Why Drupal’s Greatest Strength Might Be Its Biggest Marketing Challenge

Aprendiz de todo, maestro de nada1

That’s what my grandfather used to say. And I’ve been thinking about how that phrase applies to Drupal. Drupal is incredibly good at so many things — flexible, robust, capable of powering complex digital experiences — but that same strength can also be our weakness. We’re not known for doing one particular thing better than anyone else, and that makes it harder to market.

For a while now, I’ve been adamant that we should lean into what makes Drupal truly special: its power as a no-code and low-code platform. It’s a dream for those who need to build flexible, scalable solutions without diving deep into custom code. But what if we went further?

What if we had a library of powerful, pre-built templates tailored for specific industries — CRMs, marketing automation platforms, commerce experiences? What if Drupal wasn’t just known as a CMS, but as the foundation of powerful tools that could stand shoulder to shoulder with the likes of Salesforce, HubSpot, or Shopify? That would change everything, wouldn’t it?

And still, we keep making noise that only resonates inside our echo chamber — inside the Drupal bubble.

I had a funny reminder of this in a taxi in Atlanta during the Board retreat at DrupalCon. The driver asked what brought us to town, and the conversation ended up with Vanessa, Dries’ wife, explaining what Drupal was all about. She did an amazing job — you could tell Dries was amused and proud, watching her explain our beloved CMS with clarity and confidence. She’s probably listened to more Dries keynotes from the front row than most of us.

I wonder if that driver went home and looked Drupal up. Maybe it sparked something. Maybe he’s out there right now, building the next billion-dollar startup. It could happen. I talk every day with companies, agencies, and entrepreneurs, and I’m still surprised to find businesses that have built very successful models on top of Drupal.

A few weeks later, I was in an Airbnb in Cáceres for Drupal Iberia. The host started complaining about WordPress — how hard it was to do anything complex — and mentioned that even ChatGPT couldn’t give him a good solution without lots of code. Five minutes into our chat, he was convinced to try Drupal. ChatGPT even recommended Drupal Commerce.

Those moments constantly remind me how powerful it is when we reach outside our bubble. We now have a marketing engine in the Drupal Association. But imagine if we all joined in. If every agency, every consultancy, every Drupal company — Acquia, Amazee, Platform.sh, Pantheon and other service companies included — worked together. Not just on product, but on messaging. On marketing. On telling the world why Drupal matters. Let’s unite against those billion-dollar marketing budgets.

Imagine if thousands of us—individuals, not just companies—each made it a goal to convince just one person. To share what Drupal can do outside our immediate community. That’s how we shift perception. That’s how we reach the next level. Let’s unite in our guerrilla marketing.

I don’t believe in trying to fit Drupal into every use case. Like we say in consulting (I spent many years there), it’s about the right tool for the right job. But Drupal is already the right tool for many complex jobs — we just need to be better at telling that story.

Yes, numbers have been in decline. But as Dries said in his keynote: we choose growth. We choose to act. I love what Kevin Quillen recently said, “We don’t chase trends. We set them.”

Sometimes it takes a crisis to spark innovation. As Tiffany said at the Board retreat, sometimes things have to burn before they can grow again. And growth is happening — in the innovation working group, in the Pitchburgh initiative, in the evolution of Drupal CMS.

We were excited to see the idea of an end-user marketplace finally gaining traction — and more importantly, accepted by the community without backlash. There’s still a lot of work ahead, but we’re having the right conversations.

Because if we succeed, new users won’t get stuck after installing Drupal. They’ll get inspired.

Or in the words of Tim Doyle, we’re leaving Drupal in better shape than when we arrived in Atlanta.

Happy Drupaling!