Brevard Web Hosting now offers Instant Changes

Posted: Oct 10, 2007

Some web developers and web firms charge an hourly rate for changes (usually between $35 to $90 per hour). We’ve avoided implementing this for several years for the very reason that we’ve had a heart from the beginning to have a business model that “the little guy” could afford, not only with which to get started, but to maintain their site so that it would be current and relevant to their customers and prospects.

After all, if a small business owner was having a rough patch, and couldn’t afford to pay a few hundred bucks to have their website updated, what would be the likely result? The website would become outdated. Customers would eventually stop bothering to check the website since it never seemed to have the latest and correct information. What about new prospects who visited the website and relied upon information that later turned out to be outdated? They would have lost faith and trust in that business before their relationship even began.

Thus, Brevard Web Hosting has been looking for a CMS for a while. A CMS is a Content Management System. Some newspaper websites use them to update content quickly while not having to mess with the XHTML or other code behind the site. But most CMS’s we evaluated were far too complex for some of our clients to use easily.

However, we recently came across a CMS known as TextPattern. It allows any content (i.e. words on the page, images, documents, etc) to be easily updated or edited from a very easy-to-use web-based interface. We have begun to implement this system into all our existing sites. All new clients automatically will have this benefit.

Think about the advantages:

1. You still get professional website design, creation, hosting, and search engine optimization – all from a local business. No cookie-cutter templates. No poorly written code. In fact, TextPattern absolutely excels at some of the finest code we’ve ever seen and is completely customizable to the letter.

1. Your updates are instant. Rather than wait for a web developer to update an important date or time on your site, you can do it just as fast as you can type an email.

1. TextPattern has… wait for it… built-in commenting! Many clients express an interest in having the ability to let people comment on their site. Testimonials, visitors, customers, etc. All you do is simply check a box on any page on your website that you want to allow people to comment on. And yes, you can moderate the comments; not just anyone can post anything. This is a great way to allow your visitors to participate – and to keep your content looking fresh (for search engines) without having to do any work. Let your visitors add to the “great conversation” of the web.

1. Textpattern also has… built in blogging capabilities! Brevard Web Hosting recommends business blogs to every client anyway. Now, you can do at no additional cost. We used to charge $150 to add blogging capabilities (or only on more expensive plans). Now, everyone gets it – out of the box. (** You don’t have to use it, but it will be there if you want to).

1. Textpattern also has plugins available for most things like Photo Galleries, Survey Forms so that you can add these to your site without incurring a “Design-Change Charge” from us.

1. And best of all, we will not have to implement charging an hourly rate for changes. You can make as many changes and updates to your website’s content as often you like. (** Of course, design changes always incur a charge. For instance, if you want to redesign your entire site, the layout, the structure, etc., there is a charge for that. We’re speaking here only about content).

In summary, you can’t really “mess up” your website with this new system. Once we’ve put all your code in, you don’t need to worry about doing anything that would cause the website to “break”. And of course, we are still able to help you if you get stuck, so don’t panic.

So, what can’t you do by yourself? Well, you won’t be able to add new pages (unless it is a new blog post). So, for instance, if you decide you want to add an “About the Team” page, you’ll need to email us. Once we add it though, you’ll be able to type in your wording, add photos, or make changes to it all day long.

Instead of typing an email or a Word document with your changes and sending it to us, you’ll simply login to your own website. You won’t need to use any XHTML code or know anything about web design. TextPattern uses very simple styling called Textile if you want to bold something or underline it. For instance to bold the word giraffe in a webpage, just surround it with asterisks as you see here. Very easy. TextPattern has a quick reference guide for using Textile built into the Admin that you will log into so you don’t need to worry about forgetting the styling codes.

For those of you who want to find out more about TextPattern, navigate to its website (http://www.textpattern.com/). We don’t want you to worry. Most of all that techie stuff is for geeks like us to implement. The using of TextPattern (especially with the limited rights you will have) is very easy.

Leave a comment, why don't you?

Name	Remember
E-mail
Website
Message	Textile Help