Content Management Systems

what is a "content management system"?

Content Management Systems (CMS) are all the rage. What are they all about?

Essentially, they are applications which place the power to manage content in your hands, whether or not you know a lick of HTML. If you know how to use a web browser (such as Internet Explorer or Firefox) and a word processing program, you've already got the technical skills to use a CMS.

While we are more than happy to do a great many things with your CMS with our custom site offerings, the attractiveness and popularity of Content Management Systems means that it is logical for us to offer a basic CMS package.

Basic CMS features

Core

To keep things affordable for you, we begin with a rock-solid open source* application. After doing a great deal of hands-on research, we have settled on an application named Website Baker, which is remarkably easy to use, and has more than enough capability for most folks. (If you wish to use a different CMS, we will be happy to work with you on a custom site.)

*Open source means that the application is free to users. The licensing agreements generally require that some level of branding be maintained (e.g. a link back to the home site of the developers), and usually forbid that you create commercial software from the basis of the provided core. Although we are reselling our labour rather than the application, we always make a donation to the developers every time we build a CMS site for a client.

CMS features and installed modules

When we install Website Baker for our "Basic CMS" package, we configure it so that you will have the following basic features:

online text editor / mini word processor for easy page creation.
capability for multiple levels of user groups (hide pages from some users, not others, etc).
ability to create a fully structured site with multiple categories and page levels.
news / blog page which gives you the ability to allow user comments (or not), complete with RSS feed.
automatic menu modification - when you create or change a page's placement in your site structure, the CMS will change the navigation menu automatically.
easy file upload capability - you can easily place pictures on your pages, for example.

There are also various other modules we will install for you at no charge, including photo galleries, calendar, guestbook, etc.

value added

In addition to the CMS's own features, here are a few more things we provide when we set up your site:

uniquely designed site.
our "basic page bundle" pack (includes secure contact form with corresponding thank you and incomplete warning pages, as well as a matching "file not found" 404 page).
initial set up of email addresses.
ability to change content on every page automatically by using a content block.
up to 10 pages to get you off on the right foot.
online support with our easy-to-read manual.

Something as feature-rich as a CMS is hard to encapsulate, but you get the idea. Essentially, you're free to add, modify, and delete pages at will. You are the master of your own content. For just a bit more initial investment than a Standard package site, you can be set to grow and grow for a good long time.

Check out the current price of our basic CMS package.

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