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7 signs you need a content management system for your website

image of man using laptop for headless CMS article
Do I need a content management system for my website?
Chances are if you have a website, you can likely benefit from having a content management system (CMS). Whether you’re a travel blogger, a small business owner or a large firm, being able to manage your website and keep it updated with fresh content starts with having a reliable, go-to platform where you can get things done quickly and efficiently.

A CMS is user-friendly software that lets you input, format and upload content elements for a webpage, and then creates all the back-end HTML coding for you. So, if you are looking to launch and maintain a website with fresh, new content, using a CMS will help you do just that without having to understand any technical coding at all.

Even better, with the right content management system, you can stay focused on your content creation and strategy, rather than get caught up in development lags and coding snags.

Let's explore some key reasons you may need a content management system.

Your site will have multiple pages

If you plan to share frequent posts, or even periodic updates about your products and services, a content management system makes publishing new pages and editing existing ones a cinch. When choosing a CMS, you’ll want to go with one that is able to scale with you as your business website grows.

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Brightspot CMS Demo

You want to stay in your digital comfort zone

CMS editing toolbars and features will feel familiar to anyone who’s used Microsoft Word or Google Docs. There are even simple tools for image editing, cropping and tagging. In other words, the learning curve for using a CMS is hardly a curve at all—you’ll be able to get up to speed fairly quickly. And there’s no reason to be afraid of messing things up. Not only can you preview your updates and new content before it goes live, a good CMS will also save previous versions of your site pages and its assets in case you need to revert back.

CMS tips for Rich-Text Editor (RTE)
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Inside Brightspot: Rich-text editor

You want easy access to your content library to keep articles fresh and updated

Most content management systems are searchable, especially if you organize your content with tags and categories. That means you can easily go into the CMS and find a post you published a year ago within seconds. Then, you can easily update, repurpose or republish older items as new. You can also search for other digital assets like images or take an audit on your website by tags or keywords you’ve deemed important. 

Brightspot CMS search tips screenshot
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Inside Brightspot: CMS search

You want an easy way to change templated areas on your website

Let’s say you want to update a product logo or change the phone number in your footer. Even the areas of your website outside of the regular content publishing space (like dropdown menus or Contact Us boxes) should be simple to tweak if you use a CMS—no tech support tickets required.

screenshot of Brightspot CMS UI
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You want to be able to schedule your new content

There may be certain types of content you want to go live on a specific date and time. Or you might upload a batch of new blog posts at once but want to space out their publication. A content management system lets you schedule posts to the minute.

You have a content team

If you’re not a one-person content show, having a CMS will help with collaboration—no more missed emails or overwriting files. You can set up different types of workflows, assign users with varying levels of permissions and publishing roles and take advantage of other types of granular control. Editors can also assign projects, track changes and leave comments for writers.

Screenshot of Brightspot workflow tool
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Inside Brightspot: Workflows overview

You want customers to find your content

Search engine optimization (SEO) and social media are important elements of your content strategy (since your website content is only effective if people can actually find it). A CMS can simplify SEO and social promotion. For SEO, content creators will be prompted to fill in basic metadata—what gets crawled by the search engines—for each newly published page. Social media tools also help ensure your content is shareable with social buttons, and some CMSs even let you automate social posts at the same time you publish your content.

How to choose the right CMS

Take the guesswork out of finding the right content management system for your needs with our curated guides for finding and choosing the right CMS.
Brightspot rocket ship illustration

Learn more about Brightspot CMS

So, the question remains: Do you need a content management system? If some or all of the above statements describe your needs, then a CMS will no doubt maximize your content creation process. With its intuitive, user-friendly interface and smart collaboration and optimization tools, a CMS lets you focus more on the messaging and less on the tech.
In this quick video demo, we explore some of the many ways our next-gen CMS makes the lives of content creators that much easier, thanks to powerful features such as bulk upload, live preview, suggested tags and more.
Developers are responsible for aligning technology to support the mission, strategy and processes of their organization. Here are 10 ways Brightspot CMS empowers and improves the lives of developers.
When you’re in the market for a new content management system, you can keep your publishers, developers and marketing teams happy by reading this first.