A Content Management System is a just another type of website. It is a website that allows you to take control of your own website. It is what we term a "self-managed website". A Content Management System is a piece of software that is used to create your website, including the GUI or the look and feel. A  Content Management System also allows you to edit and manage you website or content. Then, a Content Management System allows you to  publish that content in a well organised way. All this done from the comfort of your Personal Computer.

Utilizing a Content Management System means that you don’t have the added expense of dealing with web site designers and webmasters, who can charge exorbitant fees, because you are able to edit, manage, and publish content yourself. You can even edit and manage your entire website your self. You may be asking how can I edit a website without technical knowledge? You might say, I do not know any HTML or I am not a programmer, or I know nothing about the Internet. The answer is that you do not need to  have technical knowledge to figure out how to change aspects of your website via a Content Management System.  You merely have to know how to edit a simple document in a word processor like MS Word, or even a document editor like MS WordPad. Having your website as a Content Management System allows you as the end user to update your content on a regular basis and in a timely fashion, which is very important as websites have to be kept up-to-date to be effective with clients as well as search engines like Google.

Content Management Systems are frequently used  for storing, controlling, versioning and publishing documentation such as manuals, operator manuals, technical manuals, sales documentation, brochures, news articles and various other types of reports. Some of the content that you may be responsible looking after, editing and publishing as part of a content management system might include binary files, multi-media such as images, audio and video files,  and electronic documents as well as other web related content.

Having a content management system means that you will have to log into the system and be authenticated before you can administer any area on your site. This give you great control and security as to what goes on and who is able to administer your site. You could have multiple people who have permissions to administer either the entire site or only certain aspects of your site.  Some of the tasks that you may perform within your content management system will include adding new pages, adding new modules, moving pages around, updating text, adding graphics, administering site members, sending e-mail and newsletters, changing web site colours, even deleting content will be one of your tasks.

So what exactly is this content that you will be administering? Content is basically any type or piece of digital information. This could be an image or a piece of text, a graphic or a video. What the digital information is depends on what your site is about and what type of information you need on there in order to promote it correctly. The content on your website is anything that is likely to be managed in electronic format.

Simply put,  a Content Management System is a software package where the owner of a website can update the content of their website via an easy to use web based interface.  A content management system (cms) is computer software used to create, edit, manage, and publish content in a consistently organized fashion.

If you want to see what a Content Management System looks like, just browse my website, this one. It is built entirely using a CMS. If you want a Content Management System of your own, please contact me and I will be glad to help.

• No Limit on the amount of pages
• We care about your content
• Role based access
• Great functionality
• Visitor and search engine friendly
• Professional designers
• Dynamic content
• Structured Site
• Modular Approach
• Graphical user interface
• Decentralized maintenance.
  
• Designed with non-technical content authors in mind.
• Configurable access restrictions.
• Consistency of design is preserved. 
• Navigation is automatically generated and adjusted.
• Dynamic content.
• Cooperation.
• Content scheduling.

What is a Content Management System (CMS)?

Simply put,  a content management system is a piece of software or software package where the owner of a website can update the content of their website via an easy to use web based interface.

Benefits of CMS

A content management system has many benefits and these include:

• Content creation and updating - As your business changes so should information or content on your website change, a CMS gives you the flexibility to be able to update your website content easily.
• Up-to-date Content -Content is always up-to-date and correct .
• Reduce Costs -You do not have to employ or pay exorbitant costs to some one else to update your website.
• Improve efficiency - With a CMS you can save huge amounts of time. You no longer have to wait for an experienced programmer to update the content on your website. You can change the content at will, any time, any place, any how,  and as often as you want to.
• Multiple Users - If you have different authors who wish to contribute to your CMS web site you can set up multiple user access. They can just login and begin adding their content. You can assign different areas of your CMS to different people.
• Configurable access restrictions - Users are assigned roles and permissions that prevent them from editing content which they are not authorized to change.
• No programming knowledge required - A CMS is a web based program that usually involves you putting information into a system that works similarly to a word processor. A CMS site allows non-technical people to add content. They just need to login with a user name and password then use the web editor that’s built into the CMS to add their content.
• Separate design and content  - The design of the site template is separate from the content. This allows you to change the design any time without affecting the content stored on the site.
• Search Engine Friendly - The key to good rankings with the search engines is to have a website that is updated with new relevant content on a regular basis. With a CMS you can keep them happy.
• Access from anywhere - As CMS is web based, it makes use of a normal web browser. Therefore you can update you content wherever you can find an internet connection and use a browse.
• Consistency of design is preserved - Because content is stored separate from design, the content from all authors is presented with the same, consistent design.
• Content is stored in a database -Content is stored in a central storage system like a database, which means that content can be reused in many places on the website and formatted for any device (web browser, mobile phone/WAP, PDA, print).

If you want to see a CMS in action, just have a look at this website.