Website Content Management Systems, CMSs

What is a Content Management System?

A Content Management System, or CMS, allows a website owner to update their website content themselves, as well as add new pages/sections to their website. This is done by using an admin area of the website (which requires a user name/password login), to choose the page to edit and then edit in a web page using a simple editor.

The beauty of a CMS is that is allows you to make regular content updates to a website, for example adding new products, services or news, without having to pay or wait for a developer to do those for you. Google and the other search engines love fresh content, so your CMS will be a core part of delivering your Search Engine Optimisation strategy.

CMSs are complicated programs that store information about each of your pages within a database, retrieving that information when a visitor's machine asks to view a page, and embedding it within a template that defines the design of the website. Most developers use 'open source' CMSs - systems that are developed by a community of people. Being open source they have the advantage of being free to the developer and also more 'portable' should you wish to change developers in the future.
 

What are the more common CMSs?

Popular open source CMSs include Drupal, Joomla and WordPress - at WebSanity we prefer not to use any of these, and here's why... The former two are solutions developed by techies for techies; they have very confusing user interfaces. Although very powerful, we avoid them because we think that one of the fundamental properties of a good CMS is how easy it is to use by the non-technical website owner. At the opposite extreme WordPress is used by a lot of website developers who use the vast collection of add-ons and design themes to develop websites without any technical skills. Although looking boasting an impressive range of plug-ins, WordPress is not a Content Management System, but a blogging system that leans towards being a CMS.
 

Which CMS do WebSanity use?

At WebSanity we use a somewhat niche CMS called Website Baker, to which we have added our own improvements and customisations; for example to allow us to easily add further custom functionality and also to boost its search engine friendliness (driven by our expert knowledge in the field of SEO). The key reason for choosing this is the systems ease of use - for the customer - and the lack of system constraints on how we can extend it to meet individual needs.
 

If you are interested in web design in Cambridge, Peterborough or Huntingdon then contact us to find out how we can help you develop a content managed website.
 

Screenshots

The entry screen for the Content Management System shows a simple listing of all pages on the website. Pages with sub-pages are indicated with a plus sign next to them. This provides quick access to viewing a page, editing it, or changing its settings, such as SEO tags.
 
New pages or sections can be added by filling in the simple form at the bottom of the screen.

Editing a page is as simple as clicking on it and then editing content in a small embedded editor which offers control over styles, text-alignment, colour, images, tables etc. etc.