Web Content Management (Global Market)

2023: Global Web Content Management Software Market Size Reached $7 Billion for the Year

At the end of 2023, costs in the global web content management software (WCMS) market amounted to about $7 billion. Demand for such solutions is growing steadily, which is due, among other things, to the active development of digital marketing and e-commerce. Industry trends are addressed in the Market Research Future survey presented at the end of December 2024.

One of the market drivers is the growing penetration of Internet access, including mobile. In today's world, almost every company and organization needs a website to interact with customers, investors and partners. WCMS systems help you create, publish, and modify content on web pages. This simplifies site management, reduces costs, and keeps information up-to-date. Web content management enables businesses to retain existing customers and attract new customers.

The pandemic has had a stimulating effect on the industry. COVID-19 Due to the self-isolation of employees and the transition to remote work, many companies were forced to look for solutions for managing documents and sites in order to optimize and simplify business operations in new realities. As a result, WCMS adoption has accelerated in many areas, including the public sector, retail, defense, etc health care.

Another driver is technological advances such as artificial intelligence and machine learning. Using these tools makes it easier to create and publish content on the Internet. In addition, AI algorithms provide efficient recognition of images, voice, natural language processing (NLP), as well as routine operations without human intervention.

However, the development of the WCMS market can be constrained by the high initial costs of implementing the relevant products and the lack of necessary knowledge in small enterprises. In addition, some companies believe WCMS solutions could lead to data breaches and spawn other cybersecurity-related issues.

Many organizations are hesitant to implement new solutions that involve processing or moving data from one platform to another: Security and compliance are major barriers, analysts say.

In terms of WCMS application, the authors of the study identify segments such as media and entertainment, retail, education, healthcare, banking, financial services, insurance, manufacturing, etc. The retail sector generates the most revenue due to the expansion of e-commerce: an increase in the number of online purchases and consumer spending on the Internet stimulates the demand for web content management software. North America dominates the global WCMS market, which is due to the high level of development of the IT sector as a whole. At the same time, the Asia-Pacific region is showing the highest growth rates due to government digitalization initiatives. Among the significant players in the industry are named:

• Oracle;
• OpenText;
• Cisco;
• IBM;
• EMC;
• Microsoft;
• Hyland Software;
• Xerox;
• T- Systems;
• Integro;
• Deloitte.

At the end of 2024, revenue in the web content management software market is estimated at $8.06 billion. Market Research Future analysts believe that in the future, the CAGR (average annual growth rate in complex percentages) will be 13.23%. As a result, by 2032, costs on a global scale could increase to $21.79 billion.^[1]

2018: List of most frequently hacked CMS

In March 2019, information security research company Sucuri ranked the most hacked content management systems (CMS). About 90% of attacks in 2018 came from WordPress, against 83% the year before. The share of hacks of other CMSs is shown in the diagram below.

According to Sucuri, most CMS hacks are carried out not due to vulnerabilities in the systems themselves, but due to incorrect configuration of them. In addition, problems arise due to vulnerabilities in topics, plugins and other components that webmasters update slowly. Thus, the study showed that only 56% of the reviewed websites worked with current versions of the software.

The most frequencies hacked by CMS in 2018, data from Sucuri

In the cases of PrestaShop, OpenCart, Joomla and Magento, most hacked sites worked with outdated versions of content management systems. Although 90% of hacks came from WordPress, many affected sites ran on the most recent software: only 36% of the resources studied used outdated versions.

This trend associated with outdated versions is in line with the sad fame of e-commerce sites, which are in no hurry to update in order to prevent the shutdown of working functions and not lose money. This is used by attackers who attack online stores that store valuable customer data (for example, credit card information and personal data of users), the Sucuri report says.

According to analysts, in 68% of hacked sites, hackers embed bookmarks, in 56% they post malware for further attacks, in 51% they use SEO spam, which is used to promote the resources of cybercriminals. Attackers post spam content on hacked sites or redirect users to specific pages.^[2]

2016: Sucuri (the most hacked CMS)

Web security company Sucuri published a report for the third quarter of 2016 on the most hacked CMSExperts of ^[3] According to the results of the analysis, 7937 sites were compromised during the reporting period. Most often, attackers successfully hacked into sites running WordPress, Joomla and Magento CMS.

According to the report, 74% of the compromised site ran WordPress, 17% ran Joomla and 6% ran Magento.

Sucuri named TOP-3 the most hacked CMS. According to Sucuri, most of the sites were compromised due to administrators not installing security patches in time.

However, in the case of WordPress, many problems were caused by the security of plugins, and not by CMS itself. About 18% of WordPress sites were hacked through vulnerable versions of the RevSlider, TimThumb and GravityForms plugins.

In 72% of cases, attackers installed a backdoor on a compromised system. In 15% of cases, after compromise, sites were marked as malicious by search engines.

2012: Gartner

The analytical company Gartner published in the fall of 2012 the annual summary report of WCM solution vendors in the world. It has remained practically unchanged since 2011, keeping two "top" vendors - Microsoft and IBM in "test" positions.

According to the results of the "magic quadrant" of WCM systems compiled by Gartner as of the third quarter of 2012, the market leaders are vendors Oracle, Adobe, SDL, Sitecore, OpenText, HP (Autnomy) and Ektron, while the last company is new to the list, since last year it was in the category of "seers" and "jumped" intermediate position "applicants." In this position, analysts left IBM and Microsoft unchanged, while shaking up the rest of the "quadrant," introducing one new player into the "niche" segment and removing the other two due to mergers and acquisitions and a serious decrease in revenue.

As explained in the research methodology, Gartner now pays special attention to the functionality of solutions in the field of mobile web - both in terms of compatibility and in the context of organizing an employee's workplace. According to the company, IBM is trying to balance between providing user experience and simply implementing its set of products Web Content Manager, WebSphere Portal, Forms and Web Experience Factory, but with varying success - customers rarely remember Web Content Manager due to the high cost, complexity of implementation and functionality. For Microsoft SharePoint, the situation turns out, according to Gartner, so that customers who want to use the product for external communications and work scenarios do not find them and turn to competing solutions. In addition, Microsoft has not significantly reduced the cost of the product in the new licensing policy, nor does it have sufficient interoperability between third-party solutions.