Do I need the CMS?
If you have a large website or site with many content contributors then you should use a CMS. If you have website to manage but to not have regular support from a highly-skilled web developer, then you should also consider the CMS.
The CMS can make the process of collecting, managing and publishing valuable information easier for the editor and anybody else who creates content in the University.
A CMS makes it easier to:
- edit the content without specialised development skills
- allow a range of people to collaborate on a website
- keep track of changes to pages over time
- release updates at specific times
- track and manage information
- restrict access to certain groups
We also offer a University blogging platform which is simple and cheap to set up and run for news-based websites and offer a Wiki platform for collaborative team websites.
Benefits
The following is a list of benefits a faculty or department can expect in migrating to the CMS.
Quality of Information
- Facilitated departmental management of content through CMS quality control mechanisms increases quality of information.
- Departments have more ownership of content.
- Content is managed through the content life-cycle from creation (and capture), storage, retrieval publication, presentation, versioning, and archiving.
- Archiving and version control processes are automated.
Consistency of Information
- A single repository of information content increases the consistency of information access, storage and retrieval. Content is able to be reused effectively - one source used in multiple locations.
- Users access and navigate to the information through a single consistent interface.
- Solves current reliance on manual processes to flag out of date content.
Risk Avoidance
- The business processes required for authoring, authorizing and publishing information are built into the CMS, thus users will be automatically following approved processes.
- Publishing and authority workflows greatly increase the accuracy of web and print publication information, mitigating the University's susceptibility to legal dispute.
- Automated publishing, versioning and archiving functionality ensures that web site content is kept more timely and up to date.
- There are a number of acts (e.g. Section 52 of the Trade Practices Act), policies and accessibility standards with which publications must comply.
Information Integration
- A CMS is able to hold, extract data from, or synchronise with other systems.
- A CMS is able to present information from other systems in a standardized presentation format.
Return on Investment
- Duplication of effort in publishing content around the system is minimized by information which is better organized, has greater ownership, and is easier to access.
- The time invested by departments into web publishing is greatly minimized by technology which is easier to use.
- The time and cost of centralised web centre monitoring of organisation wide web standards is greatly reduced.
Ease of Publishing
- Department office administrators and content owners are able to publish without web publishing or IT expertise.
- Users require a minimum of training (2-3 hours in 95% of cases) to use the CMS to publish content.