The Web has completely changed the way businesses communicate with their clients, prospects, employees and partners. Content is still used to help, maintain, sell and service customers, but is produced and distributed faster than ever before. Content management has become a vital component to collecting, managing and then publishing organized, targeted content to inbound customer touch points.
There are two fundamental components of content management - content and process. Typically, content authors are responsible for uploading new content to the website, editing content that needs to be changed and removing content when necessary. The content management system (CMS) gives content authors the ability to easily manage their Web content without requiring any technical knowledge. Last week, we posted a few best practices of content management for developers because it is important for developers to make sure the CMS is set up in the best possible way so that content authors can use the CMS efficiently. This post demonstrates some of the best practices for content authors that will help ensure proper use of the CMS.
Content Sharing
One of the benefits of having a CMS is using it to share or syndicate all of the great content that you worked hard at creating. Content authors should take advantage of content sharing through the CMS. Using a Meta tag strategy, content editors can repurpose content without worrying about duplicate content issues. Different CMSs (e.g. Sitecore, Kentico, Sitefinity, Crown Peak) may have different ways of developing this process, but once the process is in place, it will reduce the maintenance of sharing content for the content authors.
Content Archiving
As content grows on your website, it can begin to affect its performance, especially if there are several different versions of the same content on the site. Content authors should handle archiving very responsibly so the site performance is never impacted. Content archiving can be scheduled ahead of time or done manually by the content author. Either way it is important for content authors to archive outdated versions of content.
CMS Previewing
Content authors should use the previewing feature of the CMS to review content styling and grammar. For some larger organizations, it might make sense to use one server as a previewing environment and then publish to a second server once the content is finalized. This way you will view the content in context (with the server generated HTML and CSS) before it is published online so you can inspect the final format of the page.
SEO Attributes
Using the CMS, content authors can easily edit the SEO attributes on each webpage through the dashboard. Content authors should use the company’s keyword strategy to create keyword-rich title tags, descriptions and URLs for each page. This will ensure they are fully optimized and the content is search-engine friendly.
Workflow Automation
While every CMS offers a different form of workflow automation, it is important to learn how the process flows within your system. Workflow processes are put into place to streamline the content publishing procedures and ultimately reduce turnaround time. Content editors should become very familiar with the workflow, reviewing the process regularly to see if there are any unnecessary steps that should be eliminated. Read this post if you’re trying to set up workflow automation with the Kentico CMS.
As a content author, your challenge is not only to develop content, but to ensure the CMS respects your brand, maximizes your content, and minimizes your efforts. If you or your content authors are having trouble with content creation, content editing, content publishing, or any other technical CMS topics, then sign up for CMS Training.