DALLAS (5 October 2023) – The International News Media Association (INMA) and the Google News Initiative (GNI) have launched a CMS Vendor Selection Tool to assist news organisations in the process of selecting a content management system (CMS).

The aim of the tool, which was unveiled yesterday at a global launch town hall attended by 660+ participants from 74 countries, is to demystify what many publishers find to be a complex area and help them identify the most suitable systems to fit their needs. The tool is freely available to the news industry.

As a central technology to the news publishing business, the CMS and its selection can be critical to an organisation's product delivery and success.

This first-of-its-kind tool is designed to help news media organisations understand which CMS vendors they may want to include in their shortlist, which specific features they provide, and direct feedback about the vendors from actual customers.

In creating the CMS tool, the INMA and GNI team followed a three-step process:

• Identifying publisher needs: After identifying a core set of functionalities, the group conducted a survey and a number of one-on-one interviews with publishers to verify and hone this list, which would serve as the basis for much of the vendor analysis.
• Vendor analysis: A small selection of vendors were asked to take part. The analysis included a vendor-filled detailed questionnaire, a 90-minute demo, and customer reference checks. This research was carried out by an independent third party. The vendors invited to take part serve a wide range of media organisations and are largely chosen from the initial publisher survey.
• Publisher/vendor fit: Based on publisher needs and verified vendor responses, the team created a matrix to give a publisher a shortlist of vendors based on their size and geography. Publishers can also get a more detailed view from a three-page review of information based on the detailed research carried out for each vendor.

The free tool can be found at www.inma.org/cms.

Complementing the tool is INMA’s new report “How News Media Companies Should Choose a CMS,&rdquo: which lays the foundation for publishers to better use the CMS Vendor Selection Tool. The free report can also be downloaded at www.inma.org/cms.