Why and when to consider a CMS (Content Management)

[Dcrux]

I heard a couple of designers going on about CMS-based web sites being the next big thing. Which means this will be the next thing everyone recommends, whether appropriate or not.

A simple rule of thumb is content management strategy and a CMS go together. In general, don't have one without the other.

CMS systems can be used to manage a lot of media: text, images, sound and video. Strategy concerns using media and CMS effectively towards some objective. Without objectives, you may get an unsuitable CMS that only makes the site construction easier for the 'designer.'

Unfortunatly construction is not design. Design isn't about getting the technical end done and cashing the check, it's about user effectiveness. Ease of construction does not mean ease of use.

The business case is about execution: adaptability, precision, and communication. A CMS is supposed to be adaptable. This means you can add a module simply by turning it on. You can use a CMS to reinforce style and procedural guidelines. Each user can have different levels of access, meaning the user does not get functions they'll never use. Perhaps even more important, a content strategy fosters barriers between silos.

One eGovernment site wanted better citizen access and responsiveness. They used their CMS as a way to speak in a clear, consistent way as a responsive single city government ...not a bunch of fiefdoms. Forums, a standard feature of many CMS packages, provide a means of communication. But only by having city government involved in the forums does the kind of positive message of proactive responsiveness get sent.

Another eGov install set up an inventory of available property searchable by developers. By streamlining policies and process, the city effectively communicated how seriously they took business development. The CMS serves as more than a database, it enabled the city to provide the kind of site selection tools only available to large businesses. For example, locating businesses where traffic from one store would be a natural synergy for others. Next step: Exploring collaborative buying opportunities between these natural joint venture partners.

By using the CMS as a hub one company reduced printing costs. By switching from output to puplishing-on-demand, roughly twenty brochures and other sales collateral were reduced to the four pieces the sale force actually used. The objective wasn't to install a CMS -- it was for new kinds of conversations to take place about how organizational assets are combined in new ways

Unfortunately a CMS can not do these things without a content strategy session. The "M" stands for management, not magic. For this, make sure you consult with a designer offering several packages fitting different end-user applications. Avoid technicians who concentrate on one package, or seem too technology centered. When the technologist start leaving out human factors, start looking elsewhere.

-- What do you want to accomplish?
-- Who will produce what kind of content?
-- Who will the users be?
-- Do you need to refine or refocus requirements?

You might be shocked to learn many companies have never seriously discussed the idea of how information and data differ. Strangely enough, these are the companies have the worst luck implementing technology-only 'solutions' to problems. Having such a discussion can shed new light on your most pressing problems. If the strategy discussion never turns to issues of information design and architecture, forget the CMS.

The CMS can be the next big thing for web construction and business effectiveness, but it has the potential to be just another vacuous buzzword. Content managment is a strategy first, and technology a distant second.

[espectations]

I agree whole heartedly.

Also want to add something - reporting....drawing reports from the information gathered is a crucial element.

In my experience at this stage a lot of people do not know what CMS is, especially clients. They think it is only a means to dynamically update their content.

Websites are work! - that is one of the first things I tell clients.

Do not even think of getting a web site if you do not have content.

Second thing I ask is what is it that they want to update and how often?

Most of them back off and say - no, it is just news or some specs that needs to be changed every now and then.

For news I give them a blog. For updates on content once in three months or so they get a static site because it is not justified to give a CMS to a client that is starting out with their web site.

Normally these guys don't have budgets.

[Faglork]

Great posts.

From my experience, most users simply do not have the resources to operate a website.

a) You need quality content. Who, in the average company, can write good content for the web? Remember, you have to change the usual texts to make them fit for the web. Usually, no one has any experience with that. This is no side-job for the company secretary.

b) Operating a site is time-consuming. A CMS can help you to MANAGE, but not to PRODUCE your content. And you have to produce it in time.

c) If you do not permanently work with a CMS, you forget how to operate it. Those who just want to change something once a month run into problems: They forget passwords, forget how to set a link, etc. etc. This will actually increase the workload.

In many cases, I advise against a CMS and suggest a maintainance contract: Just send me your "content" in whatever form you have, and I convert it and put it in. Most likely, in these cases this is more cost-effective than a CMS.



faglork

[simonm]

Faglork, I totally agree!

In my opinion, most people selling CMS are selling no more than that, they get the money and job done! The client has a potentially hugely expensive infrastructure set to apparently easily manage their web presence and are in many cases abandoned unless they go on to pay the fees of the CMS provider to assist them in maintaining their content on an ad-hoc basis.

Its the content that matters, physically getting the content online is such a small part of the process that most people are far better off investing the time and effort in getting high quality useful content, then having an ongoing arrangement with a web specialist rather than making a one off big payment for a CMS that will be ditched after 6 months, also going through a web specialist you have a 'devil's advocate who might say - "Why are you posting this, will people want to read it". If the content is intended as part of a web promotion strategy that includes SEO, CMS (especially run by the PA or non web expert Marketing Dept)is a recipe for disaster!

CMS as applied to an online shop is a different matter of course!

Now I'll have to calm down.. (I'm not against CMS per se, Its just so often mis-sold as a solution which it clearly ain't)

Simon

[Dcrux]

One correction: CMS can also be used to bridge barriers betweeen silos.

As for reporting/analytics, that was my point with the sales materials. By talking about the end use, I hope to do what many pushing the technology don't.

Another idea is the one of information architecture. Most people still do not realize information doesn't just drop out of computers. There are techniques like information architecture which can help organize content so you can find it when you want it.

When these get neglected we get more new installs, but the same old problems.

[Needabed]

Great! I love cms but I did think people were already using it , why do you see it as the "next" big thing?

thanks

[chrisv999]

I have a few clients who have no knowledge of html but would like to be able to update content and images on their websites on a regular basis. Would a CMS be appropriate for their needs?

Also, I am curious about what you guys think the top CMS systems are on the market now for small businesses. I was using PHP Nuke and it had major security issues and got hacked. Would love to hear any feedback.

[Dcrux]

Would a CMS be appropriate for their needs?

You have not provided nearly enough detail. "Updates" is probably -- in many senses of the word -- not what you want a CMS for. Second, you violate the prime directive of my post -- talking about web sites and not Information or People.

The default "no" serves in this case. Despite the hype, most CMS packages are not user friendly. This will get strenuous objections from developers -- but not the people who use the CMS. For all the 'friendly' this and 'usability' that, they haven't sat next to nontechies and observed them using the CMS -- I have.

"Knowledge about HTML" is an immediate wrong turn. Think reengineering workflow, communication, coordination across departments. Use a CMS to coordinate human communication -- not html code.

I've switched a programmer off PHPnuke after they were specifically drawn to it. Why? The guy was neglecting writing the code he earned his living with to mess with the CMS. (and this was someone with much more than HTML knowledge). I don't often recommend PHPnuke. PHPnuke turns you into a PHPnuke developer, whatever your previous vocation was.

Anyone to takes so little information and then blurts out "joomla" or "wordpress" ...walk away from that person. Guess what. I really meant what I wrote:

-- What do you want to accomplish?
-- Who will produce what kind of content?
-- Who will the users be?
-- Do you need to refine or refocus requirements?

One CMS we did matched up capital sources with entrepreneurs seeking venture capital. I sat down and, in short order, worked out a flowchart of the potential users and basic architecture.

Then, and only then, we started looking at technology.


Postscript: Links on CMS Usability

A CMS is one of those applications like a word processor where many users, often non-technical users, need to become proficient with no little or no training to get their job done. Frequently CMS users are under time pressure and, if it is quicker to misuse the tool than to use it properly, the tool will be misused - or, if possible, not used at all. Content Management is a very broad term but I think this applies to everything from this blogging software that I am using right now, to a Web CMS, to a document management application. A CMS user wants to publish what needs to be published with as little overhead as possible. As a matter of personal pride, author's want their content to read well and look good. But other than that, the less time spent with a CMS, the better.
-- CMS Usability

Adaptive Path's Jeffrey Veen is less sanguine...

Sounds good, but just try putting it into practice. In a report published last year, Jupiter Research uncovered some startling findings. “Of just under 100 companies … only 27 percent of companies surveyed planned to continue using their Web content management systems as they do now.”

So why do these CMS projects almost always fail?
-- Why content management fails

And guess what Veen's conclusion was: It's Not A Technology Problem. It's an information managment problem. And step one is realizing in all this "html knowledge" nobody ever sat down and figured out what information drives the business, and what gets in the way. Again, most companies don't even know, really know, what information even is.

[ambassador]

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Dec 16, 2005

Here is a specific, current, real-life, scenario that beckons a CMS solution. What are your recommendations WebProWorld?


Regarding:
-- What do you want to accomplish?
-- Who will produce what kind of content?
-- Who will the users be?
-- Do you need to refine or refocus requirements?


Here are the details.
The goal is twofold. First, one aspect of the goal is to provide an information resource to a small 'niche' segment of a particular sportsman-type of consumer. For numerous reasons, the venue through which this information is to be provided must be a website. Secondly, the other aspect of the goal is to produce a small revenue from selling small blocks of advertising space on some of the aforementioned website’s pages. The advertising space will be sold to businesses specifically addressing the tiny ‘niche’ market segment associated with this particular sportsman-type of consumer.

Further, the website’s information will be timely, and very focused upon a few selected topics relevant to the particular sportsman-type of consumer being addressed by the website. Seven [7] very well delineated, extremely narrow-of-scope portions of the website’s information will be written once a week, each week, by individuals intimately associated with their respective portions of the website’s information. These ‘external author individuals’ live in, and will be writing from, different parts of the USA. Due to different preferences among these ‘external author individuals,’ these ‘external author individuals’ have the option of providing their weekly article by regular email to the website owner, or by logging in and composing the article via the website. The website’s article composition space (one unique, separate login for each of the seven authors) must be buffered so that the article the author is currently composing will not – when submitted – automatically substitute that same author’s previous article on the website until the article is approved by the website’s owner/administrator. Absolutely no pictures, audio files, video files, clickable links or the like will be provided by the ‘external author individuals’ – they will provide only standard text. Nearly all of the ‘articles’ provided by the ‘external author individuals’ will be very small (e.g. approximately 200 words or less). The goal of this entire matter is such that only the current ‘articles’ will be available to the website’s audience at any time – no saved, archived, or otherwise stored content provided by the ‘external author individuals’ will be provided on this website. Additionally, the website’s owner will also produce a very limited amount of content (e.g. approximately four [4] articles each year). The website’s audience, as indicated in the first aspect of the previously stated goal, is a tiny ‘niche’ market segment of sportsman-type individuals. Thus, the website’s users will be the owner/administrator, the external authors, and of course the audience as indicated.

No website feature other than those described are desired.

Ambassador
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[/quote]

[bj]

Most small businesses who wish to be able to update their own content can simply use a more elementary application such as WordPress or TextPattern. Most of these blog aps have extended themselves to be more than just blogs, but much less than a full blown content management system, and, with a bit of care in the setup and design, the right designer can create a good framework upon which a small business website can grow and develop along with the business.

The advantages to the entrepreneurial small business owner who maybe has "the gift of gab" are incredible- being able to put their information out there in a Right Now manner, and leveraging the power of RSS to put it in front of the right viewers . . . no static site with a "maintenance contract" is going to be able to do that as efficiently.

CMS are, for most businesses, overkill, but there are a couple out there that are wonderful and fun to use. Yes, they are a learning curve, both on the design end and on the user end. But for sites that are going to grow in excess of 500 pages, some flexibility of structure and the ability to change and manage it becomes very necessary. The blogging tools just aren't as flexible.

Each site and its goals must be judged on a case by case basis. I will venture this, based on what I see happening. Static websites will soon be a thing of the past. Whether people opt for simple content generation in the form of blog tools, or whether they opt for more complicated CMS to manage large amounts of content and data, I doubt that many besides the bargain basement buyers will opt for static html.

[Dcrux]

I found this to be key...

The goal of this entire matter is such that only the current ‘articles’ will be available to the website’s audience at any time – no saved, archived, or otherwise stored content provided by the ‘external author individuals’ will be provided on this website. Additionally, the website’s owner will also produce a very limited amount of content (e.g. approximately four [4] articles each year).

As you say, "No website feature other than those described are desired." The advice is a straight up web site, no CMS.

Static websites may well be on their way out -- but poor design of CMS systems ensures a slow march. Improving usability and functionality does show promise for the future.

[webmistress30]

I have been promoting CMS to my clients for the past 4 years, it is the only thing that I will build for my clients these days. If they ask for an HTML site I turn the business away, I do not have time for it, its SOOOOO Slow compared to a CMS. I have worked with several CMS programs and became very frustrated with many out there. However I've found one that I love that is flexible and pluggable. I've not found any custom request that cannot be accomplished. As far as my clients go, they LOVE it too. Small businesses have the ability to update their own content if they choose to. I want to emphasize "if they choose to". Many of them end up with their businesses growing and expanding after we do their website and we still end up doing the maintenance work for them.

Another thing is the CMS is extremely user friendly and I can set various interface levels for the clients as not to overwhelm them.

Another focus for us is to build a website that is search engine friendly and the CMS accomplishes this very well. When I turn it over to the client I lockdown specific content, functionality, etc as not to allow them to slowly deteriorate their marketing efforts.

Here is a great site that I found when comparing CMS:

http://www.cmsmatrix.org

[Faglork]

Originally Posted by webmistress30

If they ask for an HTML site I turn the business away, I do not have time for it, its SOOOOO Slow compared to a CMS.

You'd be surprised how fast it can be. A little mod_rewrite, SSI and PHP can do wonders. And with endless flexibility.

But in general, I agree, of course, especially when it comes to large sites. No doubt about that.

Originally Posted by webmistress30

However I've found one that I love that is flexible and pluggable. I've not found any custom request that cannot be accomplished.

You are talking about WEBGUI, right?
http://www.webgui.info/

Looks nice. Just a quick question: Is it XHTML compatible? I have only found HTML sites on their reference pages, and the feature list is silent on that.

faglork

[Faglork]

Originally Posted by bj

The advantages to the entrepreneurial small business owner who maybe has "the gift of gab" are incredible- being able to put their information out there in a Right Now manner, and leveraging the power of RSS to put it in front of the right viewers . . . no static site with a "maintenance contract" is going to be able to do that as efficiently.

It all depends. Of all my clients, only a minority is able to write, let alone "write for the web". And of them, only some actually find the time to do it.

So it is indeed better to turn the raw content over to someone who can do this. And whether you need RSS is a different matter. Sure, many can benefit of that, but not all.

I merely wanted to stress that there are - in most cases - no "out of the box" solutions, and that in some cases a CMS may not be necessary (we are talking about small sites here).

faglork

[Dcrux]

Let me restate I am not going to question the obvious advantage a CMS can have for those selling web site construction.

A CMS is still a business communication strategy first. And many companies don't want to think about strategy, and the barely want to think about the web site. Writing is thinking, folks. Having lots of contributors producing all kinds of content means thinking about communication strategy.

It doesn't have to be a long involved discussion. Most business people will see all kinds of opportunities to solve genuine problems. And it is not like business people aren't having information overload problems. But CMS discussions often put the cart before the horse, then throw away the horse.

I would be the first one flying the CMS banner if the topic even once swerved from throwing up or maintaining web sites to include specific customer application. Beware the technologist who has found the one true hammer. Every situation turns into a nail in need of pounding.

[bj]

in some cases a CMS may not be necessary (we are talking about small sites here).

You're right. I don't suggest a full blown CMS to small businesses at all. They don't suit, and they're too complicated for a generalist to learn to use. Most will easily grasp and embrace blogging aps as an alternative, since they've already filled out ap forms at amazon or other ecommerce sites, and already have the basic concept down. There's nothing scary there, and most small business people like the idea of being able to control not only their own content and add to it within a preset web architecture framework, but also control the costs associated with update.

Am I sometimes somewhat baffled after the fact by how they end up using these? Yes. But in all of those cases the site owner has actually used the web ap, grown their own site, and thanked me for the tool to do so.

I would be the first one flying the CMS banner if the topic even once swerved from throwing up or maintaining web sites to include specific customer application. Beware the technologist who has found the one true hammer. Every situation turns into a nail in need of pounding.

Certainly customer needs as well as audience needs must be anticipated and (hopefully) met. If the web ap is too complicated to learn to use, or the client is the computerphobic type who has put up a mental road block against learning anything, then the webdev will not be doing anyone a service by pushing them into a CMS.

Looks nice. Just a quick question: Is it XHTML compatible? I have only found HTML sites on their reference pages, and the feature list is silent on that.

I dunno about webgui, but ModX allows for xhtml/css templating, and is fairly easy for the end-user to edit their own pages if they use the quick edit feature. It's very extensible, and versatile, but definitely a steep learning curve for the webdev, and also a learning curve for the user to create new content and organize it on the backend. Is it ideal? No, though the developer definitely seems to be heading it in the right direction, and it is a young project. Is it for everyone? Definitely not. But is it worth consideration? Yes.

[freetraff]

Content management is great. You have to make changes in your content almost every day, if you are not a programmer - :(

After I got CMS module integrated into the tool which I use to work with my site, it saves me much time and pain in the back. It's like working with Word - made a change, saved it, got it on a web site.

[webmistress30]

You are talking about WEBGUI, right?
http://www.webgui.info/

Yes, I am referring to WebGUI. Actually, the best way to get to it is this:

http://www.plainblack.com

It is XHTML compliant. In fact its so compliant that it sometimes drives me crazy from a design perspective. It also has versioning built into the latest version which makes it nice, if a client screws something up you can retrieve old data.

It has become internationally recognized and there are several large companies and government agencies using it. Obviously I'm not at liberty to say who. I also have several small business owners that love it. They find it extremely easy to use. I've trained over 500 individuals internationally on the system. Like I said, I've used several CMS's and never found one to be this great. One instance of the system can be used as an intranet, extranet, and commercial site.

I am a rare breed as I can program in several different languages but I'm a true designer at heart. I've not found anything as flexible as this. Here are just a few of the items that come with the system: Message Boards, Photo Galleries, Calendar System, Shopping Cart, Merchant system plugged in, GUI Editor, File System, Versioning, Forums, Polls, Syndicated Content, Blogs, SQL reports, User Management, Security, etc, the list goes on. Everything is incredibly robust as well, when I say calendars, you can have 20 calendars running on the system and have them all integrate into one main calendar. This system can be very simple for a business user and very robust for a developer/designer. I will tell you that a developer has a harder time catching onto the system than a business user. The graphical interface is what throws a developer off track when trying to learn it. For a designer it is very easy to pick up. This is just from experience of training several individuals. I find developers the hardest to train as it is a learning curve and they would rather not learn it.

It is definitely a product that I highly recommend as I have worked with several CMS's, Portals, etc. This I find to be the most flexible. There are some usability issues that I have found with working on it. I am highly experienced when it comes to usability and I have found some flaws in the system when it comes to that. Otherwise, they have a great system and its a constantly active open source project.

Someone made a point earlier on, the biggest challenge with this is clients expect MAGIC. They hand you a check and expect a fully functional website with content and don't realize the effort that they need to put in to make it great. I give my demo's in person or over the phone and once they see it and how easy it is to work, they instantly want it. I highly recommend at least trying it out and keeping an open mind about it.