When Should You Use CMS?
Content management systems are hugely helpful for web sites that have hundreds of pages of con- tent to manage. If your web site is smaller than that, should you use it? The answer to that question is “It depends.”
What it depends on is how much content you actually have that needs to be managed, how much time you have to manage it, and how much of your budget you want to invest in managing it. For the last point, there is good news. Some content management systems are completely free. Drupal (http://drupal.org) is probably one of the best-known free systems. It’s open source, which means that the software is both free and can be tweaked by you to meet your specific needs. It’s through this collaborative development that open-source software applications are improved for everyone involved.
If you feel you need a CMS that’s a little more expensive than free, you can find those out there, too. The cost of the most basic CMS software starts at around $1,500 and increases to more than $7,000 for the initial license. More complex versions can cost as much as $500,000 for the ini- tial licensing. Fees for additional licenses, extra features, or monthly maintenance fees may also apply.
But price should not be the main reason you choose a content management system. Instead, your CMS decisions should be based on your corporate need. And that will vary from one organization. to another.