Web Content Management Best Practices

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Web Content ManagementBest Practices
October 11, 2004
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Content Management Best Practices
Bill RoseInstructional Designer, IST Solutions
Institute,Penn States School of Information
Sciences and Technologybrose_at_ist.psu.edu Rose
Pruyne Senior Webmaster, IST Solutions
Institute,Penn States School of Information
Sciences and Technologyrpruyne_at_ist.psu.edu
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Content Management Best Practices
Content is king. - Jacob
Nielsen
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Content Management Best Practices
What a content management system can do for you
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site
page
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site stage 5
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Content Management Best Practices
Life cycle of a static web site
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Content Management Best Practices
What a content management system can do for you
Gain more control over content, presentation
Eliminate the file forest
Delegate content creation and maintenance -
place content back into the hands of the content
owners
Alleviate webmaster bottleneck
Keep content timely and accurate
Employ tools and features
- output to multiple display formats and
protocols PDAs
RSS Print
- programmatic content management tools
start/expiration times
link checking device formats
scheduled site maintenance

- metadata and search tools
Efficiently make sitewide changes
Separate content from presentation
More easily meet Web Standards and ADA compliance
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Content Management Best Practices
What a content management system cannot do for
you (nor should you expect it to)
Write the content (!)
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Content Management Best Practices
What a content management system cannot do for
you (nor should you expect it to)
Write the content (!)
Convince reluctant or recalcitrant content
providers to use the software
Set up a publishing process for writing, editing,
and maintaining web content
Quell mission- and scope-creep issues
Provide Web site governance
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Content Management Best Practices
Content the Weak Link
Content is poorly written, unedited, not written
for the Web, out of date, not there!
Content is gratuitous, misplaced, or redundant
Content providers not adequately educated in what
is required for the Web
lack strong writing or editing skills
do not have access to the critical information
low interest in the Web
reluctant to use the technology
do not understand audiences needs
more focused on design than content
too busy
not one of their priorities
know just enough about Web development to be
dangerous
Content ownership over the long haul is not
established - tendency to delegate
content management to newest employees
- high turnover in content managers
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Content Management Best Practices
Of just under 100 companies only 27 percent of
companies surveyed planned to continue using
their Web content management systems as they do
now.
- Jupiter Research
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Content Management Best Practices
Whether or not you adopt a content management
system
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Content Management Best Practices
I. Treat your web presence like a publication.
It is one.
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Content Management Best Practices
II. Put Resources in Place.
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Content Management Best Practices
III. Put a Process in Place.
- Team of writer-editors gather information
- Accompanying graphics and multimedia
specialists attend to the look and feel
- Web architecture/page templates/etc. are put in
place to receive content
- Writing/editorial team edits and proofreads
content to ensure - that it meets writing
standards - that it adheres to publishing
style guidelines - that it is accurate and
timely - that it meets legal requirements
- that it meets any marketing requirements
at issue
- Administration signs off on content, if
necessary
- Managing editor oversees and has final signoff
on site content
- Content providers are able to make updates, but
this requires editorial signoff
- Live site content is examined weekly for
timeliness and accuracy
- Web projects are given AT LEAST equal priority
with print projects - in terms of either
time or resources
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Content Management Best Practices
IV. Put Strategies in Place.
- Make content and Web standards/accessibility
the top priority.
- Keep a running calendar of cyclic events that
affect Web content.
- Keep a library of content and assets that can
be edited to address these events.
- Communicate regularly with internal
stakeholders and content providers about their
external clients needs.
- Communicate with the above about what paper
publications and correspondence they are
using. Why? Should this information be on the Web?
- Keep internal stakeholders and content
providers focused on content. Not design.
- If at all possible, outsource development and
maintenance of forms, surveys, and other
programming black holes.

• Employ several methods of gathering data,
  including
• - usability testing - user surveys - usage
  data (page views, visits, browsers, referrers)

- Base communication with administration and
other internal clients on this data.
- Do not over-rely on student workers or other
temporary help.
- Visit the Web site. Frequently.
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Content Management Best Practices
V. Put Governance in Place
Why is Web governance important?
- Content needs change over time
- Content management tends to be reactive vs.
proactive
- Want-based versus need-based
- Design takes precedence over content, usability
- Internal stakeholders take precedence over
external customers
- Marketing takes precedence over providing
needed information
- Local customization of navigation, content
placement confuses users
- Local customization leads to redundant content
- Special events, features, and other gee-wiz
stuff takes precedence over core content.
- Unnecessary stuff gets put on the Web site
cause gosh, why not?
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Content Management Best Practices
VI. Be strong!
There are many possible points of failure.
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Content Management Best Practices
Content management is not a technology
problem. - Jeffrey Veen
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Goal
To raise your awareness of the importance of the
requirements definition process and equip you to
locate the knowledge and tools needed to carry
out your own requirements definition.
CMS Selection
Identifying the best possible match between a set
of needs and a system that meets those needs.
- Dont start by researching the features of
numerous systems
- Instead, conduct a proper requirements analysis
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Requirements Definition
Requirements are needs, as seen from the system
users perspective requirements deal with what a
system must do, not on how the system will do it.
Defining requirements means to surface,
understand, and document every required
capability for every user of the system.
The Process
1. Establish the business case get authorization
to proceed
2. Establish the requirements team
3. Analyze the organization deploying the CMS
4. Analyze the end-users working with the CMS
5. Analyze all the work flow processes carried
out in the CMS
6. Process research data gathered develop use
case diagrams, scenarios, and new work flow
diagrams
7. Determine all functional and non-functional
requirements
8. Document all requirements
CMS evaluation and selection begin
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Why spend precious time effort doing a needs
analysis?
- CMSs are complex
- CMSs are numerous
- Organizations are unique
- Organizations are complex
- Communication is critical yet often imprecise
- Process is anything but systematic
- Opinions are rifeWe should buy.
- Needs are expressed in isolationbut the
solution has to fit the organization as a whole
- Expressed needs can be too fuzzy to be useful
in CMS evaluation
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Do you want to risk failure?
- CMS Watchs 1 CMS pitfall Picking a content
management product before developing a business
case and solid requirements.
- The Standish Group, 1995 Of the 8 major
reasons software development projects fail, 5
relate to requirements errors these account for
just over 50 of software project failures.
- If you dont know what you want, the vendor
will be happy to determine it for you! -)
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Where do I begin? Begin with a reckoning
Time Six to nine months from starting needs
analysis to actually selecting a product 20-40
of overall development time if building your own.
Product range According to CMS Watch, more than
1,000 products purport to manage Web content.
Building CMS literacy Building up your
knowledge of capabilities, tech requirements,
product updates.
Risks Brainstorm and plan how you will handle
should they arise. Examples Total cost of
ownership higher than expected system not
flexible enough and must be adapted
Business case Vital! Plan to complete this as
your first step. Why is a CMS the answer to your
issues? What are those issues? What does the
organization lose by not addressing them? What
will it cost to address them with a CMS?
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
1. Establish the business case get authorization
to proceed
- Business case establishes the need for the CMS
by addressing the following
- Opportunity
- Justification (ROI)
- Scope
- Constraints
- Functional areas and functional goals
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
2. Establish the requirements team
- Very important to have a broad-based,
interdisciplinary team
- CMS Watch This is 2 of the top 5 mistakes in
making a CMS selection
- Web site technical team
- Web site content reps
- Other key functional area stakeholders
(marketing rep)
- Management
- Financial
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
3. Analyze the organization deploying the CMS
- Identify all stakeholders anyone with a
vested interest in the CMS
- Who are they? Top management () immediate
supervisors, Web team, IT support, end users
within the organization, etc.
- Securing support from stakeholders at the
outset is critical keep their needs clearly in
view from start to finish
- Seek to disclose all relevant business issues
(mission, strategy, operations, tactics, critical
success factors)
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
4. Analyze the end-users working with the CMS
- Identify user types and how each type
interacts with the system
- Consider the kind of interface (s) your users
will need
- Consider the kind of documentation and training
your users will need
- Do some users only require reports and other
informational output from the CMS (rather than
directly interacting with it)?
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
5. Analyze all the work flow processes carried
out in the CMS
- Work flow (and therefore CMS interactions) may
differ from functional area to functional area
- Study each areaWhat is the sequence of tasks?
How does information flow?
- Can the processes be improved? Now is the time
to change them!
- Graphically depict the as is workflow
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
6. Process research data gathered
- Perform Gap Analysisthe difference between
the as is and the desired
- Develop use case diagrams (or data flow
diagrams) and scenario descriptions
- Analyze everything you gathered to date stop
when you feel there are no open issues remaining
between you and documenting the requirements
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
7. Determine all functional and non-functional
requirements
1. Functional requirements What the system must
do from the end-users perspective capabilities
that must be present and fully adequate
2. Non-functional requirements Technical, such
as system performance, but also constraints,
restrictions, other characteristics imposed on
the system
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
8. Document all requirements

• Because requirements are specific and numerous,
  they must be written down, both for definition
  and for communication to stakeholders

- Consider using scenarios to document your
requirements

- For formal documentation, consider using
Concept of Operations (ConOps) as a guide
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
What process tools should I use?
- Make use of the available requirements tools
and CMS feature checklists derive rather than
re-create
- Victorian Government Web Content Management
Requirements Definition Report is one example
- See the handout for additional similar
resources, both for the requirements elicitation
process and CMS selection
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Best Practices for Determining CMS Requirements
Conclusion
- We havent even made it to CMS evaluation and
selection yet!
- As with any systematic process, dont be a
slave to it adapt it to your situation so you
can still benefit
- Goal To raise your awareness of the importance
of the requirements definition process and equip
you to locate the knowledge and tools needed to
carry out your own requirements definition.