Managing your web site content
If your first response to the title of this article is ‘but I don’t manage the content of my web site’ then we have a little work to do first……
There are many reasons to change the content of your web site. One of the most important is so that visitors to your web site will see that you’re up-to-date and take your on-line presence seriously. This will affect their perception of you as a modern, well-managed company.
Another is that Google and the other Search Engines are likely to see the addition of new material and see your web site as more valuable.
Lastly, the provision of information is what the web was designed for. If you add useful information to your web site it’ll be seen by more people as a useful place to visit – and pass that message to their friends, relatives and business contacts.
Hopefully we’ve persuaded you that updating your web site is a good thing.
So, how do you go about adding to or changing the information on your web site?
If the web site was built as a static site with html pages then you’ll need to edit them directly or use one of the many page editing tools available. Unfortunately most of them aren’t too friendly and most people, quite rightly, don’t know or case much about html. There are one or two easier tools to use but easier is relative. If you’re not going to be updating the site every week then even they might prove too awkward.
The most common solution in this situation is to go back to your web site provider/Designer. Hopefully he/she/they will charge you only a small fee to make simple changes to the text and images on the site. Getting bigger changes done (new pages, new menu items, more facilities or functions etc) will entail a larger cost. Still, it’s usually worth it – unless they want to charge the earth of course.
If your web site was built using one of the increasingly common Content Management Systems (CMS) then there’s a good chance that you’ll be able to edit much of the web site content yourself.
The facilities offered by the editors in these CMS’s vary widely. Some will allow only the editing of text on existing pages whilst some will allow the addition of new pages and sections or even the re-arrangement of the whole web site! The functionality that they provide is often a factor in the cost of the original site.
Sites that are both easy to update yourself AND rich in the scope they offer tend to be more expensive. In most cases, the addition of owner-editable facilities will add at least a couple of hundred pounds to the cost of a new web site – and often much more.
If you already have a web site, your decision has already been made for you. Either it was built in a CMS (and you can probably edit it yourself) or it wasn’t, and you can’t.
When you’re looking to get a new web site it’s worth considering how often it’ll be updated and who’s best placed to do that. If it’ll be updated frequently (weekly or less) then it’s worth getting the ability to edit it yourself. If it’s only going to be updated monthly or even less frequently then it’s usually not worth self-editing.
In any case, if your Webmaster doesn’t charge much to edit the site for you, think carefully about whether updating the site yourself is really cost – and time – effective.
We can update and maintain most types of web site. If you can’t or don’t want to edit your own web site or get your existing Webmaster/Designer to update it why not get us to do it for you? Contact us on 01579-342360 or enquiries@clarihon.co.uk.
