Very subjective - what do you need them to be able to do?
One might be better for some things while the other…
Visit their sites and have a look
And of course there are many others out there.
This is an area that requires a lot of thought and discussion between you and the client over how much control they want or you want to give them. There is no point in investing in an over featured CMS whose capabilities far exceed those required.
KISS - is the key. Make it too complicated for the client and they will never use it - or bugger your site up.
At the end of the day there is no ‘one size fits all’ CMS.
Agree with Dave all all points, especially with what the client requires and what their ability is to change content.
If the clients site will be multifaceted with several people on the client side involved it might require a more complex and adaptable cms. If on the other hand they just need the odd div to be cms then Pulse (or ao) would probably be fine.
I’m currently working on a 40+ page community site (revamp from their previous site) at the moment and the client wished to have the option to change content (not header or footers) for most of the simple pages themselves (ho hum) so I’ve decided to use Pulse as its very easy to implement and especially easy for the client to get their head around, with a bit of tuition.
Pulse importantly for me also handles (without extra cost) images particularly well, so the client can place them were they wish rather than fixed points, it also has a good and easy to implement gallery option.
However I am looking at other programs for more involved cms sites, weighing up at the moment what to spend my time on studying, perhaps not as complex as EE but something fun to work with.