GS1 Member Organisations (MOs) maintain a wide variety of approaches to publishing web content. Some use advanced, database-driven content management systems; others publish static content using manual processes. Whether they currently use a CMS or not, many MOs are still looking for the web publishing model that fits their specific needs.

This section of the GS1 web guidelines is intended to help explain what a content management system (CMS) is and how it might fit into an organisation's plans for publishing digital content.

This document will help you:

• Learn how a content management system can help you organise your content, your publishing strategy, your approach to SEO and your team
• Understand core strategic, digital publishing concepts that a CMS helps to enable
• Find out more about how to judge and compare CMS systems—and when it's time to start looking for a new one
• Learn more about emerging trends in the CMS space

What is a CMS?

A content management system (CMS) is a software application that enables users to create, edit, collaborate on, publish and store digital content. A CMS can fill several needs; in the context of GS1 Member Organisations, a CMS is most likely to be web-based: used for publishing content to a website and managed through a web interface.

As the digital world has grown, publishing needs have become increasingly complex. Once, it was common for corporate websites to provide limited information, be published sporadically and be supported by a small number of organisational personnel, who often held technical roles.

Today, organisations have much larger goals for the web and typically need to:

• Use large, distributed teams to create and publish content, including non-technical personnel
• Publish frequently (often multiple times a day)
• Move data between a variety of other technical systems (marketing automation tools, customer relationship management platforms, etc.)
• Support multiple goals (marketing, documentation, e-commerce, etc.)

A CMS improves the experience of content publishing tremendously, allowing organisations to meet these ambitious goals.