The Business Case for Web Content Management

Cost	Description of Cost	Benefit of Web Content Management
Content Contribution	Cost to create original content and convert existing content for Web publication.	Eliminates conversion steps by placing the responsibility for content creation in the hands of the business user.
Workflow and Approval	Cost to find and review content prior to publication.	Speeds the approval process by helping business users find and track changes.
Content Updates	Cost to update content, metadata, and links to other content as required.	Enables business users to quickly make changes, determine the impact of changes, and ensure links are not broken.

Increase Content Accuracy, Quality, and Value

Content management systems that put business users in control of content creation, contribution, and updates can increase the value of the actual content on the site. Business users, who are content experts, are more likely to understand the value of accurate, relevant content than technical staff or other non-business users.

Companies without content management systems face delays in publishing new content or in correcting errors¾delays that can result in lost customers or revenue.

According to Information Week Online:

Visitors tend to lose patience quickly with a poorly performing Web site, and especially with out-of-date content. Content-management systems offer companies an easy way to make their sites more relevant, keep content up to date and accurate, and reduce the time required to get important content published.

Cost	Description of Cost	Benefit of Web Content Management
Inaccurate Content	Cost of publishing incorrect information, such as a wrong price, poor support information, or poor guidance.	Content approval process helps ensure published content is accurate and appropriate by putting content tools and control in the hands of business users who understand the needs of the business and its customers.
Untimely Content	Customers require timely content to make decisions. Out-of-date content hinders them from making accurate business decisions.	Placing responsibility for content in the hands of the business user and providing appropriate tools ensure content is up-to-date and responsive to current customer needs.
Irrelevant Content	Customers must work to filter irrelevant material. If this task is too difficult, customers will abandon the site, having found no relevant content.	Capturing metadata in the content authoring process lets the system target content to customer content needs.

Decrease Information Retrieval Time

Web sites provide faster access to information than print or other traditional communication tools, resulting in significant cost savings. A Web content management system improves the information retrieval benefits of a Web site by providing a standard navigation structure and content templates. This consistency results in increased site usability and faster information retrieval times.

According to the Meta Group:

Organizations that can provide infrastructure for employees, partners, and clients to find the concise relevant information they require to make decisions will have a significant competitive advantage in terms of efficiencies, service, and satisfaction.

Cost	Description of Cost	Benefit of Web Content Management
Information Retrieval	Cost in time to find and retrieve information, and find relevant content in information.	Infrastructure for navigation, content presentation, and metadata simplifies and speeds information retrieval.

Centrally Manage Site Usability and Branding

A content management system provides templates and site structure tools that help enforce centralized control over site and corporate branding. Dynamic link management reduces the costs of manual link-checking and correction while improving site usability through consistency.

The traditional Web site model requires significant costs to maintain the structure and consistency of design or branding. Organizations must impose and police strict rules to ensure the integrity of the structure, or tolerate inconsistent site navigation and broken links. The result is either higher costs for technical staff or reduced effectiveness.

Cost	Description of Cost	Benefit of Web Content Management
Structure and Link Management	Cost to create, maintain, and enforce a standard content structure and navigation structure, and link validity.	Enables site architecture experts to create and enforce a consistent and usable site structure.
Brand Reinforcement	Web sites are often the only contact customers have with an organization. Weak or inconsistent site branding creates a poor impression of a company.	Centralized control of design and branding ensures the message and site design are consistent with a company’s brand and values, and a professional face is displayed to the world.

Centrally Manage Site Development and Deployment

A content management system that combines a dynamic content repository and template-based publishing enables an organization’s Web developers and designers to maintain control over the Web site’s look and feel, layout, and navigation logic. Developers are able to update sites rapidly by changing a few templates as opposed to updating each page manually. Once approved, template and content changes can easily be distributed to other sites. An organization can centralize its IT staff and reduce Web development costs across the organization.

Alternatively, it is very costly to update the design and logic of typical, static, file-based Web sites. Each page related to that logic must be updated to reflect changes, and the Web site content cannot be updated while the logic changes are being made resulting in lost time and cumbersome revisions.

Cost	Description of Cost	Benefit of Web Content Management
Administration	Costs to maintain the system, set up security, manage scalability, and manage user rights and roles.	A comprehensive set of administration tools reduces the cost of administering multiple separate servers and Web sites. Costs are leveraged across several Web deployments.
Application Change	Cost to update existing Web applications and deploy new ones either to replace or update existing applications or to deploy Web applications in new parts of the organization.	Dynamic, template-based Web applications separate the content from the application so applications can be updated and distributed to new users without affecting the underlying content.
Deployment	Cost to deploy content and Web applications created in one part of the organization to other internal and external parts of the organization.	Content management systems provide a simple mechanism for packaging Web sites and all interdependent templates, resources, and pages, making it easier to distribute sections of a Web site developed in one location to other sites.

Facilitate New Opportunities for Innovation

A dynamic content management system enables businesses to innovate on knowledge traditionally locked in static Web pages and other documents throughout the organization. By providing a standard content platform on which the organization can build automated business applications and by enabling business users to take a direct role in the Web site, a content management system opens the lines of communication between a company’s business users and customers to deliver real competitive advantage.

Organizations adopting Web content management systems can build Web sites throughout their enterprises using a standard content architecture and dynamic Web content infrastructure. Organizations can then create new Web applications that take advantage of the incredible richness of Web content and, by doing so, adopt innovative communication tools such as internationalization, customer relationship management, personalization, syndication, application integration, and enterprise portals.