How to choose a content management system
- Image via
Content management systems for managing web sites don’t necessarily inspire the creative mind, but for many sites, they are the difference between a smooth ride and headache. Whether you’re thinking of buying an off-the-shelf package or designing one in-house, there are a few things to consider before you make your decisions. This article aims to explain the benefits of running a Content Management System and what you need to think about if you are considering using one.
Hand-crafting a big site is a thing of the past. It takes too long and there are so many ways in which it can go wrong. Time to buy a Content Management System? Probably, but wait! The software is only part of the job. You are going to have to think carefully about your needs, understand a bit more about what a CMS do, do some preparation before you start your project and change the way you think about HTML and graphical pages.
1. Understand the quantity and complexity of your content:
This is arguably the most important step in the process. How many things and how many types of things are you trying to manage? How much will it change and how often? Who are the content contributors? A thousand things of the same type is obviously easier to manage than a thousand things of ten different types. As you’re assessing your content, don’t forget to include multiple languages or localities – 100 things in 10 languages is actually 1000 things you have to collect, manage and publish.
2. Think about components inside your content:
If you work with the web, the concept of a page feels natural but there is more we can do if we think about the sub-components that make up a page such as individual news stories, adverts, products or calendar events. Some CMS manipulate pages but it can be more powerful to use a CMS that builds pages from these sorts of components perhaps letting the same information appear in different parts of the site or in different formats.
What sorts of components will your site contain? Press releases, tutorials, classified ads, messages, recipes, share prices, contact addresses? Well planned and organised content components will support your business as the business changes.
3. Design the database carefully:
Most CMS use a relational database such as Microsoft SQL Server or MySQL. Others will achieve the same effect using XML.
In a relational database, each component will be stored in a table with rows and columns – think of it like an Excel spreadsheet. Each
Related articles by Zemanta
- (blogperfume.com)
- Internet Basics: A Content Management System Is Like An Interior Decorator (cmsdesk.com)
- The benefits of a content management system (CMS) – Part 2 (cmsdesk.com)
- (linkthe.com)
- (r3000forums.com)
Comments
2 Responses to “How to choose a content management system”
Leave a Reply
-
Premium Web Templates - $1+ million worth of templates for instant download!
[...] How to choose a content management system (cmsdesk.com) [...]
[...] How to choose a content management system (cmsdesk.com) [...]