Website maintenance
It is a rare website indeed that does not require changes over its lifetime. Whether these are seasonal, monthly, daily - or even hour-to-hour - our philosophy is to put full control over day-to-day website maintenance in the hands of you, the client.
The website has been built, approved, launched and submitted to the major search engines. Great. But - all too frequently - at this point the awful realisation sets in that no consideration has been given to any means of updating the site. Perhaps what you need is a content management system?
Very occasionally, unmaintainable sites are deliberately engineered by unscrupulous web designers - who hope to gain extra work from regular site maintenance - but more usually it is simply due to lack of forward planning. Any web developer with talent will not want to spend their time on routine updates to client websites - they want to move on.
For this reason, we at Albedo consider the issue of site maintenance from the word go, right back at the specification stage - and frequently we have found it sensible to implement a maintenance solution even before the site proper has been fully built.
Just for a change
Different sites demand different solutions - small sites that are heavily visual may need a different approach from large text-laden websites. A product catalogue will make its own distinct demands compared with, say, an e-publishing site.
For a smallish site that is not generated from a database, there are traditional approaches. These do, however, require a degree of staff training. One method is to use a design package, like Macromedia Dreamweaver (which is used by our design department) or Microsoft Front Page to run up the pages individually from a design template. This works fine on a small scale, but it does require training and confidence and some knowledge of how to use an FTP or other package (FTP is one method of uploading website pages to a remote server, though not the most secure).
Another approach, which many may find hair-raising - but which is used, of necessity, by our developers - is to 'hand-code' the pages using a text editor like Homesite+. This requires even more training, but we would not seek to discourage anyone from taking this approach, if they possess the knowledge and confidence.
There is, however, a 'third way'.
Content management systems
For those who do not wish to become web professionals, a far better approach is to focus just on the content that needs changing. Most sites, like this one, have a relatively constant 'template' - what changes from page to page is merely such things as headlines and body copy. In a different way, this principle will apply to, say, a product catalogue too.
For most sites then - and even small sites benefit from this approach - the best approach is to store all relevant site content in a database, from which the pages are generated, either as static pages, or 'on the fly' - as users demand them. We recommend creating static pages - not only does this improve server performance, but search engines prefer pages created in this way.
If your site is databased, maintenance becomes much easier. A form-based 'maintenance suite' - placed on the server, and passworded for security - can be created that allows only the relevant content to be changed easily, with minimal or no knowledge of the code behind the site. A system that consists of this maintenance suite, the site database and the page generation code is generally known as a 'content management system'.
Of course, even such a user-friendly approach will require documentation, help screens and, perhaps, some training, but the key points are that this method is focused, easy to learn, and allows changes to be made in a hurry. It is part of our standard repertoire, and we have also developed a 'small site' solution.
A picture is worth a thousand words, so please try out our simple website maintenance demo.
