Byrne Tony Byrne

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The trouble with WCM market-sizing

14-Jan-2010

Tags: Web Content Management, European Marketplace, Marketplace at Large

Today we received an inquiry from a research customer, and I gave what felt like a rather unsatisfying response. Here's the question and my answer. Perhaps you can suggest other ideas via comments, below.

The Question

"I am the marketing manager at a consulting firm that is a CMS Watch customer. I need to establish the monetary value of the UK CMS market. Can you help?"

My Answer

The short answer is, "no one really knows, but probably larger than we'd first guess."

Challenges in coming up with meaningfully accurate data include:

  • The vast majority of Web CMS vendors are privately held and do not report revenues
  • Publicly-traded software vendors who sell WCM tools typically also sell many other products, but don't break out their WCM income in their financial reports
  • Open source tools comprise a significant portion of the market
  • Likely 70-80% of buyers' budgets end up getting spent with integration companies like yours
  • Definitions about what constitutes CMS vary... e.g., do you include SharePoint if someone deploys an Intranet on it? What about social media technologies that incorporate some content management services?

Every year or so, IDC (major analyst firm) comes out with well-regarded marketplace sizing estimates, but typically they cover broader marketplaces (like "content management" in general) and are global or regional in scope.

We do know that nearly every major CMS vendor in the world wants to participate in the UK market, so at least for internationally-oriented suppliers, it is arguably the 2nd most significant national marketplace behind the USA. (Germany and Japan could also take that mantle, albeit for different reasons, but that's another story...)

Final Thoughts

So, I could plausibly guess that the UK WCM marketplace totals £250m or just as easily estimate £1.5bn annually.  However, I'd reserve greatest confidence in the conclusion that both figures are wrong.

In the end, market size is important for consultancies and investors considering where to allocate their resources. For end-user enterprises, this data is less important. Focus on the horses, and not the horse race or the total purse.

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