Content Management Systems are the future
We absolutely love CMS platforms. Our favourite is, of course, WordPress. It’s brilliantly supported, there are thousands of people making plugins and keeping them up to date, and WordPress itself is constantly being improved. It’s rare that you log in and don’t find some sort of update waiting for you, whether it’s just a news flash on the dashboard or a new version to upgrade to. Of course, you have to be on your toes when you apply updates; every now and then themes need updating as well to keep up with the changes made, but that’s nothing to complain about. Not when so much work is being placed into the platform.
One of the best selling points for the CMS is just how easy it is to use. So far, of all the sites we’ve built, only a few have been plain, static HTML sites. The rest have been built using WordPress with custom themes over the top. The reason for that is simple: as soon we tell our customers that they can update their own site without having to call us, they want that system. When it comes to updates, having a CMS website makes things easier all round. Would you like to sit down with a customer and explain how to update an HTML site? They’d have to find FTP software, HTML editing software… you’d have to set up FTP accounts for them, teach them basic HTML, show them how to link the CSS into their edited content so the styles are right… I don’t know about you, but that’s not something I like the thought of. It’s not really very cost effective, and would probably lead to some major arguments!
That process is completely different with CMS. We set up a user account, give the customer their login details, and spend an hour or so instructing them on how to edit their pages and create new posts. We’ve seen real technophobes go from saying it’s going to be hard to producing 2 posts a day on blogs using this system. Guys who only deal with computers so they can read their emails are now updating their websites every few weeks, with no need of us, and that is where the magic of CMS lies. By giving a customer a CMS website, you’re enabling them to run their site the way they want it. They have direct control, and they’re able to change things as they need to. They don’t have to wait until we’ve got a spare hour, or until we get back from a meeting. They don’t even have to tell us that they’ve changed something (although we prefer that they do!), they just have to login, and start typing.
Content Management Systems are the way forward. They improve the experience of website development for everyone. Hopefully, we’ll just see them getting better and better!
