Agile content management systems (CMS): 7 criteria to evaluate.

A content management system (CMS) is responsible for delivering seamless digital customer experiences across various channels. It’s easy for an organization to get lost in a sea of competing features while evaluating options. So, selecting the right CMS depends on your business needs, goals, and internal processes.

A traditional CMS might lack flexibility, while headless systems can present the opposite problem. Their separate front end and back end provide an opportunity for more sophisticated user experiences, but this architecture can hinder marketers from making the necessary changes independently. A headless CMS often requires developer input due to its technical complexity.

Hybrid systems can strike an excellent balance for some organizations, powering agile marketing and efficient multichannel content delivery. For example, an agile CMS can:

• Enhance the customer experience
• Speed up content delivery
• Support generative AI
• Improve team efficiency

A Request for Proposal (RFP) is crucial for selecting the right agile CMS. It should clearly define your business goals and give detailed requirements, evaluation criteria, and timelines. This ensures that platforms are assessed based on their performance in the real world and can deliver the right results for an organization, rather than relying solely on their features.

Download our sample RFP template to help you make an informed decision. It also includes a list of essential questions to ask vendors as you conduct your research to find the right CMS for your business.

Read on to learn how to evaluate an agile CMS to help you choose the right system and discover other content management best practices.

In this post, we’ll cover:

• What is an agile CMS?
• Why is an agile CMS important?
• 7 key criteria for evaluating an agile CMS.
• Benefits of content management with an agile CMS.
• Making an informed choice: Crafting your agile CMS RFP.
• Selecting the right CMS.

An agile CMS is a flexible CMS solution that offers both developers and marketers a standard set of publishing, workflow, and collaboration tools. It helps businesses create, curate, and deliver digital content across various channels and campaigns.

Traditional content management systems often struggle with today’s dynamic, multichannel environment as they can be slow and rigid. Headless CMS solutions offer flexibility through APIs but can leave marketers dependent on developers.

Hybrid or agile CMS platforms combine the flexibility of headless systems with user-friendly tools for marketers, supporting both scalability and ease of use. This aligns with an increased adoption of composable Digital Experience Platforms (DXPs), where modular tools enable agility.

The table below compares the different kinds of CMS systems and their main features:

Traditional content management systems often leave enterprise teams working in silos, with different tools and platforms for each department or function. To address this, an agile CMS should include the following:

1. Unified, user-centric content hub.

An agile CMS should serve as a central, user-friendly content hub for all teams involved in the content lifecycle — marketing, IT, sales, product development, customer support, and more.

This centralized system can help drive efficiency, ensure brand consistency, and maximize the value of content assets. However, a truly unified hub is more than just a repository — its effectiveness depends on assets being easily discoverable and reusable. This can be achieved through automated content classification and tagging, making it easier for teams to find and leverage existing content at scale. Generative AI can also enhance modular content, paving the way for effective metadata management.

2. Integrated collaboration and planning tools.

To operate with agility, teams need built-in tools that seamlessly integrate with the content management system (CMS). This enables them to communicate and collaborate seamlessly throughout the content creation process.

Look for CMS platforms that offer real-time collaboration features, supporting agile methodologies. This includes capabilities for task management, deliverable tracking, automated approval workflows, and version control.

This can help break down the traditional silos between marketing, IT, and other departments. It facilitates cross-functional collaboration in a central location for planning, execution, and delivery of content.

3. Flexible architecture and deployment.

An agile CMS should be flexible enough to deliver content across existing and emerging channels.

This is where a hybrid headless approach is vital, as it allows developers to adapt and scale content for different channels, without restricting access for marketers.

Essentially, this hybrid headless, or agile, content management system offers the best of both worlds. It provides developers with API-first control, framework independence, and the speeds they require, while simultaneously empowering marketers with intuitive tools — including what-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) interfaces that work effectively with modern decoupled front ends.

This flexibility is essential not only for delivering content to today's websites and mobile apps, but also for future-proofing content strategies to accommodate emerging channels, such as IoT devices, augmented reality experiences, and conversational AI interfaces, where an API-first approach is fundamental.

While such hybrid options are available, very few vendors can provide a truly unified experience (despite what their marketing materials might say). An agile CMS should be able to support all deployment options, offering flexibility and scalability without sacrificing ease of use for your teams. It should also help reduce the cost of content operations.

4. Personalization and AI capabilities.

Personalization is crucial for the customer experience, although it presents its fair share of challenges for many enterprises. This is where an agile CMS should work in tandem with generative AI to help personalize at scale. It can leverage AI to automate tasks like analyzing A/B test results, dynamically optimizing experiences based on user behavior and data, and delivering hyper-personalized content.

However, the role of generative AI in content management is rapidly expanding beyond customer-facing personalization. Many systems offer internal capabilities such as AI-driven automated content tagging and metadata generation for improved discoverability. You may also find systems that provide intelligent content recommendations or AI-assisted content generation, along with predictive analytics to help forecast content performance.

Assessing a CMS's AI readiness means evaluating its ability to enhance both external customer experiences and internal content operations.

5. Extensible architecture and integrations.

No CMS operates in isolation. An agile CMS must be able to integrate seamlessly with existing enterprise tools and channels. This includes Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems, analytics platforms, content creation workflows, Digital Asset Management (DAM), Product Information Management (PIM) systems, commerce engines, and other tools.

An API-first design is fundamental to achieving this, as it ensures you can easily exchange and transfer data from tool to tool, with the CMS acting as a central content hub. Beyond connectivity, the CMS should have an extensible architecture. This ensures the system can adapt to changes, offer new functionality, and be fully customizable to meet specific business needs.

6. Strong market presence and vision.

Evaluating a vendor and its market presence is crucial when seeking an agile CMS. It should have a strong customer base, supported by a portfolio of successful case studies across diverse industries and geographies. This demonstrates that a vendor has the tools, processes, and support necessary for enterprise implementations.

Analyst reports, such as The Forrester Wave™, can offer valuable third-party validation of a vendor's position and capabilities. However, in the rapidly evolving martech landscape of 2025, past success is only part of the equation.

It is equally important to assess the vendor's vision and commitment to innovation. Consider its ability to adapt to significant market shifts, particularly in response to emerging trends such as generative AI and evolving privacy regulations. Pay attention to its product roadmap to see where and how it is developing its capabilities.

A vendor's demonstrated ability to anticipate market trends and invest in future-proofing its platform is critical to ensuring a long-term, successful partnership.

7. Global partner ecosystem and direct support.

A global network of implementation partners, digital agencies, system integrators, and technology partners is often a sign of a mature and widely adopted platform. This partner ecosystem offers access to certified talent, specialized expertise, and trusted advisors who can assist with implementation, strategy, and customization.

However, it’s also essential to evaluate the level of direct vendor support throughout the onboarding process and beyond. Consider some of the following questions:

• Are there comprehensive training programs?
• Does documentation empower internal agile teams?
• What are the Service Level Agreements (SLAs) for technical support and security updates?
• Is there an active user community for peer support?

Comprehensive vendor support, particularly in terms of training and ongoing assistance, enables customer teams and marketers to effectively utilize the CMS and adopt agile content management practices internally.

Adopting an agile CMS can offer significant benefits to an organization, including:

• Enhanced customer experience. A hybrid headless architecture combined with AI-powered personalization ensures content can be delivered across all touchpoints — from websites to mobile apps. This ability to meet customers with the right content at the right time can help foster loyalty and drive conversions.
• Greater agility and speed. An agile CMS enables organizations to adapt to market shifts and evolving customer preferences quickly. Streamlined workflows and flexible deployment options drastically reduce the time it takes to launch new campaigns, update content, and enhance digital experiences based on customer data and insights.
• Improved collaboration and efficiency. Integrated planning tools facilitate cross-channel cooperation among marketing, IT, and product teams, leading to a more unified content creation process.
• Future-proof and scalable. An API-first, extensible architecture enables organizations to easily adapt their CMS to new technologies, channels, and requirements. A cloud-native design also ensures the platform can be scaled to handle growth in content volume, product offering, or customer traffic.
• Smarter operations. Advanced generative AI features, such as automated tagging, predictive analytics, and intelligent recommendations, enable organizations to work smarter. This helps conserve resources, saving time and money.

Selecting the right agile content management system requires careful thought and evaluation. This is where a well-defined Request for Proposal (RFP) is essential. It can help you vet prospective vendors against your organizational goals and ensure they provide the appropriate level of detail for each of your requirements.

Follow these simple steps to begin building an RFP for an agile CMS to support your decision-making process.

1. Outline your context and goals.

Start your RFP with a brief overview of your organization, its mission, and market position. Provide vendors with background information on why a new CMS is needed and what you currently use, if applicable.

Then clearly define the scope of work and your project objectives using SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound.

You can also mention any specific pain points with your current systems, as well as future requirements that might be needed in a second phase.

2. Provide detailed requirements.

This forms the main section of your RFP. You should detail the requirements in a logical order, covering five key areas:

• Functional: Specific functions and capabilities your internal teams require for day-to-day use.
• Technical: Architectural needs for performance and scalability, such as API standards, cloud-native deployment, and hybrid headless capabilities.
• Integration: Your compatibility requirements with existing systems like the CRM, DAM, and analytics platforms.
• Security and compliance: Necessary security standards and data compliance needs, such as CCPA and GDPR.
• Generative AI capabilities: Requirements for both content personalization and backend automation.

3. Include vendor questions.

Reflect on the seven evaluation criteria and develop specific questions to gain a deeper understanding of the vendor and their agile CMS offering.

Go beyond yes/no checklists. Instead, ask more in-depth questions. For example, how do the features work? How do they support agility and collaboration? And how do they apply to your specific use cases?

4. Define the submission and evaluation criteria.

Provide your vendors with a clear set of submission guidelines to help them prepare their responses. This should include:

• Preferred proposal format
• Submission deadlines
• Key points of contact
• Any supporting documents required, such as case studies or references

5. Be realistic.

Share your budget expectations and timeline up front to ensure the vendor proposals are relevant and aligned with your request. Avoid vague or overly ambitious requests, as these can lead to mismatched solutions or vendor misalignment.

With a well-structured RFP that asks the right questions and avoids common pitfalls, you'll uncover the true capabilities of potential agile CMS partners.

Evaluating a CMS can be challenging, especially when faced with the numerous options available in the market today. It is essential to select a CMS that aligns with your business objectives and consider how it supports your growth plans. The right system should enable your organization to manage content effectively, collaborate across teams, and stay up to date with industry changes, all while providing a seamless customer experience across multiple channels.

Ready to start your search? Get to know more about Adobe Experience Manager Sites and see if this industry-leading content management system is right for your business.