February might seem a little late to highlight a review of the previous year, but just last week, EContent published an article looking back at 2015 and also looking ahead through 2016 and beyond, to examine the current state and future direction of content management systems. Upon reading the article, it occurred to us that while we had discussed industry experts overviews of the previous year’s trends among local web marketing services and web design companies, we had not taken a more specific look at content management.

We would be remiss if we allowed this gap to linger, since One Brick Tech certainly operates as a CMS development company in Charlotte, NC, as well as being a general provider of small business web design services and local web marketing services. The information highlighted in the EContent article helps to make it clear that each of these functions are equally important to small businesses that rely on web for ecommerce transactions and general customer outreach.

The article also suggests that work in each of these areas is increasingly subject to overlap, meaning that small businesses in Charlotte, NC and other competitive localities could seriously benefit from contracting with a web design and development company that is capable of wearing many hats.

Once upon a time, it may have been possible for small businesses to keep content management in-house and still remain competitive. But EContent points out that in the past few years, and certainly in 2015, CMS website design companies have had to integrate a larger and larger number of assets into their systems. This creates a situation in which small companies potentially have more work than they can handle on their own, while large companies stand to lose a great deal of money if those assets aren’t placed in professional hands.

The increasingly complex work of CMS website design companies threatens to have an even wider-ranging impact on the health and success of client businesses in light of the fact that EContent says the lines are blurring between content management and overall small business marketing solutions.

The good news in this, however, is that if your own provider of local small business marketing strategies has kept up with the trends that we previously highlighted regarding web design and development, chances are that already have a sense of how to keep up with dedicated CMS website design companies, as well.

That is to say that the most prominent trends affecting general web design and development services – namely mobile browsing and responsive web design – are the same trends affecting content management. So provided that your web design company has also demonstrated past capability as a CMS website design company, it has a good opportunity to simultaneously grow its skill in both areas in 2016 and beyond.