Marie Antoinette, Anne Boleyn, Ned Stark — ask any of them, and they would be against chopping off heads. But ask a development team, and they might be in favor of chopping the head off a traditional content management system (CMS) as it opens up potentially endless possibilities for content management and delivery.
The “head” of a traditional content management system (CMS) refers to its front-end components, such as the front-end framework and templating system. These tools deliver and display the content on the desired platform. So, just as chopping off Ned Stark’s head opened up a possibility of storylines on “Game of Thrones,” chopping of the head of a CMS opens up the possibilities for content delivery.
A headless CMS removes those front-end components. This leaves raw and unpublished content at a development team’s disposal. Since they are not tied down by one default front-end system to deliver that content, developers can build as many heads as they’d like to display content. With a little magic from an API, this content is delivered to a variety of platforms, from websites, to apps, to smart watches and more. A traditional CMS already has a front-end delivery layer built in. That means content is only displayed onto one platform.
An API is what separates a headless CMS from a traditional CMS. APIs can integrate with various languages and frameworks. Various frontend delivery systems can be built onto APIs, which is how these tools can deliver content onto any platform.
A CMS is limited to pre-defined content models, which is the way your content is structured. A headless CMS is not — you have the flexibility to create your own platform on which to deliver your content.
Your files can be saved in the cloud, and then managed through one system. Content saved locally and in the cloud can still be managed through the same platform. A headless CMS should give you the ability to create, read, update and delete your own content.
One of the biggest advantages of a headless CMS is that you can publish across multiple platforms. Sometimes that means the content on different platforms has to be displayed in different languages. As a content from a headless CMS can be delivered onto any frontend framework, it can be published in any language needed, with a little help from an API.
I’ve already discussed the biggest benefit of a headless CMS — the fact that developers can build multiple heads to which content is delivered. It’s the main component that sets this type of content management solution apart from a traditional CMS. But that’s not the only feature that makes this software worth looking into.
Simple implementation
With a traditional CMS, you would need to reimplement the tool each time you wanted to upload content to a different platform. As a headless CMS does not include a frontend delivery system, there is no need to reimplement.
User-friendly
A traditional CMS is built upon a website and there is a lot of code and content required to make that happen. You only need a little code to get a headless CMS up and running, which makes it far easier to use than a traditional CMS.
According to Forbes, “It’s also a lot quicker for business teams to create new functionality. For example, if a marketing department wishes to create a new series of product mini-sites, it can go straight into the CMS and start creating the content immediately.”
Quicker deployment
As previously mentioned, a beneficial feature of a headless CMS is the fact that it allows you to streamline various tasks. One of which is the fact that content creators and developers can work in tandem with a headless CMS. With this ability, you can get your content up and running quicker than you could with a traditional CMS, since a traditional CMS requires the system to be fully developed before content is created.