A Content Management System (CMS) is critical to the success of almost every Website, Intranet and Extranet and yet many organisations are not familiar with this technology.

By definition, a CMS supports the creation, management, distribution, publishing, and discovery of corporate information. It covers the complete lifecycle of the pages on your site, from providing simple tools to create the content, through to publishing, and finally to archiving. It also provides the ability to manage the structure of the site, the appearance of the published pages, and the navigation provided to the users.

Essentially, 'content management' allows non-technical users to add, change and administer your own Website without the need to have any technical knowledge. By spreading the responsibility for the upkeep of each page of your Website to the relevant individuals or departments, you can drastically improve the development speed and upkeep of your Website whilst an administrator can keep overall control.

Gaia Technology have developed many bespoke CMS systems for a wide range of clients. For larger projects we develop sites using CommonSpot Content Server which we have implemented for a variety of clients including a enterprise level solution for a FTSE 30 company.

Read more about CommonSpot Content Server >>

Business Realities
The most important part of a CMS is the content itself. The nature of your content will influence the functionality required from your CMS. Every requirement must be associated with one or more business needs. This allows you to identify the reasons for the requirements, and to prioritise them.

The business benefits of implementing an efficient and usable CMS include a faster turnaround for new pages, greater consistancy, improved site navigation and flexibility, increased security, greater capacity for growth and reduced site maintenance costs.

Human Realities
It is important to understand the needs of your authors: they will be doing all the hard work. The most powerful CMS in the world is of little use if the authors and administrators of the system are uncomfortable or unable to perform their set of tasks. Balancing functionality with usability is crucial in the long term implementation plan for your site.

Beyond the Web
While the creation of HTML content for corporate Websites or Intranets across the Web is the strongest aspect of most CMS's, many can do much more.

Central to the power of many systems is the concept of ‘single source publishing’, where a single topic can be published automatically into different formats. This could include printed formats (PDF, Word, etc), wireless/hand-held formats (WAP, etc), or XML.

If you would like to discuss how a CMS may be of benefit to your company, please contact us for more information.