What are the best practices for scaling your CMS for future growth?

1 Choose a scalable CMS

When selecting a CMS platform, scalability is an important factor to consider. You want to choose a CMS that can support your current and future needs, such as adding more features, languages, or integrations. Additionally, the CMS should be able to handle spikes in traffic and content updates without slowing down or crashing. To ensure the CMS is scalable, evaluate the architecture and technology stack of the CMS. Is it cloud-based, self-hosted, or hybrid? Does it use a headless, decoupled, or monolithic approach? How easy is it to update, migrate, or extend the CMS? Furthermore, assess the performance and reliability of the CMS. How fast does it load, render, and deliver content? How does it handle caching, compression, and CDN? How often does it experience downtime or errors? Additionally, consider the security and compliance of the CMS. How does it protect your content and data from unauthorized access, breaches, or attacks? How does it comply with relevant laws and regulations in your industry and region? Lastly, evaluate the usability and functionality of the CMS. How intuitive and user-friendly is the CMS interface and workflow? How well does it support your content creation, editing, and publishing processes? How many features, plugins, and integrations does it offer?

3 Automate and monitor your CMS

Scaling your CMS for future growth can be achieved by automating and monitoring your CMS processes and activities. Automation can save time, reduce errors, and increase efficiency, while monitoring can track, measure, and improve performance, security, and usability. To automate and monitor your CMS, you can use workflows and rules to streamline content creation, editing, and publishing processes. You should also use backups and updates to protect content and data from loss or damage. Additionally, analytics and reports can be used to analyze content and website performance, user behavior, and feedback. This will help to identify issues, opportunities, and trends that can optimize your CMS strategy and goals.

4 Train and empower your CMS users

Finally, one of the best practices for scaling your CMS for future growth is to train and empower your CMS users. Your CMS users are the people who create, edit, manage, and consume content, such as content creators, editors, managers, developers, and visitors. To ensure that they use your CMS effectively, efficiently, and securely, you should provide them with clear and comprehensive documentation and guidelines. Additionally, you should provide regular and relevant training and support that help them learn new skills and improve existing ones. Lastly, you should give them constructive and positive feedback and recognition to motivate them to use your CMS productively, creatively, and collaboratively.

5 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?