Global Content Management News & Articles

If you were still not quite convinced that global content management is a pretty big deal nowadays, take a look at the latest research saying that 35% of companies surveyed have more than 10 websites with almost 50% of those published in over 5 languages.

This research comes from a Web CMS vendor e-Spirit (news, site). With all disclosures in place, let’s take a closer look at the numbers revealed during this exercise.

According to the vendor, global proliferation of a multitude of information channels and the general content boom are causing the worldwide web content crisis.

The survey of more than 100 businesses suggests this information explosion contributed to the following findings:

• 78% of content management systems (CMS) content authors are marketers
• 66% of those surveyed are frustratrated with the amount of time it takes to manage their global websites
• 20% of respondents complain about language barriers and content translation challenges
• 30% of marketers have up to 100 intranet sites and 50 external websites to maintain.

Sounds like an outcry for an efficient global approach to content management, doesn’t it?

Organizations struggle with the amount of content they have to manage 9 to 5, we get that. No pressure, but your website visitors are not likely to commiserate with your organizational woes and technological difficulties.

Your visitors are hungry for information, they’re impatient and demanding, and if they cannot find that (preferably, relevant and accurate) info quickly (and we mean really quickly), there’s a chance they may never come back to your lovely and freshly redesigned website with all those sweetly integrated recommendation and text mining engines.

Web content management technology on its own is of undeniable importance, we know. Nevertheless -- dare we say it? -- it is less about which CMS you use, but more about your business strategy, implementation and methods of using it. Most importantly, it is about people and processes around it. Hardly any Web CMS can do that job for you.

Being able to effectively manage multiple websites under the umbrella of a single Web Content Management System (CMS) is often one of the must-have requirements when selecting a CMS vendor.

Sitecore (news, site), the maker of a .NET-based Web CMS, knows that fact very well and keeps refining its multisite management tool called Foundry, which just saw the 3.0 release.

A new connector has just been unveiled between Straker’s web content management system, ShadoCMS (news, site) and Argo Translation, a US website translation company. The connector will allow ShadoCMS users tap into Argo’s supply chain management system and provide translation cost estimates.

Early estimates by Straker suggest that users will be able to save up to 20% on translation costs just by managing the translation supply chain efficiently.

The linguistic landscape of the World Wide Web is changing. Though at times English seems like the most widely spoken and used language, we are humbled to remember that there are hundreds, if not thousands of languages.

When it comes to the web, Asia already has twice as many Internet users as North America and by 2012 it will have three times as many. Such stats should serve as a wake up call for the many global businesses still needing to improve the way they create, manage and publish multilingual content.

By making the web much more compatible and engaging for non-English speaking or writing users (who until now have had to suffer through complicated keyboard maps or the struggle of querying in a language that's not their own) globalization innovations will allow all users to connect and communicate in their language of choice.

Straker, with its ShadoCMS v8.5 Web CMS, and Across Systems’ Language Server teamed up to deliver a new localization interface, providing an automated process from web content creation to translation management, publishing and handling of dynamic multilingual content.

The partnership promises to deliver savings above 60% for companies that manage large-scale translations of dynamic web sites. Better late than never, as they say. So, welcome to the global content management party!

Following a recent surge in globalization and multi-site management popularity, web CMS provider Sitecore has released Foundry 2.0. The enhanced tool addresses the need of international companies to maintain a consistent global brand while allowing regional affiliates to localize their websites.

Recently we reported about how global businesses need to become, well, more global. At least in the way they create, manage and publish multilingual content. Companies need to think more strategically about global content management, if they are to be key players in the global marketplace.

In an effort to provide more context to the conversation and profile an active contributor to the translation and localization industry, we spoke with Paula Shannon, senior VP and chief sales and marketing officer of Lionbridge Technologies.