Using a Headless CMS to Power Your Blog

As I’ve argued elsewhere, business websites need to have a blog. The primary reason is that blogs are the primary driver of traffic to most websites and thus represent an important element of your startup's growth journey.

However, it is common for many sites to start without a blog initially before deciding to add one after a short period (a primary reason not to run with one in the first place relates to basic prioritization and resourcing). 

As this article will outline, when it comes to the point of adding one, you can now avail of a modern CMS like a Headless CMS even if the rest of your site is on a more traditional (monolithic) CMS.

WordPress, the world’s favorite CMS started life as a blogging platform, before evolving its feature set into a fully-fledged CMS in the intervening years. However, 20 years down the line, WordPress’s dominance amongst business sites is waning. Wordpress issues ranging from security concerns to site performance to usability means that a growing cohort of users is actively seeking alternatives to it.

Headless has emerged as a more recent challenger, capturing a growing share of enterprise companies. The curiously named category represents a very different approach to managing websites. Unlike an all-in-one approach like WordPress, it adopts a best-of-breed approach where the front-end and back-ends are decoupled and API’s are used to serve content. 

Some additional context is needed here. WordPress remains extremely dominant and has a significant surrounding ecosystem all keen for its dominance to last. Both camps are thus actively championing their individual approaches. This article is no different - Contento is a Headless CMS and thus sits firmly on the opposite side of the fence to traditional CMS like WordPress. CMS selection is very much a ‘horses for courses’ decision and this article is not designed to try and persuade as to which side is better. Instead, it aims to outline how a Headless CMS like Contento could be used successfully. 

As I’ll also outline below - the use of more than one CMS is increasingly the norm. For many sites, the prospect of a full site migration from a traditional CMS to a Headless CMS may be too much to consider right now. Running your blog on a Headless CMS while the rest of your site remains on its current CMS is perfectly feasible and is largely what I am proposing here. There will be undoubted pushback from the team responsible for managing the site, but as I’ll outline below with the appropriate education and setup this is not a cause for concern.

Headless has emerged in recent years as a popular option for managing content. By decoupling the front end and back ends the following benefits result:

• Bespoke website design - because you are not constrained by a template you can custom-build your website

• Blazingly quick speeds - the architecture lends itself well to delivering really fast page load times (using a Static Site Generator and a Content Delivery Network)

• Enhanced security - those in the Headless camp will argue that the attack surface area is much reduced and as APIs are used instead of plugins you have a more secure setup

• Single version of the truth - Headless utilizes structured content and because the Headless CMS is essentially a content repository the content can feed multiple heads/delivery channels. Change once and it updates everywhere

• Vendor agnostic - With Headless you can easily swap in and out various vendor solutions and thus can avoid vendor lock-in.

• Built for scaling  - Again the architecture and workflows are separate ensuring that the platform is built for scaling.

When it comes to using a Headless CMS to power a blog you can thus enjoy the benefits of a fast-loading page, built with its own bespoke design. However, as I’ll argue below two additional benefits arise for those using Contento as distinct from other Headless CMS solutions. 

As this article argues, it is no longer a case of needing to be constrained with one CMS, and thus you are freed up to pick up a more modern future-proofed approach by adopting Headless.

There is one subtlety worth considering at this point that I alluded to above. The fact you’ll now be running more than 1 CMS. However, for larger companies, this is very much the norm and an accepted way of managing websites. Some use it as part of a phased adoption approach moving some elements of the site across to a new platform on a piecemeal basis. Others run specialist CMS to power everything from API documentation to knowledge bases. 

For smaller companies the users may balk at the proposal - however, this is largely on the assumption that the second CMS may carry the same usability challenges as a traditional CMS like WordPress. This is not always the case. Some Headless CMSs like Contento are stripped back - after all, the entire front end resides elsewhere so all design decisions are taken elsewhere and by someone else. This is a key nuance with Headless - work becomes more specialized. One non-technical individual sitting in a marketing function will no longer be fully responsible for the site. Instead, there is a much clearer delineation of roles and responsibilities. Once the content model and design of a blog have been built upfront, the role of the marketing person is reduced to “filling in the boxes”. A welcome surprise. 

So how does Contento function as a blogging platform?

Unlike other Headless CMS solutions, there are some nuances to our approach that are well-suited to powering a blog.

Firstly, we assume the primary use case for our Headless CMS is for managing websites. Most of our competition adopts a ‘blank box’ approach promoting the benefits of omnichannel. By making this simple assumption we can thus bake in features that align specifically with this specific use case. Take Search Engine Optimization (SEO) as an example, Contento has an integrated solution ensuring that SEO is ‘front and center’ when it comes to your content production.

We’ve also focused specifically on the needs of the user and assumed they are non-technical. We’ve stripped back the dashboard and designed an intuitive interface where edge cases are removed and any tasks that need developer input reside elsewhere. Hence, the learning curve for marketing users is not at all steep, and the UI/UX does not overpower. For those familiar with WordPress the experience for non-technical users is very different.

But will it cost a lot more? Paying for two CMS instead of one. 

There is no doubt that you will need to pay for a separate license, alongside some professional services to plumb everything together (and in some instances migrating content). Entry level CMS license pricing will typically apply given the use case is “just for a blog”.

These costs will be off-set by the gains of a more streamlined content management approach, and the hidden gains of a blazingly quick site (assuming no large images are used), with built-in SEO and an intuitive interface the marketing team can use in confidence.

Finally, as an aside, we power our blog on the Contento site with the Contento CMS and enjoy great speeds, and high scores when we run audits on the likes of aHrefs and SEMRush and are making decent progress on our organic positions. As the primary user writing blogs, I no longer fear the process like I once did when writing in WordPress.

Any Other Drawbacks?

Are there any other drawbacks to running two CMS in parallel?

There are several other drawbacks beyond paying for a second CMS, and the associated training costs if the second CMS is overly complicated. There are technical elements that need to be addressed upfront including:

• Addressing how to manage cookies

• Managing GA4 and Google Search Console

• Managing 404’s

• Data synchronization

• URL management

However, most of these are relatively straightforward to address upfront. 

Although tech consolidation remains a top priority for many technology and marketing leaders, many digital experience professionals are turning to a multi-CMS approach to drive agility, flexibility, and speed to market.

— Source: Three Reasons Why A Multi-CMS Approach May Be Right For Your Brand:  Nick Barber, Senior Analyst, and Kara Wilson, Researcher, Forrester.

In short, we are seeing an increase in multiple CMS use by companies as they recognize the limitations of an all-in-one approach. Using a Headless CMS like Contento to power your blog offers an attractive option to see the power of Headless in action, without needing to undertake a full site migration.