Running any online business, or any business with an online presence that is important, is generally directed toward communicating the correct message to the appropriate people. Content is king, they say, and they are right. It is truer now than it ever was, meaning that a Content Management System (CMS) is a must-have for any business producing content on an ongoing basis. If you separate the content creation tasks from the site structure maintenance and the webmaster’s layouts and code, it makes it a lot easier for writers, editors and content managers to do what they need to do transparently and efficiently. This means time and money savings, as well as a reduction in frustration.

Briefly, a CMS is a way of creating, publishing and maintaining new and existing content on Web sites. A CMS gives you tools to create what you want and manage it how you want, with template, forms and workflows that make it simple to add, delete, modify and update a site’s content. This kind of content management will help you streamline the entire site management process, as it allows you to oversee the entire process for its whole life cycle, from drafts and revisions through approval of final copy and later updating, if required.

General observations about progress

You can expect ongoing refinement to whatever professional-level CMS you are now using, as they all share the major features (although they differ in dependability, ease of use, etc.). New products continue to be introduced, too, and as they become established and accepted they will spread through the marketplace and affect the development of competing products. Competition is good for that. It keeps all the serious, dedicated players on their toes, and lets the consumer choose from a variety of capable solutions.

Therefore, as the CMS industry continues to mature, you will see greater reliability, more choices and alternatives, the introduction of new-generation tools and a real advance in usability. These advances can affect your profitability directly and indirectly, as companies that use the CMS tools in a strategic way will benefit from their increased effectiveness as time goes on. It is impossible to accurately predict anything in the future, but the trend lines are becoming clear and we can safely guess at a few things. It is interesting to note that predictions are usually not daring enough, and that actual progress is not smooth, but punctuated with occasional paradigm shifts. This is likely to be true among CMS tools, as well.

CMS trends for the future

Clearly, e-commerce, online marketing and government agencies will have greater and greater demands from consumers and citizens for more and more up-to-date information. People expect that high-quality, accurate and timely content will be made available as they need it. Advances in CMS will ensure that the process is accelerated without giving up any of the control that is necessary to ensure accuracy, good editing and proper distribution. In addition, intra- and extra-net environments are becoming more complex and increased demands are being made upon them. You can plan on seeing tools that are especially targeted for these kinds of environments, as efficiency with in-house communications is just as important as a solid, dependable Web presence. For some organizations, in fact, it is more important.

A CMS needs to be flexible and easy to use so that businesses can take advantage of the opportunities that come up by the minute on the Web. Companies need content management to be seamless and trouble-free, so that they can manage the many tasks efficiently, then deliver their content with fast, accurate and simple commands. A number of different CMS approaches are capable of delivering significant value to all kinds of organizations that are now bogged down with inflexible Web site management tools. The decision to buy and implement a CMS cannot be based only on theoretical benefits, so Return On Investment (ROI) should be calculated and attained in an acceptable timeframe.

Specific advances anticipated

As near as the experts can figure, future CMS development will focus on improving technologies for

• reusing and repurposing content,

• fast content creation and publication without delay,

• integration of various internal workflows,

• enhanced company-to-customer and company-to-client communication,

• aggregation and distribution of content from various sources, and

- multiple means of access, editing and approval.

Bottom line

Companies have ever reason to be wary of too many promises and the problem of vaporware, that is, products or new features that are announced but never seem to make it to market. The best strategy is to use the most solid CMS that is appropriate to your situation, and if you do not know what that is, by all means, ask an expert. The last thing you want is to install a CMS and find that you cannot work it correctly or it does not do what you want. Slow down just a moment to make sure you are looking at the situation correctly, and get help if you need it!