When I started creating websites in 1995, coding was done by line, typically in Notepad. Pages were created individually, updated individually. Eventually it was necessary to create a way to manage side wide design changes. Cascading Style Sheets solved that. As the Internet developed, so did the ways people access the Internet. The browsers, content available, and hardware grew up as well. As technology has advanced, so has the ability to network a business, product, or service on-line.
A lot of businesses, especially smaller companies, are still relying on old technology websites. “Brochureware” style, static websites, which worked well back in the days of hand coding, are competitively disadvantaged when a business needs to proactively market on the Internet. These static websites are also web marketing management nightmares. Dated webs designs are also very unfriendly to mobile browsing devices and may not display properly in modern browsers. These old-style websites tend to not have the ability to network where people are or use multimedia as it is being consumed today to share information.
Passive websites market passively. Websites that provide passive information that is content that is not updated regularly are much like a printed brochure. The ability to create a “Call for Action is limited and there is no reason to return since the expectation is the content is expected to be the same next visit. Conversely, an active website puts content in the marketing stream that suggests more information is coming and more visits create opportunities for inquiries, branding, and referrals.
In today’s world, “brochureware” websites don’t have much luck with search engines either. Search engines favor sites that use modern multimedia embeds, have cross links from relevant or industry related site and whose frequently updated content is written smartly.
Businesses seeking a competitive advantage will present the search engines with relevant content in their site often. Persistent and consistent energy is the key to any marketing effort and the Internet is no different. Online brochures have limited functionality when it comes to ease of updating which is a key to creating compelling reasons for clients, potential and existing to come to your site.
So what are your alternatives? One of the most popular ways to publish on the Internet now is by way of Web Content Management Systems, otherwise referred to as “WCMS”. Web content management systems can also be referred to as “CMS”. Web sites based on these platforms are used by a list of companies that begin with top international, “Fortune 25” corporations, but the platforms are just as useful to the to the small business around the corner. The reason for such diversity in implementation is flexibility, ease of updating and standardized code that is cross-browser and cross platform friendly.
The platforms that I use today, such as WordPress, Joomla, Mambo, PhPBBS, SMS Open Forum, represent a family of programs that allow for both active web marketing strategies, implementation of creative multimedia and networking with social media assets. These sites also lend to a friendlier mobile browser experience as well. Most, but not all WCMS are “Open Source” which means there is a world-wide community focused on keeping the platforms relevant and functional as the Internet grows. Although this has happened with basic HTML web code, that isn’t the case for many sites already created.
On top of the smartness of these WCMS web portals, they are comparatively easy to deploy and actually have reduced the web related budgets of my clients. You have probably heard of WordPress and might have heard other names like Joomla and Drupal. Of the three, most projects I am involved with are developed using WordPress for the same reasons summarized in the article linked below.
Even though the end result can look very similar to a static website, a CMS offers high tech ways to involve and network with site visitors. A CMS allows you to build a web presence that is an active portal online. Whereas a passive website is like a billboard, a CMS offers an opportunity to be a personalized experience that enhances site interaction with search engines, visitors and social networks.
For example, if this was a site about “My Widgets”, you could be reading a short blog about a new or updated widget. This blog update could be automatically shared on one or dozens of social networking communities when published. A visitor could share it with others by clicking on an icons published in the blog, article or newsletter.
Whether it is retweeted, shared, reposted, or is caught by search engines, the information is being actively shared. Even better, when you incorporate mail management and marketing campaigns, your site visitors can opt-in to a message that alerts them to new content! Where passive websites tend to be very stale or get stale quickly, active websites create persistent and consistent heat in marketing campaigns.
In summary, if you want to actively marketing online and interact with social media, trade your passive website for an active web portal. In many of my client’s cases, development costs are lower and deployment times are faster when compared to a static or passive web brochure. Even better, the CMS platforms offer extendibility, what you build today can grow with your business and in functionality. That is another reason companies from Ford, Best Buy, Wake University and thousands of others build core websites, blogs, forums and communities using web content management systems.
This article is from September 2009 and offers a review of top CMS platforms. What is said then is true today.