‘Content Management’ is one of the broadest and topical categories of systems. It is difficult for organizations to fully understand the range of systems available, their thrust and their comparative strengths and weaknesses.
It is also difficult for organizations to appreciate the degree of benefit a good CMS can have. A flexible and quick to implement system allows the realization of many benefits.
There is also a huge variation in the services required for CMS implementation. For instance, a Vignette implementation is typically long with total project cost about 7-8 times license costs. A Stellent project by comparison may be about 2 times license cost.
When selecting a Content Management system an organization must consider:
• the scope of need (i.e. knowledge management, document management web content management)
• the nature of the product (i.e. full featured ‘out of the box’ solution versus a toolkit from which managed content systems can be built)
• the match of CMS feature to application requirements
• the amount of services effort required for implementation (varies from a multiple of 2 times license cost to 8 times license cost)
• suitability for prototyping and getting quick results
• vendor commitment to ongoing development and likely longevity in the market