Content Management: Wise Investment For Business Prosperity

The time when a website was just a simple set of HTML pages has
gone by. It’s true, just five or seven years ago simple websites
developed with HTML and JavaScript were usual. Nobody thought
there could be another option. However, year by year, Internet
becomes a place where companies can interact with their clients,
can develop online showrooms and online shops, can announce the
latest news, and even make market researches. A new era of
dynamic web development has come.


Preconditions

Dynamic web development, in other words, server-side
programming, is a newest stage in development of modern
websites, platforms that integrate such roles as representative,
entertaining, interactive, communicative etc. When you talk
about a dynamic website, you always have in mind that it is
developed with J2EE, PHP, .NET, or other programming language.
The cornerstone here is that the website is programmed.

However, any usual WWW-user doesn’t bother himself with
technologies. He really appreciate if he can perform
complicated activity or develop a complex solution with the use
of the mouse only. Visualization that Microsoft has introduced
has become an issue that average PC user would never reject.

So we have come to a contradiction. An average Internet user
that would like to have a website is no longer satisfied with
facilities HTML and JavaScript provide. Meanwhile, there are not
so many people that would learn at least PHP in order to develop
a website. Moreover, they even won’t be satisfied if someone
else will make programming but the site management would require
programming knowledge too. So here we come to ‘visualization’.


Visualization => CMS

As an answer for the requirement for visualization of the whole
process of web development and website maintenance, web content
management systems (CMS) were developed. The cornerstone here is
that with the use of CMS one shouldn’t be a programmer as well
to develop a dynamic website. There is a graphical shell where
an average user with only a mouse and simple logic can develop a
website of any complexity and enhance it with such interactive
tools as forums, polls, feedback forms, automatic menus,
protected areas etc. Although, some systems require to know at
list basis of HTML and PHP, there is a big set of CMSs that
provide a user with a perfect visualization of the whole process
from design development up to website maintenance.

It becomes possible because of the structure of any managed with
CMS website. It consists of such elements as:

1. Design templates (it’s an HTML version of website’s design
along with proper code for interactive elements).

2. Adjustable modules (those are independent programs (polls,
forums, newslines etc.) integrated into the CMS; they have their
own graphical interface for adjustment).

3. Content (it’s the texts and graphics individual for each
particular page).


Through variation of those three elements with the CMS’s
graphical shell any average user can develop a dynamic website
in several simple steps.

There is a good article about it at the Xitex WebContent M1
website:
http://webcontent-m1.com/m1/en/product/develop_dynamic_website


Who can benefit

Although there are several thousands of different content
management systems, the market is still growing. And it will be
growing as long as people develop new websites. The solutions
that are currently present vary from freebies to systems with
the cost of up to several thousands of U.S. Dollars. They are
either simple, or too complicated. They are either for SMEs or
for huge corporations. They can be used for the website
management only, or they can be enhanced with facilities to
serve as workflow and document repository systems.

Whatever CMS it will be, it will be beneficial for both
parties:

1. Customer that needs a dynamic website.
2. Web Development Company that develops this website.

The reason for that benefit is common – when you use CMS for web
development the operational costs for both development and
maintenance are reduced drastically. That’s mainly because you
should just adjust several preprogrammed modules that are
already ready to be used. Then you make the layout and put those
modules wherever they are to be. No programming – no additional
expenses.

That’s obvious, the most of websites have common functionality.
So the most of websites can be developed with a proper content
management system. That is why, whether you are a company that
is looking to a long life of its website, hence, its permanent
maintenance, or you are a web development company that takes
care about its customers’ satisfaction the investments in a
content management technology should be your first step to reap
the most beneficial result of your activities.


Author: Alex Polonski