How to Choose a Content Management System

As your company and website grow, you may find yourself overwhelmed with the sheer volume of updates that you have to do. If it is taking far too long to update your website, a content management system can be of great help. Choose a content management system that will fit your budget and needs.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Understand Manual Content Management Systems. There are four main types of content management systems, with manual content management being the easiest to get started up and running. This is good for small sites, where you can have a Web team update your site by hand. However, ongoing costs are rather high, all content has to go through the Web team first, and there are human factors to be considered for productivity such as HTML errors or sickness or turnover.

2. Understand Server-based Content Management Systems. For these systems, content creators log into the content management server to add content and then it is automatically posted to the website. This creates a rather consistent design for added content, removes the Web team as a middle man, and content can be updated quickly and efficiently. Setup is a bit costly--you'll need a good IT team and it can take 3 to 6 months to get it up and running.

3. Understand Internet-based Content Management Systems. This is a bit like the Server-based Content Management System, except that the system is hosted by a separate vendor and content is updated through the Internet, usually through a wizard-style interface. This creates consistently structured content, gives control of the content to the creators, and it has a quick setup, customizable templates and low costs with pay-as-you-go options. This is a better system for external websites.

4. Understand Homegrown Content Management Systems. These are developed by your own team, in which you hire a consulting firm and have them custom build a system for your site. This gives you all the advantages of a Server-based Content Management Systems as well as highly customized features for your company's specific needs, but there are much higher development costs, setup time is lengthy (9 to 12 months) and turnover can leave behind a void in knowledge about your particular system.

5. Consider objectives and limitations. What are you trying to achieve with your content management system? Determine how much gain and benefits you expect, what kind of costs your budget can handle, what kind of IT you have on hand for installing and administrating the system, and what kind of time frame you are looking at to deploy the system. Make sure you can afford both the setup and the upkeep for the system in the long run.

6. Compare vendors. Start reading about or meeting with vendors to hear what they have to offer. Make sure it corresponds with your business objectives. Read up on some consumer reviews in the resources.

7. Make a decision. Once you have made sure a content management system provides all the features you need, provides a good return after costs and has good references, you should be ready to decide on a content management system.

Tips & Warnings

• If you are running a large company, it might be a good idea to put together a decision-making team. Get representatives from every group that contributes to the site to bring in their input and give feedback on possible choices.
• One rule for determining costs in the long run: server-based content management systems are typically 3 to 8 times the cost of the actual software. Homegrown systems are usually significantly more and Internet-based are significantly less.
• Consider additional costs other than setup, such as personnel to maintain the system, software purchase (such as databases and analytics) and IT processes and hardware required.

[nlc-molly]

on 8/18/2009 Hmm. My comment was cut off…

... Evaluate closely and carefully how the vendor or reputable partner can assist in the actual implementation. What is their industry experience and specialization?
- Almost everyone underestimates the level of effort required to deploy a CMS. Having a realistic appreciation of effort will allow you to craft the most effective budget and project plan.

I work for a company that implements a number of CMS solutions - each has its own set of strengths (and drawbacks.) Unfortunately, many orgs approach us having already purchased a system that may not be as ideally suited to their needs as they first thought... Since the problem seems pretty endemic, a colleague of mine has put together a whitepaper that explores the key considerations that we see as most important in choosing a CMS... worth a read:

http://www.nonlinearcreations.com/whitepaper/index.as...

[nlc-molly]

on 8/18/2009 Feature sets and costs are, in my opinion, only a piece of the puzzle. Selecting a CMS is a very nuaced process; without a solid methodology for evaluation, navigating the vendor landscape can be very tricky business. A few key considerations:

- You need to map out online goals, user needs, existing technical infrastructure, editorial processes (governance) and marketing tactics PRIOR to selecting a system. Without this, you run the risk of choosing a system that's incompatible with existing systems or invisible/unusable to the audience your trying to reach.
- Detailed feature sets commonly seen in RFPs can be misleading. Instead of relying on these, use various true-to-life scenarios to evaluate the applicability of the product to your needs.
- Selecting an implementation team is as important as the product itself. Evaluate closely and carefully how the vendor or reputable par...