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Your Heart's Content: Searching out a Content Management System for your Website
by Kevin Rogers Cobus
Ever had one of those ambitious moments, where you feel like tackling a seemingly insurmountable task? Of course, we all have. However when that insurmountable task refers to learning a web programming language because you have been recently appointed as "web guru" for your church, we may only be referring to a select few. A very brave, valorous few.
If you are part of this group, and you have little to no experience in hard-coding HTML, fret not. A not-so-recent phenomenon is in place as one possible alternative to guide you though the learning curve.
A Content Management System (CMS) is a tool created by various web developers to stand in as the translator between you and your website. CMS creators are aware of the fact that not everybody can code and program. Actually, they most likely bank on the fact that most people can't. They are also aware that although you may not be a programmer, you still need a website. With the help of an appropriate CMS in place, luckily you may not ever need to know what a header tag is.
People look into using a CMS for various reasons. CMS solutions are for the most part consistent in that they concentrate on providing a simple user interface. If you paid a CMS designer to customize a CMS solution for your church, and the user interface ended up being too confusing for your crew to manage, then that basically defeats the purpose.
"A CMS is a poor man's way of doing HTML coding," summarizes Marcus Singleton, Digital Media Coordinator at Breath of Life Church in Memphis, Tennessee. "The number one reason for our church to have a CMS is that it makes it easier to manage the content. Prior to the CMS being installed, it was one person's responsibility. One person would have to log onto the FTP (File Transfer Protocol) web server to make any changes that had to be made. This person would end up using Dreamweaver or some other software to make the changes. By having the CMS, it makes it easier to upload pages and change stuff on the fly. It keeps us from having to do any real coding. Generally, a CMS is good for churches and ministries that don't have someone in house who knows HTML coding."
It also ends up being a good solution for churches that may only have one or two volunteers as their web "team". What happens if the Pastor realizes to their horror that next week's guest speaker's name is misspelled on the home page— and the web volunteer is on holiday? Even if the volunteer left semi-detailed instructions about how to pop onto the FTP server to make the change, if you don't know what you're looking at, a raw HTML source document is enough to make anyone blanch. Now, try doing it in a rush. Now, try fixing everything you just screwed up.
Some CMS solutions will also allow you to split up the workload into sections for different members of your crew. Let's say you want to have the Children's Ministry page updated by someone specific, but you don't necessarily want that person to be able to change the home page of the entire site. Some systems will allow you to give out different passwords to allow multiple people into separate portions of the site.
That's the way it happens at Breath of Life. "Someone has access to a portion of our site and they can make changes to it, and then upload that content to the site." explains Singleton. "We do that throughout the week. Our in-house manager has access to the system, and I also have access to it, and so we make changes back and forth. Occasionally, the senior pastor will also make some changes."
Planning Ahead
It would be wise, if you are in the process of selecting a CMS for your site, to think about what you want to incorporate in the future. Are you going to want to post Flash video? Are you planning to stream your services? Do you want to manage a portion of your member donations online? All of the possible scenarios should be laid out for the CMS provider to ensure that these accommodations can be met, if not right away, then somewhere along the line.
There's also a chance that down the line, you may be blessed with someone coming into the fold with mad web skillz. If the CMS you have installed does not allow for any deviation from the look and feel of the user interface, then you may be coded into a corner.
Overall, you'll want to make sure the CMS is built to handle what you want to throw at it. If not, "That ends up being burdensome," Singleton remarks, "because you may end up having to contact someone at the company if you want the functionality to do interactive things like use Flash and AJAX, (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML) and if the response is 'Oh, no we can't do that with our CMS', then you're stuck."
A CMS can be a great benefit to your church if it is implemented properly. Just as in anything else, you want to be sure that it is being implemented to suit your needs, not cause more confusion.
Remember also to shop around. The web is more or less like the wild west. There are companies out there who have no qualms with charging monumental amounts for a custom CMS that you may not even need. Shop around, check recommendations, look at the work they have done. If the company digs your vision and is on track with your goals, then they will most likely suggest a website that is similar and you can model some ideas from there.
The overall point of incorporating a CMS is to incorporate cool ideas seamlessly and have the ability to update your web content to your heart's content.
Kevin Rogers Cobus is Executive Editor for TFWM. You can email him at krc@tfwm.com
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