SEO and Content Management Systems

During the last two years our company, Position Front Page, had been asked by many seeking to develop a new website to help them build or install a CMS or Content Management System.

We always declined, and for a while there we thought that perhaps we had missed the boat. Sales were sluggish last year and we quickly looked to see if maybe just maybe we could spike sales by learning more about CMS.

I am not sure what really happened but I personally killed that project and I am not sure why.

So let me tell you a little about Content Management Systems. They are what they imply. They are there to help website owners manage their content. Owers or their staff can update website content including pictures, products, prices etc. Basicly website content now shifts into the hands of the owners and their people.

Listen, frankly it saves them some money. Many Content Management Systems are free, can be customized and installed cheaply. Web Designers love them too. Many come with cookie cutter designs so change a logo, add a background and voila a Custom Designed CMS and they make some fast change.

Our firm could pump out 10- 15 such clients in a week. But we are an internet marketing SEO services company so we started asking ourselves the question Are Content Management Systems SEO Friendly?

To answer that question let me take you back a month or so ago. We got a call from a guy asking us if we recover the username and password of his CMS because his IT guy quit and he had all the codes and now they can't find him. Five minutes later we got another call from another guy asking us why suddenly his website was nowhere to be seen in Google but just a few days ago he was number one for all his primary keywords. I surfed over to his website quickly did a view source saw it was a CMS, quickly scanned the content and understood completely.

Now I swear this is true Five minutes after that we got another call from another person asking us the same question. In common with the first two this person also had a CMS. And while I was on the phone my assistant was writting down another web address this one with a serious display issue which the person could not fix because the code on the CMS was so complex.

Calls like those mentioned above happen all the time now. Content Management Systems are supposed to be very user friendly and in most part they are, but people still find a way to mess them up. Content Management Systems are supposed to be SEO Friendly and again here lies the question, how can they claim to be SEO Friendly when they are designed by programmers and populated by common users?

Search Engine Optimization is an art form
We have been in business for more than 7 years now and still get caught by Algorythm Changes, then franticlly search the web to see what changed. We update websites daily, try various combinations in Keyword density, Check trends, monitor call to action, submit changes, build links, and a slew of other factors, a content management system does not do those things. So how is it SEO Friendly?

To top it all off its very code heavy and that means the page weight is going to high which is another Algorythm no no and this is before the user adds his un-optimized content, and images with file sizes that would shock you. Ok its friendly because the URL strings are connical, it forces users to enter unique titles tags. Does anyone other than industry professionals know what I just said.

Not AT All SEO Friendly
We are a professional SEO services company and we do not manage Content Management Systems and we do not build or install them because we have come to beleive that they are NOT SEO Friendly. A client may want to do it themselves and save a little money but they will end up getting what they paid for, unless they hire an expert to run their site. Then the whole cost saving scenerio disappears and could end up like case one mentioned earlier.

To this day the best way to code a website is with simple HTML code, no need for code deep Content Management Systems lined heavy with un-readable and very un friendly Javascript, which is what most Content Management Systems have in common.

What does SEO Friendly really mean?
In industry talk it means that the website in question can easily be index by Search Engines when content on the web pages reflect their subject matter. SEO guys know how to do this, website owners usually do not. When a SEO firm finishes with a website and turns it over to their owner or puts it online their job now really begins. They begin to monitor SEO indicators and tweak the website and perform a slew of tasks to get it just right.

When they turn over a Content Management System, the owners, who by the way are not SEO experts, usually will not know how to or do not put in the required effort to make it SEO Friendly. And when all is said and done they will eventually seek expert advise and that expert will tell them that they will need to get rid of the Content Management System.

There is something that needs to be added to this article and its plain as day. When a car breaks down some people usually have some idea of what is wrong, most have no idea. They then take it to a mechanic or their dealer to have it fixed.

Business is once again booming at Position Front Page thanks mostly in part to badly managed Content Management Systems.

Archie Glikakis
Position Front Page
SEO Consultant
http://positionfrontpage.com