Top 5 Free CMS Solutions For Small Businesses

A CMS or content management system can make or break any website - especially those websites operated by small businesses. I have seen many cases where a small business owner is frustrated with his/her website because it does nothing and they do not have the HTML and CSS skill to update simple content such as telephone numbers, company history, products for sale, and the list goes on. Or the webmaster or employee that they have hired is inaccessible or slow at updating. So what do they do? They resort to doing nothing and their sites become archaic.
Small business owners have a lot on their plate in order to run their businesses. So in most cases updating the website is not high on the priority list since the site is likely already outdated and giving a bad impression and not generating any leads or revenue.
Now, enter the world of the content management system (CMS). Generally speaking a good CMS will allow you to at minimum edit your static content, insert pictures and change the formatting of your text. The way CMS's work is that your website design is transformed into a template which specifies the editable content areas. This way you can edit your content without breaking the layout of the site. A few good web hosting providers can work with all the top CMS systems and may even help you install and convert your website to work with them.
Content management systems are available in all shapes and sizes. Some are free and others you have to license. Some are complicated to use and others are newbie friendly. Some only run on specialized frameworks like .NET or JSP and Java and others are built on Open Source Friendly languages such as PHP.
For most small businesses, you want to choose a CMS that has been around a long while and has a large following. This helps to ensure stability and in many cases flexibility as if you ever need work done on your CMS your costs will be lower and your choice of help greater. CMS's that require specialized frameworks are generally more complicated and require specialized hosting like Windows Hosting or Java Hosting- which increase costs. I am of the opinion based on my own experiences the following CMS's are best suited for small businesses and small business owners. For most CMS's you will still need to have someone help integrate your chosen CMS into your website, however after this step you are able to manage your own website.
1) Joomla, www.joomla.org This CMS has been around for numerous years and almost has a cult following. The most current version of Joomla has a refined administration panel which makes it even easier for new users to operate. The Joomla community has amassed numerous extensions from free to paid for all types of industries and solutions that are needed. The development cycle for Joomla is also very fast, so this means the community is always releasing new updates and security fixes.
2) CMS MadeSimple, www.cmsmadesimple.com This is a great CMS that has gained much popularity. It is lightweight and easy to setup. Unlike other CMS systems it is very simplified. This makes it very good for small sites or sites that need to be quickly developed .
3) GL Fusion, Gives you the ability to quickly and easily setup websites complete with extras like forums, CAPTCHA support, calendaring, and full file and media gallery management solutions, and MooTools AJAX support. glFusion creates sites that arefully XHTML compliant with a pure CSS driven layout. The design is SEO friendly and is also accessible by screen readers and other assistance tools used by the visually impaired.
4) Etomite, This CMS makes use of some new content delivery techniques, specifically in the utilization of AJAX. You can incorporate AJAX functionality through the backend editor without any knowledge of AJAX programming. In addition, this CMS system creates your site in a fully W3C/XHTML validated format. This is become more and more important with regard to search engines and placement, and having a clean cross browser compatible site.
5) Impress CMS, This is a community developed CMS ans still young compared to the others listed above. However, its fast growing and as easy to use as editing a word document. This CMS won the 2008 most promising CMS award and currently, a small selection of add-on modules are available.