Select a Mess: Choosing a CMS

At the tail end of last year, I wrote about Ooooh, Shiny Syndrome and mentioned that we were in the process of selecting a Content Management System (CMS). It has been one way hell of a way for me to hit the ground running.

The CMS that was used when I was hired is clunky, difficult, requires IT to be a part of content publishing, and we wanted to allow Marketing to have full control over content, while we work on the rest. Completely normal, and what a good CMS usually does. Umbraco was not that solution for us.

So, the first months of the new job has been meetings, demos, specs, sandboxes, and chaos. Not to mention the duct taping to keep the web properties running while we research and rebuild. And one case after another of OSS. Which, as I’ve mentioned, is a bitch to come down from.

We’ve finally settled on a package, and it was an adventure to be sure.

Some lessons learned:

Someone will inevitably have already chosen something as the end all be all and most likely not care about other packages. A version of OSS, if you will.

There will be an amazing thing that blows you away and if you’re lucky, it will be that baller shiny I mentioned before.

Do due diligence for packages with partners that you already do business with. The execs will ask and you don’t want to be standing in the pitch meeting and have it cut short because you didn’t explore all options. Even if you end up not going with that partner, it will be appreciated that you checked anyway.

Spin up sandboxes. I know that some of you reading are like, “well, duh.” You have more experience than someone else who might be reading this.

Make sure to include the people who will be using this, and get their input. You as a dev may love one solution, but marketing or sales may find it difficult to use. You don’t want to blow $25,000+ of the company’s money that doesn’t solve your problems.

LISTEN TO YOUR GUT. If you have squeamish feelings about something, explore why and SPEAK UP. A gut feeling is great, but sometimes you’re going to have to explain why.