at the same time, however, without the right systems in place, technology also puts medical record integrity and security at risk.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/patient_portal_by_opentext.jpg" alt="sample opentext healthcare cms interface" />
<h2>Technology Both Mitigates and Creates Risk</h2>
On the one hand, an enterprise content management (ECM) system such as Hyland's OnBase can eliminate the security risk posed by old-fashioned document-shredding, allowing medical professionals to instead assign automatic expiration dates for information deletion.
On the other hand, the very existence of ubiquitous computing (via smartphones, etc.) is what makes infamous medical record security breaches – like the case of the laptop that was stolen from the UK's Peterborough District Hospital – possible to begin with. It is for these reasons that healthcare information management guidelines worldwide recognize the benefits of a software system that ensures the ability to track the location of information, to monitor who accesses it (and when) through careful user authentication, and to encrypt data as needed while preventing data loss and fighting malware.
The right technology must also be accompanied by sufficient technical support, ensuring good user training and education, as well as proper system maintenance over time.
CMS' like <a href="/products/cascade-cms/" target="_blank">Cascade Server</a> and MedTouch, which is a <a href="/products/sitecore/" target="_blank">Sitecore</a> partner, emphasize the importance of customer service and support amidst challenging data migrations – and the ongoing challenge of compliance and adaptability to meet the needs of patients, as well as the challenges presented by evolving technology and regulations.
<h2>The Changing Landscape of Health Information Management in the United States</h2>
The market for strong healthcare CMS in the United States – where federal and state regulations regarding HIT (health information technology) are still being defined – has been an increasingly high-stakes endeavor ever since the time of the passage of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability (HIPPA) Act and subsequent HITECH (Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health) Act.
This act offers healthcare entities high incentive payments for Medicaid if they can demonstrate by 2016 that they have adopted – and are “meaningfully” using – EHRs (electronic health records) at an acceptable level. It also puts in place penalties, starting in 2015, for those who have not met this requirement. “Meaningful use” of a certified EHR includes the use of electronic prescriptions and the electronic exchange of health information – all with the aim of increasing the quality of patient care.
Therefore, a CMS with the flexibility to meet such demands is invaluable.
<h2>Communicating Across Software Systems &amp; Across Organizations</h2>
The ability to communicate information about a single patient across various care facilities – in a way that is centralized, accurate, secure, and accessible to healthcare practitioners when they need it – is at the heart of what a CMS must be capable of doing in order to be useful for the healthcare industry.
To that end, a CMS like MediTech stresses that its system allows an electronic unified personal health record (PHR) to seamlessly follow each patient – from physicians' offices to ambulatory care centers, to behavioral health facilities and hospitals – all the way to home care organizations.
Interoperability is also a vital part of health information exchange (HIE); this means that the CMS in question can be used regardless of an organization’s existing software or affiliations. It also means a system is adaptable enough to handle mergers, ever-expanding care networks, and the implementation of shared models (such as Canadian health registries).
OpenText's and Lexmark's CMS both market the desirability of their paperless systems, which can digitize everything from medical imaging to prescriptions. Patient portals, such as Geisinger Health System's – powered by OpenText and pictured here – are just another part of what an excellent CMS for healthcare makes possible.
The benefits of effective and secure content management are many for the healthcare industry, but here's one more that hasn't even been mentioned: cost. It is estimated that old-fashioned methods of exchanging patient medical records can unnecessarily cost a single-clinician practice nearly $20,000 annually.
Therefore, investing in a CMS that is up to the challenge of handling the type (and amount) of information vital to good healthcare is a financially sound decision as well.

What Makes a CMS a Good Fit for the Healthcare Industry and Why?

My choice for Best Free CMS for this year (and the one that will be my #1 recommendation in this category until next years awards) is the one and only, <a href="http://processwire.com">ProcessWire</a>!  ProcessWire is a free, open source content management system/framework that lets you build amazing and unique websites and web applications while maintaining exceptional speed and a small footprint.
<a href="http://processwire.com" target="_blank"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/open-source-cms-with-custom-fields-api-processwire-cmscmf-google-chrome_2012-12-03_11-14-29-620x436.jpg" /></a>
One of the biggest bonuses to using ProcessWire is the active and friendly community. Users of the system are made to feel welcome and and are given encouragement and assistance to help get their projects off the ground. Community members are quick to help those in need with not only detailed solutions but also suggestions on how things can be done better.
ProcessWire is an incredibly flexible system to use and when I first took a look at it, it's minimal interface and size made me think I was dealing with something that had minimal capabilities, but I was sorely mistaken. Once I started working my way through their excellent <a href="http://processwire.com/videos/">video tutorials</a> and trying things on my own, I quickly realized the power of this system and that I was, in fact, only limited by my imagination.
As my choice for this year, when asked to offer suggestions for the best free CMS, I will point to ProcessWire.  They will receive my recommendation from now until next year's winner is announced.
Congratulations to Ryan and the team at ProcessWire, you guys deserve it! If you haven't already done so, check out my <a href="/processwire-review/">ProcessWire Review</a> to learn more.

Critic's Choice for Best Free CMS goes to...

LightCMS is a constantly improving platform, geared towards small to medium sized businesses looking for a feature rich website builder.With this latest update, the LightCMS team has enhanced the eCommerce experience, with an updated checkout process and store users, to go alongside <a href="/lightcms-brings-in-user-registration-enhanced-user-profiles/">recently introduced profile pages</a>.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/lightcms.jpg" /> Here's a look at what's new thanks to this latest update.<h2>Store Users &amp; Enhanced Checkout</h2>Shoppers can now sign up and create their own accounts for a streamlined buying experience. All the standard fields are there for customers to fill out, such as; name, address, billing information, and so forth.Existing LightCMS sites will have store users disabled, but it will be enabled by default for new sites.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/storeusersettings340x0-is.png" />With this release, LightCMS' checkout becomes a two-step process. The first step in the checkout process gathers customer email, shipping information, and shipping method.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/checkoutshipping_thumb394x0-is.png" />The second step gathers billing information, including payment method, billing address, and special instructions.Another useful update has also been made to user profile pages, where a new “Purchases” tab now resides, showing each user their purchase history.

LightCMS Bolsters eCommerce Offering With Store Users & Updated Checkout

This year’s winner of the People’s Choice Award for Best Budget CMS goes to the ever-popular Concrete5!
<img style="max-width:300px" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/koken-620x361_muxhsx.png" />
Congratulations to everyone at Concrete5 for their awesome work.
Concrete5 makes running a website easy.
Go to any page on your site, and an editing toolbar gives you all the controls you need to update your website. No intimidating manuals, no complicated administration interfaces – just point and click.
What can you build with concrete5?
<ul>
<li>Online magazines and newspapers.</li>
<li>eCommerce sites.</li>
<li>Extranets and Intranets.</li>
<li>Government websites.</li>
<li>Small business websites.</li>
<li>Non-profit and organization websites.</li>
<li>Community-based portals.</li>
<li>Church, club, and team websites.</li>
<li>Personal or family homepages.</li>
<li>Marketing-focused sites for a corporation.</li>
<li>Any school, college, or university website.</li>
<li>Many online communities.</li>
<li>Anything else you can dream up!</li>
</ul>
Check out Concrete5 on <a href="http://www.concrete5.org">their website</a> to learn more about this great CMS.
Our runner up for this year was SageFrame, which fought a hard battle and did a commendable job of making Concrete5 work for their win.
This isn’t the end of the awards, however, as the Critic’s Choice portion of the awards which will be selected by CMS Critic will be announced soon.
<ol>
<li>Concrete5</li>
<li>SageFrame</li>
<li>ProcessWire</li>
<li>MODx CMS</li>
<li>ExpressionEngine</li>
</ol>
Thanks to all for really driving hard for the votes and don’t forget to stay tuned to our site to find out which of our five shortlisted competitors below takes the <a href="/cms-critic-awards/">Critic’s Choice Award</a>, to be announced soon.

People's Choice Winner for Best Budget CMS is...

<img alt="agile crm app" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sshot-10.png" />
<a href="https://www.agilecrm.com/">Agile CRM</a> has just released their mobile app for iOS (beta) and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=agile.agile.crm&amp;hl=en">Android</a>, making it possible for their users to access their free CRM on the go.
The Agile CRM team recently announced that their platform was now <a href="/agilecrm-free-10-users/">free for up to ten users</a>, so their new app should come in very handy for small businesses and startups who work from the road.
The relatively young platform is winning users from around the world.
<h2>CRM for Mobile: How Agile Are Making it Work</h2>
Agile CRM's mobile app for iOS and Android is a powerful tool that helps marketers and salespeople acquire, retain, and service customers.
<img alt="agile crm app" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sshot-11-1.png" />
Here's a breakdown of the core features found within the app.
<h3>A Simple Dashboard</h3>
The Agile CRM mobile app dashboard gives you quick access to recently viewed contacts, deals and upcoming tasks.
Agile's streamlined mobile dashboard helps you increase sales and track, tag and convert more leads. You can also change your app settings from the dashboard.
<h3>Manage Contacts</h3>
The app also lets you access contact data exactly when you need it.
You can add tags, change lead scores, write notes and check tasks related to your contacts, directly from your mobile device.
<h3>Track Deals, Events, and Tasks</h3>
The app can also be used to <a href="https://www.agilecrm.com/deals">track deals</a>, move relevant milestones, and get a real-time picture of the progress of your leads.
You can also check pending tasks, mark tasks as complete, and create new tasks and events for colleagues to see.
<h3>Google Calendar Sync</h3>
Agile CRM’s app can be integrated with <a href="https://www.agilecrm.com/google-calendar-sync">Google calendars</a> to create a seamless 2-way sync. This enables you and your team to view up-to-date versions of all of your tasks from the calendar within the app.
All in all, this seems like a pretty comprehensive mobile version of Agile CRM, and since it comes at zero cost, it's hard to fault it. It's especially nice to see now that Agile CRM is free for teams as large as ten.
To find out more about the Agile CRM app, <a href="https://www.agilecrm.com/mobile-crm">visit their website</a>. You can <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=agile.agile.crm&amp;hl=en">download it now for Android</a>, but you'll need to wait a short while before it's out of beta on iOS.

CRM for Mobile: The Agile CRM App Goes Live

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