Content Management Systems (CMS) - are they for me?

CMS
Over the past 5 years or so, Content Management Systems (CMS) and particularly those for the web (WCMS) have improved dramatically.

What are CMS' used for?
They allow less trained users to gain control and manage content of their web site.  This is especially valuable when you need to do news posts, administer forums, blogs, or social networking interfaces as part of an overall website design.  Entire websites are rapidly developed used CMS tools.

CMS examples
Some of these systems are fee-based: e.g., Adobe Contribute about $200/user.  Others are open-source tools such as Joomla, WordPress, Drupal, CMSMadeSimple, and so.  These open-source tools have literally thousands of developers offering (usually for free) many templates for designs that can give your site a relatively unique look. All CMS-based designs can be further enhanced using html and cascade styling techniques (page & content formatting), although these customizations are usually left to the web developer to implement for you.

These systems vary in richness of capabilities but are offset by the complexity a user needs to work with it.

Most often a web developer is initially involved in the design of the website, but once it is up and running, the "users" can then take control of nearly everything they need to post new content, images, graphics, etc.

So the next time you want to "gain control of my website," consider a CMS system.  Not for everyone, but a great tool for those who need it.  Talk with your eBizServices web developer and see how to best utilize these new tools in your next web design.