How to lower TCO with your next CMS

Shopping for a new CMS—trying to balance features and functionality with costs—can sometimes feel a bit overwhelming. While it might be tempting to merely compare license prices and be done with it, there are a number of other factors to think about, especially if you want to reduce your total cost of ownership (TCO) over the long run.

Here are a few ways to lower your TCO with your next CMS:

1. Embrace a flexible, more open approach

If your current setup is an all-encompassing integrated solution, it may be to your advantage to employ a progressive re-platforming strategy rather than replace the entire system at once. This lets you upgrade problematic components quickly while plotting your next moves carefully and distributing development and customization expenses over time.

It also keeps you from spending money on things you don’t need or that you already have. For example, just because the all-encompassing solution has a digital asset management system (DAM), it may not be the best DAM for your specific needs. Consider open solutions that allow you to choose the best tools and MarTech solutions for your specific business requirements.  

2. Automate where possible

Look for ways to automate operations wherever it seems feasible. The idea isn’t necessarily to cut total expenses on labor, but rather to cut expenses in this one area, giving team members more time to focus on initiatives that make your company more competitive, such as user experience or customer service.

3. Don’t be held hostage by your history

Familiarity with a particular platform doesn’t make it the right choice. It’s not always easy, but it’s worth your time—and money—to take a step outside your comfort zone and check out other options that might be a better fit for today’s needs and a more solid platform for tomorrow. If needed, an objective third party, like Credera’s team of experts, can help you determine the best, and most economical, way forward. 

And don’t be afraid to dump your digital baggage. You don’t need to include the functionality for that “digital postcard” campaign that was a great success in 2006 in your 2022 re-platforming. Think hard about the content and functionality you bring forward. 

4. Be realistic about your needs & capabilities

Another area where you should lose the rose-colored glasses is with your team’s abilities. Be realistic in your expectations around what they can—and can’t—do when it comes to implementation and customization. It can cost you in several ways if, in an effort to save money, you end up biting off more than they can chew.

All web teams aren’t scaled to take full advantage of the capabilities modern platforms offer. There’s no sense in investing in a complex, expensive analytics reporting platform if you don’t have an analyst who actually uses it to gain actionable insights. 

5. Follow best practices

Don’t try to swim upstream and fight your chosen technology. Set it up the way it’s supposed to be set up and don’t try to make it something it’s not. (This is where doing your homework and making the right choice upfront comes into play.) You can end up throwing a lot of good money after bad if you don’t follow best practices during implementation.

While we’re on the subject of not wasting money down the road, it’s also best to use standard tools rather than vendor-specific ones, no matter how hard they try to sell them. You want to avoid being locked into a certain vendor to make sure you have flexibility and cost-saving options in the future.

6. Make it easy to use

A low-code/no-code user experience enables marketing teams to create and distribute content themselves, speeding up campaign timelines and providing more engaging experiences. Solutions that feature click-and-drag page-builders, templates for content reusability, collaborative authoring, and preview capabilities save you money by enabling marketers and freeing up developers to focus on other maintenance tasks and initiatives. 

7. Consider solutions that have a factory model

A centralized governance model for multi-brand websites allows each brand to have its own digital entity that’s centrally controlled and maintained on a single code base. In general, this lowers costs related to IT and maintenance—and in some cases, lowers infrastructure costs, too.

If you manage dozens of brands, some solutions have a break-even point where once you surpass a certain number, the cost per site gets lower. It could be worth a larger upfront investment to set this up if the long-term TCO savings are greater.

8. Validate integration capabilities 

Make sure the CMS you choose will play nicely with these key tools, among others:

• Digital asset management system (DAM)

• Customer data platform (CDP)

• Marketing automation platform (MAP)

• Personalization and journey optimization tools

• Customer relationship management system (CRM)

• Social media management 

Additional things to consider

Once you’ve checked all those boxes, here are a few more things to keep in mind as you evaluate your options:

• The number of sites you’re planning to migrate to the new CMS 

• The amount of training/onboarding required to get your team up to speed 

• Scalable pricing models that allow you to pay only for the features you need

• Being able to use your chosen technology for more than one generation of your site

The bottom line

An objective third party can be a crucial ally in helping you make decisions that will save you money down the road. If you find that you need clarity around your options and some guidance in finding the right fit, schedule a call with our platform-agnostic team to talk about your business goals and how you can achieve them while lowering your TCO over the long run.

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