Content Management Systems, Bespoke and Off-the-Shelf CMS Systems

Content Management Systems (CMS) have simplified the way content is published on websites and intranets these days. A CMS is an easy-to-use tool that requires minimal technical skills. Any lay-man can easily create text and multimedia rich web pages this way. However, you are not just confined to designing and publishing web pages. It also allows maintenance of documents and other content.

A CMS can also be used for specific purposes like document management, knowledge management, website content management, and so on. There are many systems available that are bundled with more or less similar features and are equally effective. Many of these can be tailored for a specific type of working environment and are usually referred to as bespoke content management systems.

Content Management System

Broadly they can be classified as enterprise level CMS and Open Source CMS. Enterprise content management systems have advanced elements like workflow management and security features. Open source CMS are free-to-use tools with all the required basic functionalities. Content management systems also depend on the type of platform used like the programming language (ASP, PHP, JAVA, and so on) and the supported databases (MySQL, Oracle, and so on).

Much of CMS success can be attributed to its usability aspect. The ease of use does not necessarily mean how simple it is for the author to get the content published on the web page. The usability factor of a content management system also takes into account the following:

Simple to design layout, publish the content, and speedy deployment. The ease with which the CMS can be learned. The manner in which the errors are reported and controlled. Portability between versions and scalability on various platforms.

Apart from easy functionalities, a CMS should ideally include the following features:

Customizable templates that can readily applied to content. Workflow management and document management. Advanced plug-ins and upgrades that comply to latest web standards. Content virtualization, where a virtual copy of the content can be worked on by multiple users.

A bespoke CMS allows the users to renew the content on any page or portion of the website.bespoke content management systems are best used when there are distinctive requirements like multi-lingual support, automatic link check, access rights depending on the roles, convoluted database systems, and so on. It is useful to have requirements and implementation objectives clearly defined before selecting and finalizing a content management system.

Content Management Systems, Bespoke and Off-the-Shelf CMS Systems

What Is CMS? Content Management Systems Explained

A lot of people have been asking this question. Every month 1.2 million people search Google with the term, what is CMS.

In its simplest terms a CMS is a lot like a word processor in that you can edit documents in a WYSIWYG format. WYSIWYG stands for 'what you see is what you get', this type of document creation allows you to see exactly what the document will look like as you are typing and adding different elements.

Content Management System

Content management systems are also pretty complex. A good content management system acts more like a database than a word processor. The database is where you can link content together and keep a record of changes made to any web page or web page element.

Electronic content management systems have been around since computers were invented. But content management has been a problem since the beginning of the printing press, and some historians say that the problem began with the first written word.

The scope of this article is beyond the history of the content management systems, instead I'm going to focus on the most used content management systems today and give a brief over view of each system. The most popular content management systems are:

Drupal Joomla WordPress

These are the top three systems in use today as they are all popular among people that don't know how to create a website or haven't learned any HTML.

Drupal

Drupal was launched in 2000 in a dorm room at the University of Antwerp by two students who wanted to be able to share information with other each other and other classmates. It was named "Drop" for the first year until the creator, Dries Buytaert, graduated and moved out of the dorm room.

The name Drupal, pronounced "droo-puhl," comes from the English enunciation of the Dutch word "druppel," which means "drop." Drupal is free. It is open source software that is constantly being updated by IT professionals from all over the world. With Drupal you don't have to know any HTML to create websites as everything is accomplished inside the interface that looks like a word processor. So you can create websites easily and manage all of the web pages from one location.

Joomla

Joomla is also free open source software that allows you to create websites and web pages easily once you get over the learning curve. You'll have to install and learn all of the modules to begin creating web pages. The Joomla website has extensive documentation on how to use the software and a broad FAQ page to help new people learn the tips and tricks and how to get around the different features of the software.

WordPress

WordPress was released in 2003 and has become the benchmark for automated SEO optimization. WordPress plug-ins automates most of the tasks associated with making a website search engine friendly. This software also has to be installed unless you choose to let WordPress host your website on a subdomain such as "yourwebsite.wordpress.com".

Having a website hosted by WordPress has its draw backs as you don't have control over your website and WordPress can ban you if you violate the rules.

WordPress is the easiest to learn of the three content management systems. And in my opinion the best one to start with if you don't have any experience in creating websites. It is powerful bu nimble and if used correctly any WordPress blog can be made to get high rankings on Google.

Now click on this What is CMS link to see introductory videos for the three content management systems listed in this article.

What Is CMS? Content Management Systems Explained

The Basics of Content Management Systems

A Content Management System is a computer application that permits the creation, editing, publishing and manipulation of content on a website.  These systems are usually used for the storing and retrieval of technical and user's manuals, news articles, brochures, guides, among others.  The content itself may be constructed of any file type: images, audio/video files, spreadsheet and word processor documents, or any form of Web content. The primary types of Content Management Systems include:  Enterprise, Web and Component systems. 

1) An enterprise CMS focuses on content and documents oriented towards the organizational processes of a business enterprise, and have a primary function in managing the organization's unstructured information content.

Content Management System

2) A Web CMS focuses on content and documents specifically designed for Web publication by non-technical content creators.

3) A component CMS focuses on content within documents, often managing structured content, such as XML, to locate, link and render content at any level of organization.  This content is then often sent over to Enterprise and Web Content Management Systems. 

The five primary aspects of Content Management Systems include the following:

1) Versioning. The ability to keep, and roll back as required, previous versions of content, even after content is updated.

2) Granular User Management. This is the ability to assign and differentiate users based upon permission levels.

3) Content Organization and Relation. This is the ability to position content in both larger organizational structures as well as in relation to other content.

4) File and Image Management.  This is the ability of the system to store files in relation to the content that uses them.

5) Multi-State Content. This refers to the system's ability to store content in a variety of states, from 'in-progress' to 'archived' to 'active' or 'inactive'.

Along with these core functional requirements of a basic CMS, such systems often include a collection of other features and enhancements including extensibility and integration, scheduled publishing and expiration, task management and collaboration, among others.  The capability of such systems to pick and choose among such a wide array of functions provides evidence that no strict definition yet exists.  The CMS, as a technology structure, continues to advance as users and developers define and refine their needs and definitions.

The Basics of Content Management Systems

Content Management System - Choosing The Best Developer

There are loads of benefits of choosing a content management system. If you have a website, you should definitely opt for suitable content management software. You can install such a software on the website. Such a system allows the website owner to change and modify the data present on the website as and when he wishes. He does not have to hire the services of a web developer every time there is a need to make changes or modify the information on a website. The website owner can use the password and user name of such system to make the necessary changes. So, if you are searching for a tool that can allow you to change and modify the data on a website regularly, you should opt for a web content management system. With the help of such a system, managing and maintaining the information on a website is easy and convenient. However, when it comes to choosing a suitable CMS website, the first thing you should do is to choose a suitable developer.

There are a number of developers of content management systems. Most of them have websites, from where you can find information about the. There are also sites of companies that provide CMS website development services. You should research well before choosing such a developer. Given below are a few useful tips to choose the best developer:

Content Management System

The first thing you should check while choosing a developer of CMS is whether the professional has valid registrations and licenses. You must check whether the developer you are choosing is accredited by the state. In addition to that, you should know that you should know that the professionals you are choosing should have permits to develop such software.

The developer you are choosing should be experienced enough. You should check whether he is competent enough to develop the best quality system for your website. Find out whether the professional you are choosing has been in the profession for a considerable number of years. Make it a point to find out whether the professional has developed software for reputed companies' websites. You must also find out information about the background of the developer.

Do not forget to compare the cost of hiring such a professional. As there are a number of developers, you should check whether the cost of hiring the professional is well within your affordability.

So, you can see that if you know what to look for, it is easy to look for a developer of content management system.

Content Management System - Choosing The Best Developer

3 Top Benefits Of A Website Content Management Software

There are many entrepreneurs and website owners who do not know the benefits of opting for a website content management software. Ask such website owners, and they will tell you that they are not satisfied with the amount of business their websites are bringing for their companies. It is mainly because there is no fresh content on the websites of those companies. Thus, the sites get stagnated. Moreover, those sites continue to lose ranks on search engines. Moreover, as there is no interesting content or information on those sites, customers do not return. Thus, the website owners lose valuable customers. However, you should not let that happen to your website. You must know that if the content of your site is managed and maintained well, you can gain more than the expected amount of business. Moreover, there will be a huge traffic to your site and your site will rank on the topmost pages of different search engines. All these are possible due to a website content management system.

A web content management system is an application that can be installed on your website. This can turn your website into a platform, which allows regular edit, delete and modification of data without the need to make changes to the structure and design. Moreover, a website owner does not need to have knowledge of HTTP or program to be able to make changes to the content or information present on the site. There are loads of other benefits of website content management software. Top 3 of those advantages are given below in brief:

Content Management System

A vital benefit of choosing a website content management software is that, with the help of such a software, you will be able to popularize and promote your products and services to a large number of people. Having an online presence helps a great deal in reaching millions of online visitors. Thus, your goods and services get the maximum exposure.

Putting fresh content on your website at regular intervals helps to gain good search engine rankings. There will be a large number of customers on your site. Thus, sale of your products will increase. More and more customers will come to know about your products and will avail discounts and offers of your company.

Online promotion is the fastest means of popularizing products and services of a company. In addition to that, you can interact directly with your customers and get feedback and comments from them. This will help you to grow your business further.

So, you can see that there are loads of benefits of choosing a website content management. So, what are you waiting for?

3 Top Benefits Of A Website Content Management Software

How Can You Manage Content Successfully With PDF?

A Portable Document Format is an application that has been designed to prepare the content and transfer the same across multiple platforms. This format has been designed to reduce the dependence on paperwork and increase the dependence on electronic files. A user can manage vast amount of content in this document and prepare a number of documents on a variety of files.

A Portable Document Format is a non-editable file format that is designed by Adobe Systems and introduced in 1993 to the world. Since then the popularity of this file format has increased a lot for effective and efficient handling of the tasks. The portable and compatible feature of this computer application can make the task of a user easy and convenient. This application has got compression algorithms and the advantage of this feature is that one can insert graphics and type as much content as possible but the file size does not increases. In other words, it is these compression algorithms that compress the size of the file and as a result of which the size of the documents get compressed. A person can also insert the animated images in a file without even worrying about the size of the document. You can make the presentation your reports attractive as well as impressive in a Portable Document Format. Make the presentation visually striking and appealing in a Portable Document Format application.

Content Management System

It is easy and convenient to convert PDF to word Excel, Power Point and other such documents. You can also create PDF out of any of these file formats. All this is possible with the help of converter tools available in the market. These computer programs are available in the market and you can try out the usability of these tools before making a final selection.

How Can You Manage Content Successfully With PDF?

How Using a Content Management System (CMS) Can Save You Time and Money

WordPress and Joomla have both allowed websites to be delivered to clients allowing them to make simple changes and add or delete content with ease, meaning the client does not end up having the pay costly invoices just because they want a simple change to be implemented on their own website. It also means you can make the changes instantly, instead of having to fit into someone's schedule and end up waiting much longer for the change than you expected.

A Content Management System allows you to:

Content Management System

Make Changes - A decent CMS will allow you to make quick changes easily and efficiently, meaning that if you wake up at 3am and spot a spelling error, you can fix it, publish and then hopefully sleep a little easier knowing you don't have to wait for your web designer to make this change for you, and charge for it. Add Content - There is nothing more frustrating for a budding web entrepreneur than having to wait for someone else to do something. A CMS allows you to add the content within seconds of entering your admin area, and it will be live on the internet for your public to see within a few seconds of clicking the publish button! Instant Access - Because the CMS sits behind your website, as long as you have an internet connection you can login and access the system, meaning wherever you are in the world, on holiday or travelling on a train, you can access your own website, make changes and do whatever you need to do. Adding your latest article or uploading your photos can be done from anywhere in the world, meaning more control and quicker updates for your personal website or commercial offering. Optimisation - A good CMS allows you to not only control the content, but also control your keywords, title and description tags, per page, which means you will have the chance to really optimise your site. Although content is always the most important thing for getting traffic, you still need to make the pages optimised, and a good CMS will give you full control of this as well.

When most web designers first started designing websites, they would of used programs like Frontpage and Dreamweaver, and then have to upload the new pages via FTP. This caused major issues if you had more than one person in more than one location working on the site, due to content control issues. A CMS will take this issue away, as everything is done online and most decent ones will also lock the page, meaning only one person can open it at one time.

A CMS will save you time and money because you can do things quickly and do them yourself. When you take people you rely on out of the equation, you then take back control, which any business owner will tell you is a must when it comes to trying to stream operations to make them more cost efficient. It is also much more rewarding once you have got to grips with a CMS, as it just means you are now in control of another aspect of your business, which is vital in this day and age.

Will a CMS ever replace the need for Web Designers and Developers? The answer is no, not at all. It just means that we can give our clients more control over what they can do on their own website, something we feel is very important for clients and customers. A good CMS actually helps web designers and developers to do their job more efficiently, as the coding aspect is normally really good; leaving them to concentrate on making sure the website is perfect for the client.

How Using a Content Management System (CMS) Can Save You Time and Money

Why a Content Management System Is Important to Website Design

Do you want to be able to have a website design that allows you to alter the content of that site? Many people seriously underestimate how important a CMS can be to the functionality of their site. Here are a few of the reasons why a CMS is so critical to ensuring your website's success.

It Can Make Your Site More Affordable To Maintain
A good CMS can ensure that your site is as affordable as possible to maintain. This is because you will be able to do much of the maintenance yourself and leave only the most difficult tasks up to your web design company. Many website design and development companies will charge you a certain amount for ongoing site maintenance. The less they have to do for this, the lower the cost will be for you.

Content Management System

You Can Make Changes Very Quickly
If you are running a site where you are selling products, a CMS is important. This is because you may need to add, remove or change certain items. If you are waiting for the company that created your site to make changes to your products or other areas of the site you may find that you lose the chance to sell new items simply because your customers do not know about it. A delay can actually cause a new product to fail and this can be a costly problem for many people.

Even if you are not selling goods, it can still be worthwhile to have a CMS system built into your website. If you have a portfolio of work you will want to be able to alter the items that appear in that portfolio. You will be able to remove older items and replace them with newer work that better shows your evolving skills and abilities.

It Can Give You a Feeling of Control over Your own Site
Having a good CMS in place can really give you a feeling of control over your own site. Instead of simply handing it over to others to alter and maintain you can do this work yourself. This can make you feel as though you are in charge and are not relying on people who do not have the same dedication to your company to maintain your website.

You want to ensure that you understand completely how to use the CMS that is built into your site. The good news is that many of them can be learned in a few short lessons as they use controls that are familiar to many modern computer users.

Why a Content Management System Is Important to Website Design

Usefulness Of SEO Content Management System

SEO content management system is new technology system resource, which decides how, and in what fashion your written documents will be published. It is one of the most effective methods which will make your voice go live to million of audience in the manner liked and praised by every body. All you need to do is simply choose the application or the software to make the things turn your way. And the rest what follows is automatic.

Technology is changing and transforming at a phenomenal pace. The presentation of the content as well the editing procedures also change with this change. SEO Content management system brings forward the right way to publish the content to various online web directories, RSS feeds, polls, forums, news flashes and the list is endless. The system works perfectly well in a synchronized manner, for e learning companies, big corporate architecture, media organizations, and for everybody who wants to remain in the online business activity.

Content Management System

The enterprise content management system, is just another modified name of SEO content management system, which helps to maneuver create and capture; manage, store, retain, destroy, distribute and personalize multiple format pictures, audio and video across the web and beyond, in a seamless manner. All done, what about the content part! Who'll look into it! Will a laid back content with all those errors make the business of an online marketer swell? Answer to all these is NO.

Therefore, it is important to make sure that you have a synchronized content with coherent distribution of ideas and then move on for application of any real time SEO content management system tools. Besides, ensure that you make the content with the appropriate use of keywords. Because when you post the content out there for tracking and earning the much-needed popularity, it will pay you rich dividends, and I assure you that.

I will conclude by saying that means to sell your product online is not the only means to be there. In fact, it is proper utilization and application of SEO content management system, which works to your benefits and gives you high search engine page rank.

Usefulness Of SEO Content Management System

Role of Content Management System in Website Development

Content Management System Software, otherwise known as Web publishing systems, is a computer application used to manage the workflow related to content publishing. Content Management System (CMS) is used for storing, controlling, versioning and publishing documents such as articles, technical manuals, sales guides and marketing brochures. The advantage of content management system in Web sites is that it helps manage the content of a Web site from a server than uploading it from local editors such as FrontPage and Dreamweaver. It allows you to work from a basic Web site design, so it is easy to add, edit and delete contents.

Content Management System consists of a huge database, file system and related software required to store and manage huge loads of data. In contrast to typical databases, CMS can index text, audio clips, video clips or images. The use of CMS simplifies the job of Web site developers. With this, it has become easier to publish contents online. They also allow non-technical authors and editors to contribute information to the Web site via graphical user interface (GUI).

Content Management System

CMS is a boon to large organizations that handle huge amount of data for collaborative purposes. With CMS, these organizations can make the data available to employees, customers and business partners across the world via different applications such as ecommerce systems or Customer relationship management (CRM) software. This allows companies to define workflow tasks for collaborative creation of contents. CMS can also track and manage multiple versions of a single instance of content. It separates the content's semantic layer from the layout and automatically set color, font or other features of the text so that publishers can add, modify or delete content without worrying about the basic layout.

DotNetNuke (DNN) is a popular form of content management system software available today. DotNetNuke is an open source framework written in VB.NET for the ASP.NET framework. DNN CMS is highly extensible and customizable through a set of skins and modules. Working with DotNetNuke CMS does not require any expert knowledge in ASP.NET. DotNetNuke CMS solutions are highly flexible. With the help of dozens of modules and skins available in DNN, Web site designers can create compelling applications such as blogs, e-commerce applications, photo galleries, email forms, site registration, RSS news feeds, and more.

Role of Content Management System in Website Development

Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Content Management System For Your Site

As a webmaster do we need a CMS(Content Management System) to start a site or go for custom portal development?

When one enters the Internet world this is the first technical question that always comes in the mind of every new webmaster after you have grabbed the domain name and the server space. I've compiled some advantages and disadvantages of using CMS.

Content Management System

Advantages of CMS:

CMSs are well written software and tested by a large community of users. So you'll not find common coding bugs and errors. Most of the CMS are easy to install. Your site can be up and running quickly and you don't need to spend lot of time. Most of the CMS are free nowadays. Even the paid ones cost few bucks only. You can get any free technical support from the developers community. CMS softwares can be migrated in different servers and most of them can work with any database.

Disadvantages of CMS:

For a simple and small site CMS can be very heavy. To add or configure any existing feature you need to understand the codebase of CMS if they don't have the plugin for this. Different pages of portal can't have different theme or CSS when you use CMS. If a CMS is not avaialble to a different technology then migrating a site is rellay impossible and cumbersome work. Hiring a developer for configuring a CMS costs more as most of the popular CMS are heavy in size.

Example of some popular free CMS are:

Tinyportal-SMF (This requires SMF forum to be installed then tinyportal to be installed as a plugin. Here is a link to one popular community site for Programmers, developers, students and webmaster containing IT discussion forum and large collection of java/php/Ajax/javascript/Linux tips and articles which is developed using CMS (Tinyportal): http://www.techcubetalk.com) Joomla (Very popular CMS and lots of sites are running Joomla) CMS Made simple Wordpress (Though this is a blog publishing software but it can be used as a CMS. Example site is www.technotalks.com)

Advantages and Disadvantages of Using Content Management System For Your Site

Web Site Content Management - An Important Aspect in Running Your Business

In running your own web site business, it is imperative that you effectively manage the flow of your work so that your business will not only be in order but also organized. Like any other business, having it organized is very important in the sense that a business which is disorganized is sure to fail. This is so since, having a business, you will have to manage every aspect of it. From your data, indexes and any other texts, you will have to need to find the right application in order for you to keep track of your records. Without any means of organizing yourself, the success of your business will surely be under the constant threat of not happening. Simply stated, having your business organized is imperative. Without organization, no success could follow. And without success, money arising from your business will surely not come.

Web content management system is precisely there to provide you with the organization that your web site badly needs. Even in the normal course of everyday life, organization takes a very important place in your life. But the degree of importance varies as when it comes to business, organization is a requisite. Without which, no business could take away or get out of the ground. This means that whatever you do, if you are in the web site business, or in any other business for that matter, organization takes precedence over anything else. Without organization, your success will surely stay as a dream.

Content Management System

It is for this reason that if you are running a web site business, you should have a web site content management system. Without this system, you will have a hard time organizing your video files, audio files, manuals, indexes and many other electronic documents such as articles or even web content. Such is the importance of having your own web site content management system. Imagine a web site business which does not have any storage in terms of its articles, video files, audio files and other electronic documents which are essential in keeping said business in order. It will be hard for you to manage such a business without this system. Without it, you will have no place with which to store your computer files which is very important insofar as said business is concerned. This is so since in running such a business, document organization is very important.

Consequently, you should not think twice in getting a web site content management program because this will serve as the back bone of your business. Without such program, your business will surely be very difficult to handle. If not, incapable of being handled. Hence, having said program is a must to those who would want to have their very own web site business.

Another important aspect in having this program is that it will give you a peace of mind insofar as the documents of your business is concerned. And having a peace of mind, it will certainly take some pressure off of you.

Web Site Content Management - An Important Aspect in Running Your Business

What Are the Components of a Good and Effective Web Content Management System?

Once the decision has been reached to purchase a web content management system the issue then becomes "What makes a good web content management system?" Should the purchase be based on brand? Can the assumption be made that Microsoft (for example), because of their name and based on the fact that you are running a Microsoft shop, has a content management system that would best fit your needs?

There are four questions that must be a part of the debate. The four questions address:
What your web content management  needs  are versus what the available CMS' offer How steep the learning curve would be for your  IT department and especially for your non-technical employees who will now be asked to create and publish their own web sites When can you have this system available for use across the enterprise - days? Weeks? Months? Which content management product is most effective in providing a return on investment that is easily quantifiable?Is the web content management system easy to use? Aside from the ROI, the most important question initially has to be "is this system easy to use?"  Chances are that the desire for a content management system is based on a perceived need to take basic website maintenance out of the hands of your IT department and place it into the hands of those who actually create the content. This saves time and money, but those savings will never be realized if the content managers have so much trouble learning how to use the system that it's never adopted.

Content Management System

An easy to use web content management system will have:
Training and support in the form of easy to read and use documentation, online videos, and cost effective training  provided by the vendor WYSIWG editors that  make creating and editing content as easy as typing a memo in Word or creating a PowerPoint presentation Easily created page templates and the ability to clone existing pages and or templates Automatic versioning  where new versions are created upon update and the content manager can copy or rollback to a  previous version   Pre-built components that allow the content manager to easily create a feature rich user experience with images, audio, video, calendars, news feeds and blogs Globalization features that allow an entire website to be easily translated into the local languageIs the web content management system feature rich? Does the web content management system provide the built in features that your organization is looking for?  Sure, just about every product has the WYSWIG editors and some type of security and a couple of built in nice to have components. When the discussion turns to features here are just a couple of things to look for:
Just how deep does the" granular security model" go? Is it "role-based" and can it be easily integrated into your existing security model? Can it insure that the right people have access to the right content and can work with the content as required by the business?  How many components does the content management system ship with?  And how many components do you have to pay extra for? For example - will your marketing department be able to indulge their penchant for customer surveys at no extra cost whatsoever? Built in navigation components  for easy and fast creation of horizontal and vertical menus, bread crumbs and  even category specific menus  where needed Inclusion of social media type components - blogs, message boards/forums, personalized web pages, photo galleries. Tools that can be used companywide  such as a news release  manager,  or a Frequently Asked Questions component What if you need document management also? Is it  integrated with the web content management  system and a part of this purchase or does this require a whole new set of purchase orders, licensing fees and sales  agreements?Is the web content management system fast to deploy? I have worked on projects which involved a purchased software package, where the system was rolled out over the course of several years.  This is because there is a certain amount of customization required before the application is ready to go "live".

You do not want this to be the case with your web content management system. Look for a product that doesn't cost as much to deploy as it did to purchase. You also want something that can easily be installed by your own IT personnel and doesn't require a manual to accomplish.

Is the web content management system affordable? I love taking cruises and going to certain resorts. Why? Because they are all-inclusive, I pay one price and am fed and pampered for a week, and any additional costs are clearly stated up front. This is  exactly what your web content management choice should be like - all inclusive and any additional costs clearly stated up front.

Do yourself and your organization's bottom line a favor and get a test drive of the product - not just a demo. Make a list of the features that your organization is looking for in a content management system and the make sure that most (if not all) are included in the base price for the product.  Nothing shoots holes in a pre-calculated ROI like a product that continues to cost money long after the sale has been finalized.

What Are the Components of a Good and Effective Web Content Management System?

To Create a Great Speech or Presentation - Don't just Research the Content

To create a great speech or presentation you certainly need content that will appeal to your audience and support the impact you want to make. Research will find you that content. But you also need to research vital details about audience, venue and context if that speech is to be successful and is to have the impact that you want it to create.

Once you have articulated the purpose of your speech, you can go about collecting the material you need. It may be that you have a specific message to present or you may have to create your own. If the latter is the case you will need to range wide in your research to cover the whole subject until a suitable message becomes clear. Then you will see sub-themes developing and you can direct your research along those lines.

Content Management System

Research on the internet. Use search engines, and include databases and blogs. Opinions in the blogs will give you some ideas for your own message.

Use libraries and include magazine articles as well as reference books and fiction or non-fiction.

While you research, be sure to note your sources. Head each new document of notes with the name of your resource then if you want to quote ideas you can refer to the source.

If you are speaking regularly, you will develop the habit of collecting material on your subject areas - articles from magazines or the internet, quotes, sayings and anecdotes. Keep a paper file of notes and save useful websites in your favourites file of a tagging system like del.icio.us.

And never forget your human resources. You cannot interview a website or book for clarification or for a quirky perspective that just might give you the winning angle on a topic.

Finally, if you are a visual person you can use mind mapping to record your ideas and information. (You can visit my article on the subject.) It will be a great tool to help you create a logical structure for your speech and to help you remember that structure.

Once you have content for your speech, you will also need to extend the range of the research. It is also vital to find out as much as you can about

The audienceThe venueThe context
1. Research the audience

Find out as much as you can - their age range, gender, income levels, dreams, needs, wants, culture.

You can gain much from a registration form.

You can ask the event manager.

In your preparation routine, you can mingle with them before your speech.

Then you can use that information in constructing your speech. If you need to persuade, for example, you can use your knowledge of their interests and dreams.

You will choose language that they understand, and that is not irritating or offensive to them, and subject matter to suit that audience - themes, supports, anecdotes all will be tailored to them.

2. Research the venue

Research the equipment available if you can, and the area.

If you can visit it before your presentation you will be able to incorporate it into your visualisations.

Apart from becoming familiar with the operations of the equipment, you may need to structure your presentation around what is available. The way you present using PowerPoint will be very different from the way you present without it, for example.

The location of your presentation, and of the equipment, in the room may also add constraints or possibilities to how you organise your material.

3. The Context

If you can find out the details of the programme you will have an advantage.

Ascertain, if you can, any other speakers on the programme and their subject matter ... and the theme of the event.

And in your dealings with the organizers of the event, ensure that you know just what it is that they expect of you. A satisfied event manager is a powerful ally.

You must also know the time of day, so that you can either write for an audience that is alert, or one that is ready for an after-banquet nap, and the expected length of your speech or presentation. If you hope to have a positive, lasting impact on the audience and the organizers, you will stick to that time limit and write your speech accordingly.

So the research you have conducted to find content and to familiarize yourself with your audience, the venue and the context of your presentation has given you the information you need to present a great speech that will create impact with your audience.

To Create a Great Speech or Presentation - Don't just Research the Content

Web Based Content Management System: Basics

A web based content management system (CMS) is used for webdesign so that the php, asp or jsp scripts call in the data from the mysql or sql database to create the content on a page. You would enter the content of a website in a database using a user friendly Admin Panel and this would update itself on the actual website. CMS is critical to the success of almost every website and intranet.

The need

Content Management System

Static websites are easy to design but hard to maintain. You have created a static website with desired content and you put in efforts to promote that site. As a result, the website grows organically over time, and while it is very useful, it is far from perfect. The search engines give more importance to the websites which are updated regularly.
To update the site content on regular basis, you would require the web professional company to give you continuous support. Now this dependency leads to either continuous expenses or poorly update site.
Thankfully, this dependency is what a content management system is specifically designed to solve.

What is Web Based CMS ?

A web based content management system (CMS) helps you manage the content data on the website. The management includes creation, updating, distribution, publishing, and discovery of content.
And it is not the only thing that the CMS can do for you. The CMS now helps to generate new pages, categorize the content, manage the layout and presentation of the site, manage users and permissions for the site, manage other dynamic modules on the site and many other things using a very user-friendly Admin Panel which requires minimal or no technical expertise.

Features and Benefits

There are a wide range of features and benefits that can be achieved by implementing a CMS, including:

· Create and Manage New Pages

· Manage site navigation and meta content

· Assign users to manage the content in decentralized way.

· Manage site layout and presentation by editing the HTML.

· Manage other modules on the site. Like if you have forum installed on the site, you can manage the forum preferences, settings, categories, forums, users from the Admin panel.

· Better consistency

· Increased security

· Reduced duplication of information

· Reduced site maintenance costs

Out of all the features, content management remains the mainstay of the CMS sites.

Content management

The CMS based sites have a front end which the site for public, a database which stores the vital data of your site and a Admin Panel to manage the site. Through the Admin Panel, you can create content pages like you are creating a document in MS Word. This is a completely non-technical interface to create new pages or update existing pages without any knowledge of HMTL, javascript or programming language.
You can simply click create pages and a page opens which asks you to define the attributes of the page like Title of the page, Link Title for the frontend navigation menu and page content. The page content box uses a WYSIWYG editor which helps you to improve the presentation of the page like making any text bold, colored or creating hyperlinks. You can also upload images with your content.
You can also define the meta tags for the page, publish and expiry date, author information etc to make the page more meaningful.
Once a page has been created, it is saved into the database on the server. This stores all the content of the site, along with the other supporting details.
The CMS also helps you to make the content management an interactive process between you and your users. A similar page can be accessible to your users who can post the content like articles, news or event. The added content pages can be accessed through the Admin Panel and approved to be published on the site.

CMS Availability

There are various CMS options with different capabilities and strengths in the market to choose from. Depending on your business requirements, you can have a customized CMS based website or you can choose any open source CMS available like Drupal, Xoops, mambo, Joomla, Typo3 etc.
Every organisation has a unique set of requirements for a content management system, and there is no solution that can fit your needs. By allocating sufficient time and resources, you can achieve the best possible solution. Out of customized and open source CMS, I would advice to evaluate the open source CMS available and get it customized to your needs by any company specializing in the Open Source solutions like Dyanmic Intel.
Now the common question is Won't my CMS site look like all the rest if I use Open Source solution?
It doesn't have to! Most quality content management systems will allow you to apply templates and plug-ins to your site, which can set the design of your site apart from others using the same engine by nearly anything that HTML and CSS can do. Typically, you can find templates on the main web site for the content management system you've chosen - and in the rare event that this is not the case, templates are typically no more than a Google search away. Most systems which let you install a custom skin will even let you design your own; allowing you to make your new site virtually as personalized as any site on the web can be.

Conclusion

Content management systems are now no more new to the market and have been established as the most important part of your presence on the internet. Now CMS based websites can create SEO friendly pages and be managed by various users across the world.
I have provided the basics of Content Management System in this article. If you want to read more on CMS like evaluating CMS etc, use our article directory Pacific Articles.

Web Based Content Management System: Basics

Wordpress - A Content Management System

If you are looking for a suitable and easy to use content management system (CMS), the task at hand can be difficult. In order to best serve your needs, a CMS should be flexible, secure, and work once it is downloaded. Coupled with these features, it must be able to extend functionality and be search engine friendly. With that in mind, we will discuss why WordPress is so popular and what it can further do as a simple content management system.

Keeping in mind it was originally designed to be a blog platform, WordPress offers a choice when you are looking for simple CMS, with a lot of great plug-ins availability. For this reason, it has become popular, because of its simplicity and user-friendliness. It is not only a blogging platform but it is provides a great way to customize your site by eCommerce, online gallery, etc. While other content management systems may make the same claims or perhaps even better about their system and the features theirs provide, one thing is for certain, and something that is said time and again, WordPress is tremendously easy to use. Beginners are able to handle and work with it much more rapidly. Another consideration for the ease feature that many of the clients are people with very little programming knowledge or have less experience with content management systems find that the WordPress system in a matter of a few hours. Because it is so versatile and flexible, you will be amazed as to how well it handles any one of these features quite efficiently.

Content Management System

Since WordPress has captured much attention since its release in 2003, you would not be wrong if you followed many other users who have made this same selection. In this case, familiarity breeds trust in this system. This system has the ability and expertise so that you can customize it to your specific needs.

When comparing CMS, the WordPress Repository provides a lot of free themes, templates and plugins. The quality of these features far surpasses the competition, and not to mention how simple they make life for their users. There are endless possibilities when customizing your site.

There may be some concern about security with other CMS, but with Wordpress, they have a team comprised of dedicated developers who are constantly striving for perfection, and who are working to fix any potential bugs and security issues. Even with the addition of new features, WordPress download remains free. Another benefit is that the WordPress community is a resource of which you can tap into should the need arise. A forum was developed that has a tremendous knowledge base on all aspect of using this application. More than likely, if you complete a search, you will land on an answer page.

WordPress has grown to such a point that it is not only being used by bloggers but by developers and designers as well. Through all of it features, such as, blogging, designing templates, converting PSD style to WordPress style XHTML, it is one of the most important platforms on the web.

RESOURCES
http://www.onextrapixel.com

Wordpress - A Content Management System

Buying a Content Management System

A Content Management System focuses on areas such as speed of uploading, coherence level of the website, web server bandwidth utilization, interactive features, syndicating of content and more fundamentally, simplified navigation and importance of website aesthetics. Outsource CMS Development and will get high quality solutions and services through skilled and qualified developer's team which is normally focused on exceeding clients' expectations every time. Outsourcing provides best combination of affordability and quality. Outsource CMS Development makes sure the clients with best solution at very competitive rate. Offshore CMS Development can develop complex custom module and components for the website.

For buying a Content Management System four things needs to be considered:

Content Management System

Background to buying a CMS Steps leading to Purchase Important to Remember Further Resources

Background to Buying a CMS

Buying a CMS is not same as buying other software even though you think that your need for using software is quite simple. A content management system will have great impact on the organization at many different levels in different ways whether you have a small or large business with simple or complex requirements. It will directly affect staff, customers, suppliers and approach to communication. Before buying CMS from anybody it is very important to have a sound knowledge and understanding of CMS deployment issues and also related & on-going costs. A CMS is normally purchased as an essential part of a development project or as part of business improvement strategy. In small company where you are building website, web developers tie their preferred CMS in with design and construction quotation.

Steps Leading to a Purchase

Following list summarize the common approach of selecting and buying a CMS. There is no single way of doing it. The approach changes depending on the complexity of requirements, existing level of knowledge, expert resources and other things.

Given below is the list of further resources:

Important things need to remember

Do research and think about your purchase with awareness Make sure to see the product working Evaluate the product you want to purchase directly against your key requirements Make sure the product you need to purchase is well supported.

Buying a Content Management System

Drupal As Your Chosen Content Management System

If Drupal isn't the world's most popular Content Management Systems then it certainly is in the top five - there must be hundreds of thousands of websites built using this CMS.

Drupal was started by Belgium programmer Dries Buytaert in 2001, and today the award-winning project encompasses a thriving online community and many conferences and get-togethers in cities across the globe.

Content Management System

There is an extremely active development community that surrounds the project, with the company Lullabot being particularly keen to roll out audio and video guides for everyday use.

Based upon the Dutch word "dorp" (village), it is an open source project released under a GNU General Public License.

For those that haven't used the CMS yet (and as those that have will testify to), Drupal isn't easy to master. It takes some time to get to grips with much of the basic framework, and even then hardly any Drupal site is run without the assistance of one or more third-party modules.

When it comes to learning this CMS, the online Drupal guides are notoriously sparse. This isn't a problem that is exclusive to Drupal as most developers love writing code, but hate writing the accompanying documentation.

If you find that the information on their site is not detailed enough or difficult to navigate through then a good book to buy is Building Powerful and Robust Websites with Drupal 6 by David Mercer (Packt Publishing). This book isn't necessarily cheap, but it is easy to read and will give you a good grounding in using Drupal.

A good source of advice when tackling this CMS is at their forum. You can almost guarantee that your query would have been asked before so use their search function and check from the thousands of old threads before you start a new one.

A big problem too with using Drupal is finding the right third-party module for the job. There are over 4,000 published modules, and although some are extremely well-written by coders with years of experience, others are perhaps not so hot and code perfect.

It takes a great deal of trial and error to find the addons that you know you can depend on.

Here are some essential Drupal modules that I use in every installation:

Token: Used by a number of different modules including CKK, Custom Breadcrumbs and Pathauto.

Pathauto: This creates user and search engine friendly URLs.

Cache Exclude: It allows you to exclude certain pages when you turn on your cache. It is essential to exclude the frontpage if you have a number of different users signing in and out.

Custom Breadcrumbs: Creates pretty, workable breadcrumbs for individual pages.

Meta tags: Adds description and keywords meta tags to pages.

XML sitemap: As the title suggests, this module creates an XML sitemap.

Content management filter: Enables greater control of nodes in the administration section.

Javascript Aggregator: Minifies the aggregated JavaScript file when Optimize JavaScript is enabled.

CAPTCHA: Essential install in order to stop being overrun by spam.

PNG Behave: A great module if you are using 24 or 32 bit PNG image files and would like them to render properly in IE6.

Views / CKK / Panels / Contemplate: These are all essential modules if you really want to get to grips with Drupal as they allow you to make drastic modifications to Drupal core and themes without knowledge of PHP.

The biggest problem with Drupal at the time of writing is its bad usability, both in the administration section of every install and on the main site at drupal.org

This will be fixed over the coming year as a great deal of time has been put in by the Mark Boulton Design agency in fixing the myriad of usability problems as highlighted by studies carried out by the University of Minnesota and the University of Baltimore.

If you are not on the Drupal train then jump on board today as this Content Management System is going places!

Drupal As Your Chosen Content Management System

Entrepreneur Web Budget - Content Management Or Other Do-It-Yourself Options?

Building a web site usually comes right after choosing a name and right before ordering business cards. Which means businesses are still facing loads of start-up expenses and haven't even made their first dollar. No wonder entrepreneurs try to save money on their web sites.

While new business owners will eagerly sit down with a web developer, intending to build a web site that kicks butt both in design and in usability, they usually walk away either depressed or angry when they discover how much that kick-butt site is going to cost.

Content Management System

"It takes a village," as they say, to build a really good web site. Included among the professionals whose services are needed are:

A graphic designer A content writer A marketing professional A programmer A hosting provider

Charges range from dollars-per-hour to dollars-per-page and dollars-per-month, but the commonality here is: Dollars. And that's just to get the web site launched. When it's time to update the calendar, add new pages or rewrite the page content for better search engine optimization, plan on shelling out more dollars-per-hour to do so.

To cut costs, many new businesses look for other options to the traditional custom web site developer. Options they might want to consider include:

Getting the kid next door to build a site Using an online web site creator Downloading an Open Source Content Management web-builder

To be perfectly honest, any of the above options could be the right solution, depending on how much the new business owner is willing to give up. Among the compromises that might need to be made are:

Original graphic design Professional graphic design Professional marketing advice Site management support Functionality

"Support" is usually the number one problem folks have when they try to save money on their web presence. When the kid next door is never around to update the site or the online web site creator can't provide the function customers are asking for, the entrepreneur often returns to the traditional web developer for help. Unfortunately, there is often no choice but to start fresh. Which means the entrepreneur bought some time maybe, but is facing the same estimate they walked away from in the first place.

Content Management web sites built with Open Source code are not the cheapest option, but they can equal custom-developed sites on many levels at a fraction of the cost and problems. Among the popular Content Management systems available that you may have heard about are:

Joomla Drupal Typo3 DotNetNuke

Each CMS listed above offers similar features and has its loyal fans. The scale tips a bit toward DotNetNuke because In addition to providing hundreds of options for web site building, on-going support is easy to access.

Based on Microsoft's DotNet technology, there are thousands of programmers and web developers world-wide who support the existing code and are busy coding new functions all the time. If the business grows in a year and needs new functions, new modules can be added seamlessly to the old site.

The fact that DotNetNuke is also a Content Management system is just a bonus. Clients update their own pages and they are able to keep their sites fresh without having to justify the cost of a webmaster.

Open Source means that it is free to download the code to build a DotNetNuke web site. Anyone can do it. But in all honesty, not everyone will be comfortable building their own site. In addition, the do-it-yourselfer may also be uncomfortable creating graphics, writing copy and handling site optimization, but DotNetNuke is still a solid solution for the new business owner.

At a cost a little more than an online site-builder, but less than a custom web designer, entrepreneurs can hire a DotNetNuke web developer to install the Content Management system for them. With a little training, business owners can update their own pages or have someone else in the office do it.

Free "skins" are available that will no doubt meet short term needs for the look of the site, and thanks to the exceptional DotNetNuke community, more unique skin designs can be purchased or even commissioned and swapped for the old look when the budget allows.

To keep costs down, entrepreneurs can buy an hour of consultation with a web marketing professional from time to time and use that advice to make their own changes to the web site. As the business grows, the owner can add new functions to the site by hiring a DotNetNuke developer to install the appropriate free or low-cost modules. On the very slim chance that no module for a specific function exists, programmers can be commissioned to create one.

With DotNetNuke, the entrepreneur can start with a basic do-it-yourself site and build it over time into a fully-functioning, graphically unique and completely optimized professional web site. In fact there are many big-name companies that use DotNetNuke technology.

The kid next door might make a fine web site, but an entrepreneur needs to plan ahead. Once the business gets rolling, slamming on the brakes to re-think the web site solution could cost more at that point than what was saved when starting with the cheapest option.

With an Open Source Content Management system, however, professional services can be purchased over time while providing a complete online presence from the very beginning.

Entrepreneur Web Budget - Content Management Or Other Do-It-Yourself Options?

Web Design and Content Management System

How many times you wanted to change images placed in your website or edit the text. Every time you had to call your web designer to do this for you. This whole process can be very tiring at time and also can cost you couple of extra bucks. Luckily, you do not have to practice this anymore; with the growing technology there are softwares through which you can manage the content of your own web site easily without any professional experience.

Content Management System (CMS) is one such software, for managing, and organizing the documents and content placed at your web site. Content Management systems were initially started internally for the content management of publishing companies, and then this system spread to manage things on the web. There is a growing need of Content Management System (CMS) for storing, editing, and publishing, deleting the marketing content such as News Letters, Articles, User Manuals and marketing broacher. It can also help you with uploading videos, images as well as other web related components.

Content Management System

Generally every Content Management System (CMS) has some kind of authentic procedure, not every user can access and edit all parts of the website. This means each authorize person is required to enter a password and he will be directed to only those pages where he can manage the contents around. Now when we have an idea of what CMS is, it's easy to talk about how it can be beneficial for us. It reduces the maintenance cost of the web site as you can edit your content yourself so no help is required for external professional companies or designers. It will reduce the time needed to maintain the contents on the website and you can do more work in less time with little effort.

Once the content is added in to Content Management System (CMS), it provides a very flexible mechanism and that content can be used over and over again at different pages just by making few clicks It can also be effective with the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) campaign, adding more content to your web sites, will keep it up to dated and fresh so this will provoke search engines to visit your Web Site again and again and rank it better. Selecting CMS which suits right your needs is a critical part, so if you are having problems with selecting a suitable system than 199web can provide you a solution that will be tailored according to your needs.

Web Design and Content Management System