There are several steps in the traditional content
management process that require manual work which could be
made more efficient. One area is telling the system how to
assemble content components into pages. Publishing content
onto a page usually requires several steps:
Input the content itself, along with the corresponding
metadata Specify how that content should be displayed in relation
to similar content, such as its placement in a list and that
list's order Specify how that group of content should be displayed
on a page If we can provide predetermined rules for the system
to assemble the content components, we could simply enter
the content and let the system do the rest. For example, a
company that makes products could create a rule that states,
"Whenever a new product description page is published,
create links in the sidebar to related white papers, support
documents, and local retailers." On the page for a particular
white paper, a corresponding rule could state, "If a
new product description is published and is relevant to this
white paper, create a link to it in the sidebar." Rules
could be created hierarchically, so that sub-rules could determine
what links appear in the sidebar and sub-sub-rules determine
how each link in the sidebar is displayed.
To create a CMS that followed rules like this,
the system would have to know 1) the information type of a
piece of content - a white paper, product description, etc.
- as well as 2) how certain information types relate to each
other. Once we specify this information, the system, by following
rules, is smarter, and ultimately reduces work for the people
using it. There are a few major benefits to this kind of system
over a conventional CMS:
Content
Management Systems:
Introduction
Content management holds the promise of better organization,
increased access to resources, greater organizational effectiveness...for
those who dare slog through the process of setting up a
content management system - a task often more onerous than
dealing with unorganized content.
After clearing
away marketing hype, "next-big-thing-ism", bloated
expectations, and misconceptions, content management is
revealed as a necessary tool for organizations to achieve
strategic goals and thrive.
In many organizations/industries
(especially my field - higher education) digital content
creation is far outpacing management. The result is an almost
chaotic format of resources dispersed across an organization
(which is fine - as long as connections are made), without
a clear understanding of information/digital assets - the
building blocks of a knowledge society.
New technologies/concepts
have two potential impacts: a completely new way of doing
things, or an improved way of doing what is already happening.
Managing content with technology falls into the latter category,
but is unfortunately marketed in the former. The "new
thing" is the rapid growth of digital resources...improving
organization with technology is only an improvement of existing
practices of libraries and information architects.
In our developing
knowledge economy, content management will continue to take
a central and increasingly vital role in organizational
success, effectiveness, and competency.
What
is Content Management?
Content management
is (drum roll...) the management of content (any digital
item - video, audio, text, graphic, links to physical resources,
etc.) to allow for contribution from varied sources with
points of control to ensure quality. The contributors are
often individuals without strong technical background (subject
matter experts), so templates are used to create uniform
and consistent documents.
Content management
is a concept, process, function, and a strategy.
As a concept,
it is the organizing of corporate information and making
it useful (useful defined as being usable in format, time,
and place needed by end user).
As a process,
CM is a set of guidelines, templates, roles, and procedures
to achieve the concept of CM - namely to make information
more useful.
As a function,
CM requires low-tech front-end (for non-technical users),
multiple contributor environments, control points (to ensure
quality), scalable, and separation of content from presentation.
As a strategy,
CM is part of an overall knowledge management process and
includes:
- Organizing information
in an organization
- Knowing what information
an organization owns
- Finding what information
an organization has
- Maintaining (current
and relevant) information of an organization.
Process
of Managing Content
- Creating - This may involve
the creation of content via an authoring tool native to
the CMS, conversion of legacy content, or creation of
content through regular corporate processes (and the content
is then uploaded into the CMS in its (usually) proprietary
format).
- Reviewing - Content that
has been created is submitted to a review process. Reviewers
can accept, reject, or suggest changes.
- Editing - Improvements/alterations
to content based on review, feedback, or changes in the
underlying principles expressed by the unit of information.
- Organizing - Information
needs to be organized in order to be accessible to end-users.
Some aspects of organization:
- Publishing - Once content
has been created/reviewed/edited/organized, it is then
published and set "live" in a system. "Presentation"
(CSS, usability, accessibility, etc.) is added at the
publishing stage to create look and feel desired for the
format.
- Feedback loop - 3rd party
evaluations. The initial review process will ensure content
accuracy and conformity to standards. However, knowledge
becomes outdated (or errors were made during the review
stage), and feedback from content users can ensure knowledge
"freshness". Additionally, 3rd party evaluations
can offer qualitative assessments of the content
itself that may not be intrinsic to the initial review
process.
- Searching and retrieving
- This aspect of CM ensures that content is available
when it's needed and in the desired format.
Benefits
of Content Management
The ultimate goal of CM is to permit organizations
to achieve strategic goals. As with any technology process,
the tool has value only to the degree that it enables (not
dominates) achievement of larger corporate missions. This
list details some major value points for CM:
- Repurpose
content for use in various formats - web page, documents,
etc
- Reduce costs associated
with maintenance of content/web sites
- Reduce costs associated
with searching for content (or duplication of content
creation)
- Access -
findability (and its implications - info when needed,
avoiding duplication)
- Meet info
needs of organization - when, where, how
- Relevant - content is
current and meets needs of users
- Organized - content can
be easily located due to an imposed organizational structure
at the time of publishing
- Customized - delivering
info in a manner and format required by the person for
the task
- Increased responsiveness
to trends, markets, etc. (and every else that comes from
knowing where things are)
- Quality control (via
automated workflow process)
- Collaboration and "spiraling"
knowledge as contributors build on each others' work
- Permits non-technical
staff to enter and publish content into a system
What
is a Content Management System?
A content management system (CMS) is a combination
of tools used to achieve objectives of CM. Often, content
management is viewed as content for the web (digital content
used for Inter-Intra-extranet). This is a significant use
currently, but as organizations (like libraries and education
institutions) begin to use CM, the system can also be used
to point to physical resources (though only having a link
to a resource does eliminate one selling feature of a CMS
- content when needed).
Some additional
definitions:
"Most
content management providers and experts can agree on
at least a basic definition of a web CMS: at a minimum,
a web content management system should be able to separate
content from presentation, and in so doing should allow
the non-technical creators of content to manipulate a
web site's content directly.
"A CMS
is a tool that enables a variety of (centralised) technical
and (de-centralised) non technical staff to create, edit,
manage and finally publish a variety of content (such
as text, graphics, video etc), whilst being constrained
by a centralised set of rules, process and workflows that
ensure a coherent, validated website appearance."
"A content
management system provides Web site operators with tools
to automatically enforce versioning and change control,
maintain hyperlinks and site maps, and schedule publication
of content. It also allows content providers to submit
text and graphics without knowing HTML, while enforcing
a consistent look and feel across the site.
Features
of CMS
Each CMS will have different features and functionality.
Some common features are:
- Versioning to allow revisiting
of previous content and to detail development process
- Template-based publishing
for consistent look and feel
- File "check-in"
and "check-out" to avoid accidental over-writing
- Workflow process
- Roles-based
- Repository for storage
and access for various needs
- Metadata features
- Content scheduling to
ensure content is current.
Content
Conversion
Proprietary
content formats can be inhibitive as organizations need
to present content in various ways. Content conversion is
a significant aspect of effective management. By creating
content and presentation separately, usability of each piece
of content increases (i.e. for multiple formats).
"Most
existing content is trapped in a proprietary format that
binds the content to a particular viewer and editor. To
be liquid, content needs to be free from its proprietary
format and thus, free from its proprietary editors and
viewers. Converting legacy content to XML makes the content
liquid and therefore, easy to reuse in different contexts
destined for a variety of display formats.
"Corporations
have a tremendous amount of information assets that exist
today as individual files in directories...Because of
its unstructured nature, it has been difficult to leverage
this information and to reduce both the cost and complexity
of managing this information...By converting existing
documents and new documents into XML, organizations can
achieve significant savings of both time and money.
Centralized/decentralized
Contrasting opinions (centralized or decentralized)
exist about the best format of a content management system
based on:
- Technology trends
- Organization needs (security)
- End user needs (access)
In a centralized model,
content is organized in large databases, resulting in increased
control and security. In a decentralized model, content
is stored in pockets, and then connected and searchable.
Centralization is based on a business management/control
model, while decentralization is based on the Internet model.
Centralization
and decentralization both have unique characteristics, and
each should be selected based on an organizations needs.
If the objective is a closed, higher security system with
maximum control, the centralized model may be the best choice.
If the objective is an open model for maximum sharing and
collaboration (especially with other institutions - a focus
of higher education), then a decentralized model may be
the best option.