A Content Management System (CMS) manages the creation and modification of digital content. - Wikipedia

Enterprise Content Management Systems (ECMS)

For large enterprise use, it is termed as Enterprise Content Management Systems (ECMS). ECMS typically remains behind the organization's firewall (i.e. an Intranet Application). By providing end-users with role-based access, integrating document management, digital asset management and records retention functionalities, ECMS facilitates collaborative authoring for the organization's digital assets, with different styles of governance and workflows.

Web Content Management Software (WCMS)

ECMS software often includes a WCMS publishing functionality. Web Content Management Software (WCMS) is a set of tools allowing users without prior programming knowledge to create and maintain digital information on a website.

Typical CMS Features

The followings are a list of typical features of Content Management System (CMS):

Manage Contents

As the name implied, it helps you manage contents

1. Digital content include text, graphics, photos, video, audio, maps, and program code.
2. Content hierarchy with unlimited depth and size.
3. Powerful (WYSIWYG) Editor: You do not need technical skills (HTML/CSS/JavaScript) or coding knowledge to create, update, remove and organize your contents.
4. Revision control tracks changes made to contents by individuals.
5. Streamlines publishing
   • You can preview your content before publishing.
   • You can also publish/un-publish (i.e. hide/remove) the content without affecting the navigation menus as the CMS will update it automatically for you.
   • If you are running a promotion, the CMS can help you schedule your publishing activities – automatic publish the promotion during the promotion period, and remove the promotion when the promotion end.
   • Related to that, most CMS will give you an overview of the status of all content, whether it's live, being reviewed or a draft. This allows you to assign and check the publishing tasks. As such, you can easily integrate your marketing plan with the content.
6. Content taxonomy. A CMS enables you to create categories, assign tags to your articles, and so on.
7. Multi-user and Group-based permission systems: With a CMS, user accounts can easily be created, and you can assign a role (i.e. admin, contributor, etc.) to each user. Each role has specific publishing permissions – some users are content creators, whilst some are reviewers.

A high level of customization

Content Management Systems are flexible and can power nearly any type of website.

1. Improve functionality with plugins – Nearly every CMS allows you to install plugins to increase the features.
2. Extensibility: You can extend their functionality easily. Almost every CMS includes an extension or plugin system that enables you to add extra features with ease.
3. Scalable: A CMS can create websites that scale to businesses of almost any size and adapt to niche markets and specialized needs.
4. Mostly Open Source – Open source Content Management Systems allow access to the underlying code, this gives the user a massive range of flexibility and scalability because of their in-depth customization options.
5. Template/Theme. By their nature, CMSs support the separation of content and presentation. So that, you can allow individuals to use a template or a set of templates approved by the organization, to create or modify content – as a result, your website will have a more consistent look and feel.

Built-In SEO Tools

Includes Search Engine Optimization (SEO) tools for you to optimize your content to be SEO friendly. This includes SEO-friendly URLs and allows you to edit page titles, headers, and meta-descriptions.

Indexing and Comprehensive Search

A CMS needs to equip with intuitive indexing, search and retrieval features. With indexing, users can conduct a fast search based on search parameters such as publication dates, keywords or author.

Social Media Integration

Website pages must support content promotion capabilities including sharing buttons and comment function.

Responsive Design

The goal of the responsive design is to build contents (or web pages) that detect the visitor's screen size and orientation and change the layout accordingly.

And More ...

1. Robustness
2. Integrated file managers
3. Multiple language support
4. Integrated audit logs
5. Serve dynamic contents
6. Choice of hosting solution. Business owners have the flexibility to save their CMS data and move to a different host if necessary.
7. Steep learning curve: Learning how to use a CMS can take some time, especially for people with little technical expertise. Companies often lack the in-house talent needed to create customizations for CMS-based sites, requiring the retention of professional design firms.

What are they?

There is a huge number of CMS offerings available for personal and enterprise use. You can check Wikipedia for a comprehensive list of Content Management Systems.