Articles - Page 194

Agentic AI for Agencies in 2026

bmckeiver

EPiServer has announced the release of EPiServer 7.5 Commerce, a .NET ecommerce solution. Building on the success and flexibility of <a href="http://www.episerver.com/Products/EPiServer-7-CMS/">EPiServer 7 CMS</a>, the newly available version uniquely combines e-commerce functionality with state of the art customer experience management. The updated platform allows EPiServer clients to capitalize on the convergence of e-commerce and content marketing, enabling improvements in top-line revenue and average order value.
EPiServer 7.5 Commerce combines content and catalog handling to allow the full complement of customer experience tools to deliver value to organizations that recognize the importance of the online sales channel. By creating a combined solution, EPiServer 7.5 Commerce offers a transparent business view, beyond complex side-by-side or e-commerce led integrations that have traditionally created problems for business uses and customers for years.
<blockquote>
“Companies need cohesive digital customer experiences, but marketing and e-commerce groups often operate in silos with differing objectives, which leads them to buy and operate independent solutions for brand content and transactions,” according to a Forrester Research, Inc. report written by analysts Stephen Powers and Peter Sheldon (Content And Commerce: The Odd Couple Or The Power Couple?, November 19, 2013). “The end result? A fragmented and poorly integrated digital presence that confuses the customer, is difficult to manage, and, ultimately, leaves revenue on the table.”
</blockquote>
The new release helps marketers with the challenge of controlling their content layout, design and landing pages through tighter integration of content and commerce. EPiServer  7.5 Commerce enables a ‘quick launch campaign' with flexible layout control, and content and catalogue re-use, which allows merchandisers to do their jobs effectively and efficiently. Marketers and merchandisers often find it too hard and too time consuming to manage product content and this latest platform helps them navigate this challenging terrain. EPiServer 7.5 Commerce”s capabilities also create a more personalized experience across channels for the consumer, a top-priority for businesses that understand that customer loyalty is driven by great customer experience.
<blockquote>
“It's obvious for people that are thinking about the future that content marketing is changing the way digital marketing moves,” said Bob Egner, VP of Product Management at EPiServer. “The opportunity to improve experiences for ecommerce and help marketers reach the connected consumer by enabling them to seamlessly interact with customers across channels is tremendous. EPiServer is capitalizing on this new industry trend not just for B2C retail customers, but for other segments as well, such as those in B2B ecommerce who are finding their footing in this exciting new market opportunity.”
</blockquote>
The latest platform is easily integrated to help IT teams effectively streamline business processes. More information on EPiServer 7.5 Commerce is available <a href="http://www.episerver.com/Products/EPiServer-Commerce/">here</a>.

EpiServer 7 Released

mike-johnston

Jahia today presents its Digital Industrialization vision and the product that supports it: <a href="http://www.jahia7.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Jahia 7</a>. Jahia 7 will be officially presented during <a href="http://www.jahiaone.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">JahiaOne</a>, the vendor’s 1st International User Conference to be held on Feb 6-7 in Paris. 
The Digital Industrialization vision is about an uninterrupted, optimized and continuous production flow of digital experience, from the business need to its final digital rendering. 
This is now possible thanks to a new approach where distributed development is secure and fully integrated with code server and private apps forge. Developers and business users can collaborate in fast and short iterations to deliver validated components that would be made available to the entire organization via a private apps forge. Project after project, the TCO and time-to-market of digital projects decrease thanks to the ability to reuse modules and components from the private apps forges. 
Elie Auvray, CEO at Jahia Solutions Group SA says “Jahia 7 delivers two game-changing capabilities: it brings the ability to develop collaboratively with Marketing AND deploy modules and apps securely thanks to Private App Forges. This is the end of the tunnel effect era: because they can now truly work together, developers and marketers can deliver business solutions faster. Decision makers validate recent developments that are made available to the entire company through private forges. Everyone can then use and reuse – safely – these modules and applications for all new digital initiatives without compromising neither the assets of the company nor its critical projects. You no longer spend with no visibility, you invest without sacrificing marketing velocity, but instead, by augmenting it. This is the double promise of Digital Industrialization. “
<h3>Key strengths of Jahia 7</h3>
<ul>
<li>
Distributed development to industrialize the development by combining control and agility. Jahia 7 brings many new improvements based on the integration of Jahia Studio, its unique UX builder with shared source repository. Several developers can work on the same subject, independently from where they are located, directly on the integration server or from their desktop. All sources modifications are pushed to a repository to which the Studio is linked. Changes are versioned in the source repository and all changes can be tested on the same server to verify compatibility and to actually develop with agile methodology.
</li>
<li>
Agile Deployment. Two major enhancement now allow for agile and faster deployments:
</li>
<ul>
<li>
The integration of OSGi allows the hot-deployment of modules without downtimes or restarts
</li>
<li>
The introduction of Private Enterprise Apps Forge where all validated modules and business applications are made available and versioned for administrators to decide whether to deploy them or not. This centralized and secure Forge allows for unlimited reuse of previously developed modules and for instant deployment on as many instances as needed. Both TCO and time-to market are drastically reduced, project after project. The apps forge can be declared fully private within your entire organization and/or shared with your integration partner.
</li>
</ul>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>
Dynamic Content. Marketing teams get control over their main objectives: ensure brand consistency through all their sites and adapt their content to each required channel for the best possible user experience. They benefit from an entire autonomy to create, at will, any global and localized digital initiatives, manipulate any type of content, assemble full-fledged sites based on pre-defined templates and socially engage visitors by just drag'n dropping related modules and validated content. And much more!
</li>
<li>
Guaranteed Update. Jahia 7 comes with a fully secured and guaranteed update process to protect former investments in Jahia.
</li>
</ul>
<h3>Official Presentation of Jahia 7</h3>
Jahia 7 will be presented for the first time at JahiaOne, Jahia’s first international user conference. During two days, developers, users, clients and partners will be able to meet, share their experience and discover Jahia 7.
JahiaOne will be held in Paris on February 6 and 7, 2014.
<a href="http://www.jahiaone.com/home" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">More about JahiaOne</a>
<h3>About Jahia</h3>
Jahia's next-generation, Open Source CMS stems from a widely acknowledged vision of enterprise application convergence – web, search, document, social and portal – unified by the simplicity of web content management. Structured around Jahia xCM, Jahia Wise, Jahia Studio and based on the powerful Jahia Content Platform, Jahia brings a unique modularity to the Java development arena. With its hundreds of built-in widgets, downloadable JahiApps and third party modules, Jahia is the tool of choice for building business-driven user experiences for innovative web and mobile applications, at a fraction of the cost of competing solutions.
Founded in 2002 and based in Geneva (Switzerland), Jahia Solutions Group has offices in Paris (France), Klagenfurt (Austria), Düsseldorf (Germany), Toronto (Canada) and Washington, DC (USA). Jahia counts hundreds of global brands and governmental organizations among its loyal customers, in more than 20 countries across the globe. For more information, visit: <a href="http://www.jahia.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">www.jahia.com</a>

Jahia 7 to be unveiled during JahiaOne in February 2014

Magnolia International has released Magnolia CMS 5.2. The new version delivers the latest Magnolia 5 content management platform to existing Magnolia CMS users, offering a supported upgrade path with dedicated migration tools. Magnolia CMS 5.2 also offers a new REST API and enhanced support for the Groovy scripting language.
“Since the launch in June, new customers have been telling us that Magnolia 5 is the best user interface available for integrating mobile devices,” comments Magnolia’s CTO Boris Kraft. “But we believe it is just as important to deliver this innovation to our existing user base. Version 5.2 now offers all Magnolia users a free, safe and straightforward migration path to the new Magnolia 5 platform.”
Magnolia 5’s new user interface represents a radical rethink of how employees interact with their organisation’s web and mobile channels. Users work through intuitive task-focused apps, which can be customised around their job role. Actions and responsibilities are allocated, monitored and managed in real-time through “The Pulse”. Meanwhile the “Favorites” function allows users to create a personalised view of the system, with shortcuts to common tasks and relevant areas (see the <a href="http://www.magnolia-cms.com/company/news/press-releases/magnolia-5-release.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Magnolia 5 launch release</a> for details).
Magnolia 5.2 now provides tools for users of Magnolia 4.x to migrate content, along with a step-by-step guide for migrating and testing custom-developed modules and extensions on the new platform.
In addition to the migration tools, Magnolia 5.2 also implements a new REST API, simplifying integration of Magnolia with other applications and online services. The new release also features upgraded support for the popular Groovy scripting language. This allows developers to use Groovy for creating new page templates, apps and functionality. Groovy scripts can also be used to automate repetitive tasks and content updates, dramatically reducing administration overheads and providing an additional tool for users migrating to Magnolia 5.
A full feature overview of Magnolia 5.2 is available at: <a href="http://www.magnolia-cms.com/5-2" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.magnolia-cms.com/5-2</a>

Magnolia CMS 5.2 Delivers Migration Tools, Simplifies Integration and Dramatically Reduces Administration Overheads

Sitecore, the winner of both our People's Choice and Critic's Choice awards for <a href="/cms-critic-awards/"> Best Enterprise CMS </a> , has recently acquired .NET Ecommerce solution, <a href="http://commerceserver.net"> Commerce Server</a>. This new purchase shows how quickly Sitecore has been able to respond to calls within the industry to offer fully integrated all-in-one solutions to customers.
Commerceserver.net offers a powerful platform that is sure to integrate nicely with the Sitecore family of products, namely their Customer Experience Platform. To learn more about what Commerceserver.net offers, check out their product overview here: <a href="http://commerceserver.net/Product%20Overview/"> http://commerceserver.net/Product%20Overview/ </a>
<blockquote>E-commerce functionality is critical to delivering relevant, personalized experiences for online shoppers, yet current CMS solutions offer poor or non-existent e-commerce integration. The acquisition of commerceserver.net by Sitecore is great news for customers because it introduces a rich level of integration between commerce, content, and digital marketing that has not been achieved by any other vendor. It will also provide a compelling .NET choice for enterprise customers while ensuring a strong and viable future for Commerce Server technology to its sizeable install base. – Ryan Donovan, President, Commerce Server </blockquote>
From the Sitecore announcement:
<blockquote>Industry analysts have repeatedly highlighted the need for online retailers to adopt a holistic approach to their operations, taking full account of the overall customer experience. We understand that at Sitecore, it’s the philosophy behind our Customer Experience Platform. The addition of Commerce Server’s enterprise grade e-commerce capabilities means that we can quickly move to a position of leadership in this space to complement our successes and leadership in content management and customer experience.</blockquote>
From our standpoint here at CMS Critic, we see this as a positive change reflecting the need for solid integrations within CMS suites and platforms. Sitecore has made some significant strides this year and we are looking forward to seeing what 2014 brings to the CMS market.
<a href="/products/sitecore/">Learn more about Sitecore.</a>

Sitecore Buys Commerce Server, Aims to bring ECommerce to their Platform

<h3>Background</h3>
For over a year, HCC Medical Insurance Services utilized WordPress for their content management needs. Recently, however, it became evident that using a number of plugins and an outside vendor was ineffective and prevented the company from efficiently updating their corporate website. The usage of shortcodes to build content blocks and to style content on a page resulted in a high number of poorly coded and poorly presented pages. Considering that healthcare is a highly regulated industry, HCCMIS worried about compliance with regard to the content published out to their website. The compliance approval process often resulted in delayed content releases, sometimes to the point where the content was no longer relevant by the time it was approved.
<h3>Goals</h3>
As HCCMIS decided to upgrade to an enterprise CMS, the most important objective was to gain full control of their web content. Creating and editing content needed to be placed in the hands the Subject Matter Experts. In order to meet this objective, proper workflows had to be put in place to streamline the process of content creation, compliance approval and final publishing. Another goal was to speed up content creation through the extensive use of reusable blocks, which would also generate greater consistency from page to page, resulting in an improved visitor experience.
<h3>CMS Evaluation Process</h3>
During the CMS evaluation process, HCCMIS reviewed several content management products and performed a side-by-side comparison of features. This was followed by an ROI analysis to show which product would be able to provide a positive return to HCCMIS over a three-year period. The team presented those reports to the executive team, and Cascade Server was recommended based on future potential for growth and the ability to leverage the system to grow the value of the HCCMIS marketing department within the overarching umbrella of HCC companies. According to Bill White, senior developer at HCCMIS, Cascade Server’s enterprise capabilities proved to be the clear winner for this healthcare organization.
<h3>Results</h3>
While it had taken HCCMIS more than two months with an average daily input of three hours to put the 700+ pages on their site into WordPress, moving the same site into Cascade Server was much easier. Once the templates were built, 2-5 marketing team members, who were all non- technical, were able to migrate all 700+ pages from WordPress into Cascade Server within three weeks working one to two hours a day on the migration, with as little as 5% as many requests for technical help as compared with the WordPress implementation.
HCCMIS was able to overcome compliance issues with the help of Cascade Server’s ability to track all changes to content and provide a full history of page content by date of revisions. With Cascade Server, HCCMIS can now quickly reproduce what a visitor on the website would have seen on a specific date in the past. Reverting back to previous versions in Cascade Server can be accomplished with just two clicks, much to the delight of the Compliance department.
The Subject Matter Experts at HCCMIS are now empowered to manage their own web content. Workflows have been put in place for compliance approval, and the use of content blocks allow HCCMIS to maintain branding consistency throughout their site.
<h3>Upcoming Projects</h3>
HCCMIS started the process of completely redesigning their site at the same time that the marketing team moved the old site into Cascade Server. Handling both projects simultaneously was not an issue due to Cascade Server’s content reuse capabilities. The new site will be more user-friendly and utilize responsive web design. In addition, HCCMIS intends to further customize its compliance approval workflows.
<h3>Can Cascade Server Help with your Content Management Needs?</h3>
Cascade Server is a robust enterprise CMS that is used by over 300 organizations worldwide. If you’re in the market for a new content management system, our solutions consultants can help! They will work with your team to help you identify your needs and goals for your new CMS and determine if our solutions are the best fit for you. We’d love to show you why Cascade Server was a finalist in the <a href="/cms-critic-awards/">CMS Critic 2013 People’s Choice Awards for Best Enterprise CMS! </a>
Fill out the form below, and we’ll contact you to set up a demo and give you access to your own sandbox instance for testing!

Moving from WordPress to Cascade Server for Better Content Governance and Compliance

As part of our efforts to offer as many resources as possible to our readers, we are pleased to announce that we now offer unique editions of CMS Critic for specific topics.
Since themes and theming are so closely tied to Content Management Systems, we felt it was a good idea to start with this particular topic and as such, I am pleased to announce the launch of CMS Critic (Theme Edition) , our first foray into this new venture.
This new sub-site of CMS Critic will be offering theme reviews, resources and news for all types of content management systems. We will, of course, also be sharing those posts here as well. I hope you find these new sites useful and if there is something specific that you'd like to see, please by all means, drop me a line and I'll take them into consideration.
To access an edition of our site, simply use the red drop down menu on the left sidebar.
To kick things off, we've got a few great posts on it for you to enjoy, which I'll begin sharing momentarily.

Announcing CMS Critic Editions

Your reputation as a company is important to ensure your success. This is why branding has become an essential aspect of marketing for every business, particularly smaller businesses. Unfortunately, when you open up the lines of communication on the Internet, you create the opportunity for individuals to give negative opinions about your business as well. Learning how to balance the negativity will help you protect your overall branding online.
Encourage Interactions
Use social media and your blog to encourage your customers to share their experiences and talk about your products. Some individuals may post negative information about your business, but it is best to avoid simply deleting these posts. It is tempting to quickly get rid of any negative feedback. However, you can use it to your advantage. Find a way to make things right with unhappy customers and make sure everyone sees how you resolve the situation. This will increase their faith in your customer service and your dedication to their satisfaction.
Reach Out to Existing Customers
Your existing customers can be your best customers going forward. People who have made purchases from your company before already know what you can offer and have firsthand experience with your customer service. Use email marketing and your social media to reach out to those customers and encourage them to come back to you. It can even be useful to reach out to those who interacted with you and didn't make a purchase.
Focus on the Positives
Your branding is essential to your success, which is why you need to focus on making it as strong as possible. Think about all the positives of your business and find ways to implement those characteristics into your branding. Try to find things that are unique to your industry or put you one step ahead of your competitors. The end goal is to convince potential customers that your products and services are better than anyone else's and that you can meet their needs.
Manage Your Reputation
Reputation management is an important tool. This means you can't simply ignore what people are saying about you. It is important to find out what people are saying about your company on social media sites, third-party review sites and other locations online. Sign up for alerts that indicate when your business is mentioned. Once you see this information, respond to as many of the mentions as you can to show your customers you are listening to them and appreciate their feedback. This process is very time consuming,  look into <a href="http://smallbusinessreputation.com/">reputation.com reviews</a> and see if they can’t help off-set some of the management of your social properties at an affordable price.
The success of your business relies heavily on how well you can manage your reputation online. Your image will let customers know if they can trust you and the products or services you have to offer. While some companies simply put together a website and hope for the best, you need to put more effort into your branding and your online image. Use social media, your blog and various other online tools to really make an impact with your current customers, as well as potential customers. The more effort you put into promoting your image online, the greater your success will be, increasing your sales and making a name for yourself.

Always Promote Your Online Image

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You may have already heard the terms ‘Portlets' &amp; ‘Portals' on various occasions, yet you may also still wonder what the differences are.
A Portal is a generally a web page which aggregates information from diverse sources, presenting them in an organized, manageable way, on one screen or page. Each module or source of information usually gets its own section within the page, and these smaller ‘boxes in pages' are called Portlets.
Generally speaking, a Portlet produces fragments of markup (HTML, XHTML, WML), displaying small windows within pages, which may contain things like weather, email and news. A group of Portlets coming together on one page, create a Portal.
However, the question now just might be, are Portlets on their way to becoming extinct?
<h2>The Power of REST</h2>
REST, or Representational State Transfer, is a stateless architecture which predominantly runs over HTTP. Today, it is often used in mobile applications, social networking Web sites, mashup tools and now increasingly, in Portals.
Essentially, Representational State Transfer is an architectural style which makes the most of existing protocols and technologies, including HTTP, JSON and XML. REST helps to meet integration requirements which prove critical to systems where data needs to be combined.
REST is simpler to use than SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol), which instead requires either writing or a server program combined with a client program. REST's simplified approach has attracted giants such as Google,Yahoo &amp; Facebook, all of which have adopted REST services in recent years.
So, where exactly does this leave Portlets?
Well, modern web applications are rich Javascript clients, using AJAX technology to offer user experience. Portlets on the other hand, are packaged in Java EE web applications, which by design, are instantiated in separate class loaders. That's great for isolation, but not so great when it comes to collaboration.
<h2>REST in Peace Portlets</h2>
In practise, Portlets are ironically quite difficult to port from one server to another, whereas REST services can be hosted anywhere.
There is now a growing need to exchange content and services between modules, which is difficult with Portlets, since true portable Portlet repositories never really emerged. For example, many Portlets built using a particular Portal software will only ever work on that particular platform, as the Portlet will by-and-large depend upon the services of that server.
You could of course argue that REST-compliant Portlets can be developed, but such a stance makes little sense when you consider the ease of just using REST services on top of any given framework.
So, interoperability has, over time, become key. That leaves Portlets out in the cold, whilst more Portals are now becoming aggregations of REST clients that use simplistic client-to-server interfaces to work their magic – regardless of presentation technologies.
<h2>The Future of Portlets, Portals &amp; REST with Jahia</h2>
When it comes to moving forward with the times in terms of Portlets, Portals and REST services, <a href="http://www.jahia.com/home">Jahia</a> has the right idea, modernizing their approach faster than their competitors.
Jahia offers both the client side components and the technology to quickly and easily develop REST services, whilst still supporting Portlets to handle “legacy” applications.
Using a drag-and-drop system, Jahia's components can be easily integrated into a Portal page. What's more is, Jahia offers Bound Components, which can “talk to each other”.
This works by defining a binding between components whilst positioning them on the page, not at deployment time, allowing them to augment the capabilities of a particular component. For example, this can be used to make any piece of content “commentable” by binding an article to the comments module
Components offered by Jahia can also inherit from each other in an object oriented fashion.
The next major version of Jahia, expected in early 2014, will make its components OSGi compliant, making their deployment and hot-swapability easier than ever, whilst they will also benefit from the existing ecosystem of OSGi components, such as <a href="https://github.com/barjo/atmosphere-osgi">Atmosphere-OSGi</a>, or <a href="http://felix.apache.org/site/apache-felix-web-console.html">Apache Felix’s Web Console</a>.
To conclude, as time goes on, Portlets are racing faster and faster towards irrelevancy. Whilst at the same time, Portals and associated technologies are now more critical to web deployments than ever before – and Jahia is primed to help you handle all of that, and more.
If you're interested in exploring what Jahia has to offer in terms of REST and other services, <a href="http://www.jahia.com/home">check out their website</a>.
You can also explore a little more of <a href="/products/jahia/">Jahia via our CMS Directory</a>.

Portlets are Dead, Long Live Portals

The sleek, robust and open-source forum software known as NodeBB has just released its latest update, NodeBB v0.1.0.
<a href="http://nodebb.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">NodeBB</a> is a powerful platform offering single sign-on, social network connectivity, and responsive design which transitions fluidly from desktop to mobile device. Additional core features include streamed discussions, instant updates, notifications, and more.
Now, with NodeBB v0.1.0, users of the platform will get the benefit of a handful of new updates, making their lives as forum administrators easier than ever before. So, let's take a look at what's new.
<h2>Improved Notifications, Plugins &amp; Mobile Layouts</h2>
NodeBB v0.1.0 bring about a number of fixes to both the internal and external functions of the platform. The main ones of which are:
<ul>
<li>Better handling of notifications (including a new notifications page)</li>
<li>Better plugin support with the addition of new hooks</li>
<li>Improved mobile layout</li>
<li>NodeBB pages are now more search engine friendly</li>
<li>Theme installation now easier than ever</li>
<li>Many changes in the administration panel will now take effect immediately, without the need for NodeBB to restart</li>
</ul>
These impressive updates, which NodeBB users can now enjoy immediately after they update their software, are but a few from amongst many more. 
For the full list of NodeBB enhancements, and to also see what’s coming via future updates, take a look at NodeBB's <a href="https://github.com/designcreateplay/NodeBB/wiki/Version-History-&amp;-Roadmap" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Version History &amp; Roadmap</a>.
<h2>Closed Beta Announcement &amp; An Exclusive CMS Critic Offer</h2>
On top of the long list of improvements brought about by NodeBB v0.1.0, news has been announced that NodeBB's premium hosted platform has now officially entered closed beta. 
NodeBB's premium SaaS (Software as a Service) platform allows anybody, irregardless of their technical ability, to build their own NodeBB community. All you have to do in order to test out the beta, is email NodeBB via “sales@nodebb.com” and express your interest.
If you wish to claim 30 days of NodeBB's premium platform for free, simply mention CMS Critic in your email request. 
For more information on NodeBB v0.1.0, you can visit the <a href="http://designcreateplay.com/nodebb/2013/11/14/nodebb-v0-1-0-released" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">official release notes</a>. To learn more about NodeBB as a forum and community solution, check out their <a href="http://nodebb.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">official website</a>.

NodeBB v0.1.0 Released

Content is only as strong as the methods used to target it. A website is only as valuable as its user experience. When a visitor hits your site, they want to see only the most relevant content possible, in the most immediate and obviously engaging way you can provide. Marketers can run into trouble when they’re faced with the challenge of mixing free, open content with secured or limited-access content.
If your website is acting as your primary lead generation tool, it’s often necessary to gate that content; to create a level of secured access – either because some content is more sensitive than others or because the viewing of marketing resources should be a transactional process. If you’re struggling with a content management system that focuses on security over marketing value or vice versa, it can lead to wasted time and abandoned projects, ultimately reducing your day-to-day marketing plans to a conflict between multiple platforms. Don’t let your CMS drag you down – choose a platform that can easily create and managed gated content that works for you.
When we talk about “gated content” we might be addressing a number of topics. Here are a few ways that gated content can improve the user experience of your website:
Staff Intranet
A website acting as the digital hub for your company can often do more than simply generate leads. It can act as a database for staff documents, feedback tools and sensitive information. Your website, by way of a simple login form, should be able to provide your fellow staff members with a secure area where they can collaborate, discuss and download resources. There’s no need to use a separate tool for this – your CMS should be able to integrate secure and public information together without the additional loss of productivity that comes from managing separate technologies.
Document Library
A broader application than an intranet, a document library may be used by prospects who want to download case studies, investors looking to view reports, current customers looking for  the latest software release information or looking to access support documentation. This kind of information exists in a sort of grey area: not necessarily requiring the level of security that a staff intranet might require but certainly not public information, either. It can also require some administration from your users; as data continues to grow and change, you want to be able to provide the most up-to-date information to your privileged visitors. Your CMS should allow you the ability to create granular user-groups with easily-altered access to various aspects of your asset library.
Customer Portal
For any service-oriented business, a customer portal can be an invaluable asset. Allowing customer access to help documentation, ongoing project reports or up-to-date licensing information will save your customer support team hours in direct communication time. Let your customers serve themselves by accessing a gated section of your website where this data is available. Any CMS platform you choose to use should have the flexibility to both create and manage these kinds of customer portals. More importantly, it should enable personalization of the data, available links and user experience that your customers have once they’ve logged in. This kind of personalization can be simple (content based on customer-grouping) or complex (altered by behavioural data, generated live as users perform various actions on the site).
Marketing Resources
After spending your limited hours and budget creating marketing content for your website, you’ll want to get the most possible return on that investment. Webinar videos, whitepapers and presentations are some of the most valuable resources available to a potential customer visiting your website. While it’s admirably charitable to simply upload these documents and let your visitors read at their leisure, it’s often wiser to restrict access with a gated content tool. Give your leads a chance to qualify themselves with a simple permission form – they give you their email address, you give them the resources they want. With a cookie placed in their browser, you can then track subsequent downloads. Want to know what topics John Doe is interested in?  Want to see what product spec sheets he’s been viewing? A gated content tool can allow you to track that data simply and easily – once you’ve got that, lead scoring, triggered email and drip marketing are a breeze. The CMS you choose should allow you to make this process painless for both you and your visitors. Everyone deserves a positive user experience!
Marqui: Content and Subscribers
Combining functionality from two disciplines, Marqui enables marketers to create content that can be easily gated from within the CMS and create dynamic segments with access to that content. Users are empowered to act as gatekeeper in whatever capacity makes the most sense. Want to hand-pick the people who have access to your gated section? A static group enables granular control. Want to allow the system to automatically grant (or deny!) access based on location, company, or other attribute data? A dynamic group can save you time, handling group membership in a hands-off capacity.  Here’s how we do it.
Gated content is created just like any other – there’s no separate tool to manage gated vs. un-gated content. Once it’s ready for launch, a user can set a flag to protect that content. From there on, anyone attempting to visit a secured folder will be redirected to a log-in page. This is where the subscriber module takes over.
Whether they’ve been added manually, by filling out a form, being imported from a spreadsheet or a direct sync from your CRM, users will be sorted into various groups dynamically. It’s as easy as matching up the groups with their appropriate folders. Want your Board Members to have access to /files/PDF/reports?  It’s just a single check-box. Since users can belong to a number of groups, you can easily add your prospects to a new customers group and give them access to all the documentation they need to get started. Marqui’s smart login form will prioritize and redirect appropriately, making sure that your visitors never have to fill out another login request. Built-in password management tools allow users all the conveniences they’d expect from a dedicated gated content tool, safely and securely.
Once a visitor is logged in, Marqui’s multi-channel tracking module allows you to assign click-through and conversion behaviours to those visitors. Did John download the new Web Design Trends whitepaper?  How many times has he watched the SEO and CMS webinar? As documents are downloaded and content is viewed, Marqui builds a profile of your visitors that you can leverage for all kinds of future marketing campaigns. Personalization tools allow you to tailor the user experience, ensuring click-throughs that become conversions and conversions that become sales. (Of course, once John becomes a client, his status is updated and he gain’s access to the protected client content.)
It’s an outmoded concept to think of gated content as merely the purview of the IT department. Every click, especially ones attributed to those visitors who have qualified themselves with that initial request for a log in, counts towards your ROI. Don’t struggle with a tool that doesn’t let you leverage your content in the right way. Gated content should be a paradise for you and for your visitors, not a prison.
<a href="http://www.marqui.com/CMSCriticDemo">Learn more about Marqui today</a>.

Gated Content: A Paradise Not a Prison

Jahia, the Open Source vendor of new generation Java CMS solutions, today announces a major event and a premiere in its history: JahiaOne, its first international conference. Save the date for February 6&amp;7th 2014 for an exceptional 2-day conference.
“Our products and technologies are experiencing an expanding interest from all around the world, from all types of companies with sophisticated and successful web and mobile projects worth sharing. We felt it was the right time to provide our community with the right event to meet, share and get further involved with our solutions, thanks to the presence of our international architect team and of passionate consultants as well as. JahiaOne is this event and we hope it’ll become the key recurring event our community is expecting.” Says Elie Auvray, CEO of Jahia Solutions Group SA.
<h3>JahiaOne in a Nutshell</h3>
<ul>
<li>Time and location: Paris on February 6th &amp; 7th</li>
<li>Audience: this two-day event is the ideal venue for Jahia developers, users, clients and partners to meet, share their experience and discover Jahia's upcoming versions. Members of the Jahia community from all around the world, including speakers from global customers and partners and, of course, the Jahia Team will be present.</li>
<li>Program: The program will feature technical and business tracks, as well as certifying sessions for the upcoming Jahia release.</li>
<li>Tickets are only 99€ and covers the two-day conference, lunches, dinner on the Thursday night and coffee breaks. Inscriptions are open here. (<a href="http://www.jahiaone.com/tickets">www.jahiaone.com/tickets</a>)</li>
<li>More about JahiaOne (<a href="http://www.jahiaone.com/">www.jahiaone.com/</a>)</li>
</ul>
<h3>JahiaOne program</h3>
Here are some of the key elements of the two-day program currently under finalization:
<ul>
<li>Keynotes from the Jahia team and other speakers to present the major achievements and projects of both past and upcoming months</li>
<li>Detailed presentations of the upcoming version of Jahia xCM. </li>
<li>A series of certifying sessions will be delivered for already certified developers to “upgrade” their certification to this new version – FOR FREE.</li>
<li>Two parallel tracks – Business and Technical –  of over 10 slots each, to further explore the capabilities of Jahia. These tracks, animated by the Jahia team,  are open to speakers from partners and customers.</li>
<li>A FREE certification session will give experienced developers (we recommend a minimum of one Jahia 6.6 project carried out in the past 12 months)  the opportunity to pass the Jahia certification exam</li>
<li>Many networking opportunities to keep the conversation going in a more personalized fashion</li>
<li>Another key highlight of JahiaOne will be the Gala Dinner on Thursday night: a great time for networking and discovering the winners of the 1st Jahia Developer Contest. (www.jahiaone.com/developer-contest)</li>
</ul>
As new speakers, sponsors and partners will join, information will be announced and presented on the website.
<h3>About Jahia</h3>
Jahia's next-generation, Open Source CMS stems from a widely acknowledged vision of enterprise application convergence – web, search, document, social and portal – unified by the simplicity of web content management. Structured around Jahia xCM, Jahia Wise, Jahia Studio and based on the powerful Jahia Content Platform, Jahia brings a unique modularity to the Java development arena. With its hundreds of built-in widgets, downloadable JahiApps and third party modules, Jahia is the tool of choice for building business-driven user experiences for innovative web and mobile applications, at a fraction of the cost of competing solutions.
Founded in 2002 and based in Geneva (Switzerland), Jahia Solutions Group has offices in Paris (France), Klagenfurt (Austria), Düsseldorf (Germany), Toronto (Canada) and Washington, DC (USA). Jahia counts hundreds of global brands and governmental organizations among its loyal customers, in more than 20 countries across the globe. For more information, visit: <a href="http://www.jahia.com">www.jahia.com</a>

Jahia introduces JahiaOne its First International User Conference

Good websites are able to provide consistently enjoyable experiences for the end user. In addition, they’re able to provide benefits for the website manager, like increasing company sales. The best websites take into consideration the lifestyle, beliefs, and abilities of their target audience, utilizing user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) design to further the ultimate purpose of the site. If you’re interested in improving the experience on your website, start by following the 8 UI design tips described below.
1. Have a Clear Call to Action
First and foremost, you need to focus on converting your viewers into leads, be it through an email signup, a contact form, or a free download. No matter what approach you take, make sure that the call to action is clear and prominently featured on the page. Simplify content as much as possible to bring the call to action to the forefront, and be especially observant on the homepage and any landing pages.
2. Take Note of First Impressions
In the same vein of thought, make sure you keep a fresh perspective on the first impression you’re creating. You have literally a matter of seconds in order to hook viewers into actually browsing your site, so the initial impression is everything. Make sure that the page is well designed and that the content is at the forefront. Ask others to give you a fresh eye and always revise in order to make the best pages.
3. Keep Your Navigation Consistent
Consistent navigational elements are necessary in order to ensure that viewers can find their way around, navigating both backwards and forwards as needed. A good website builder should make sure the primary navigation is consistent throughout your entire website. Of course, this rule applies in other ways. Make sure that you use consistent navigational elements throughout page content, not just in the menu bar. Implement a breadcrumbs system if you think it will benefit site viewers and take care to make sure it looks the same every time.
4. Always Consider Readability
Content is key, so make sure that readers can fully absorb the content. Take the time to observe readability throughout the site, noting font choices, color contrast, the effect of text effects and more. Things like text-shadows and decorative fonts are hard to read in large amounts and are more suited to large headlines, while small body text should be a light and simple font, with good background contrast. You must also make sure that your text is easily understood and not cluttered with other page elements.
5. Remove as Much as Possible
Simplicity is key in modern web design. This same principle extends to user experience design, so you should always think about what you can take away. Removing all extraneous content helps to clarify the message and ensure a good experience.
6. Follow the Rules
As a society, innovation is a praise-worthy skill. This extends to web design, but don’t get too caught up in the idea. Some new, exciting and innovative sites provide a solid UI, but many neglect these principles in flavor of fluff and fancy effects. Sticking to the established rules of good web design like established layouts or navigation elements make for an easily understood site favored by most viewers.
7. Open links in new windows
This rule is simple but important. Every time you add a new link to your page, make sure you set it to open in a new tab or window. You don’t want viewers to exit your site completely every time they click a link.
8. Build for Your Target Audience
Last but not least, always keep your audience at the forefront of your website management. Your audience should influence every design and content decision, every marketing choice and really everything you do in terms of creating and utilizing a website. Make sure you have a clearly defined idea of who your audience is, comprised of their beliefs and abilities, demographics and lifestyles.
When it comes to user experience design for a DIY website, you really need to just stick to the basics. These UI design tips are simple and straightforward, but provide a good starting place. Take the time to make sure you’re following all of the tips and you are sure to see an improvement in consistent viewership and reader conversion.
Have you tried to improve your UI and UX design? What techniques did you use? Share your advice below.

Improving Websites Through User Experience Design – 8 UI Design Tips for DIY Websites

If you're like many creative professionals in a design business, you're probably not as focused as you should be on growing your company. You'd rather work on your next great design than call former customers to ask for a referral. But without those calls and referrals, the business won't last long. Here are five simple, but often ignored, tactics for expanding a design business.
1. Be a salesperson. You prefer to think you're a designer, producer, or marketer, but to grow your business, you also have to be a salesperson. Selling means asking friends and existing clients for referrals, getting out into the community to network, creating and distributing marketing materials, getting active on social media sites and even cold calling possible customers to introduce yourself.
2. Don't discount. It's tempting to try and grab hold of available projects by offering a low rate, discount, or even a freebie. That's a big mistake. It's much harder to raise your rates once you've set them. Plus, most customers base their decisions on more than just price. So, if you've got a quality service to offer, don't cheapen it with price cuts. This also applies to all the little extras you add in for clients and which you're loathe to add to the bill. If you added a service they requested — a third revision, additional graphics…etc. — put it on the bill. If you don't, you risk starving your business of needed revenues.
3. Set reasonable deadlines – and meet them. We all know we're supposed to meet deadlines, but all too often we struggle to deliver what we’ve promised on time. When you're competing against other agencies for business, meeting deadlines is a major factor in getting repeat business and referrals. The perception that you deliver what you promise is critical. You’re always in control of the timeline, so set reasonable expectations and meet them
4. Return phone calls quickly.  Handle calls immediately when you can and always return missed calls the same business day.  If you find it distracting to talk on the phone while working on a project, then divide your day so some of it is focused on creative tasks with other times set aside for customer calls. Getting back to people quickly will help you land more projects and keep customers satisfied.
5. Specialize. At first, most new agencies will take on every kind of work they can get, from newsletters and business cards to corporate logos and websites. But when business starts coming in regularly, it pays to focus on a specific niche or industry. Sharpening your niche will make your entire business more efficient — from focusing your sales and marketing efforts, to streamlining your daily tasks, to improving your customer support on finished projects. It’s better to become the go-to expert in a specific field than to try and do everything. A focused approach will also produce better referrals and help you grow your business to the next level.
When it comes time to put your design business online, check out <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/out/lightcms">LightCMS</a>, a powerful, yet easy-to-use cloud-based platform for creating beautiful websites and online stores.

Five Ways to Grow Your Design Business

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