Content Management with Commitspark

Introduction

Content Management refers to the process of creating, editing, publishing and maintaining digital content on various platforms such as websites or online stores. In the context of marketing, this involves managing and optimizing the content displayed on these channels to engage customers, promote products/services, and drive conversions.

Instead of hard-coding content into target applications, content is typically stored and maintained in a separate Content Management System (CMS) from where it is programmatically retrieved and then dynamically injected into applications using software code. This separation allows content changes to be performed independently of application code changes. In such situations, the CMS is generally called a "Headless CMS", i.e. the CMS is not responsible for content presentation.

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Example: Marketing Content for an Online Shop

The processes related to content management are essentially the same as those found in software development: Just like software code, content must be created, reviewed, published, maintained, and finally retired. With Git being the de-facto standard software code management solution, the Git-based data management functionality of Commitspark allows Commitspark to be used as a headless CMS for an online shop, where content is stored in a Git repository instead of a relational database like PostgreSQL or a non-relational database like MongoDB.

Technical Implementation

To use Commitspark as a headless CMS, developers define a Commitspark GraphQL data schema that support serving content for the various visual building blocks that are requested by marketing teams. Such building blocks typically are hero components, call-to-action (CTA) components, continuous text in markdown format, product sliders, and others.

Using the Commitspark data editing frontend, marketing teams can manage and store schema-conformant content directly in a Git repository without having to understand the complex details of how to use Git. Software developers later use the Commitspark API library to retrieve this content directly from Git in order to render shop pages, marketing pages, and all other output where content is required to appear.

Benefits of Using Commitspark

For Content Editors

  • Commitspark enables content management workflows that were previously only available to software developers for source code management, e.g. separate branches where changes independently go through preparation, review and approval steps
  • A hard content validation point can be established that requires passing before content is permitted to be merged into the production branch
  • Commitspark enforces content editors to stay within the content data schema
  • Human and automated change reviews are facilitated through Pull Requests

For Managers

  • Commitspark provides full ownership of content storage using the existing industry-standard data format YAML
  • All content changes are fully auditable with a cryptographically secure chain of change records over entire content repository, thanks to Git

For Developers

  • Commitspark enables developers to build content automation pipelines around Git workflows, the same way they already do for code development automation
  • Building compelling content-enabled applications with Commitspark is as easy as with any other CMS API from a developer perspective
  • No surprises for developers during development and operation due to a predictable content API driven by the Commitspark content schema
  • All common tools for frontend development can be used, as Commitspark builds entirely on open data formats and an API based on the widespread and well-known GraphQL standard

Conclusion

Commitspark enables improving content management processes not only in terms of efficiency but also quality, as Git unlocks unique ways of working that are not possible with traditional CMSs relying on databases for content storage. Parallel editing using multiple branches, Pull Requests with mandatory manual or automated reviews as well as secure auditable change logs are just a few examples for the possibilities that Git unlocks. This makes Commitspark an ideal tool for organizations looking to take their content marketing processes to the next level.