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Versa Studio offers a number of services to web designers that can expand the your offerings to clients. Many designers follow the typical route of design:

1. A mock-up in Photoshop
2. Slicing the images in to graphics
3. Making templates in Dreamweaver, GoLive, or a text editor
4. Building a web site from these HTML, image, and JavaScript files

This is a tried-and-true method, and can produce good results, but when it comes to managing the content of sites built this way, you will rapidly run in to the limits of straight HTML (or "flat file") web sites.

Editing the site

Editing requires either the designer to make changes, or your client to make changes with either Adobe Dreamweaver or Adobe Contribute.

Designer does the edits

Some clients may prefer to ask their designer to make routine changes, however, this is not very efficient or cost-effective for them, nor is it efficient for the designer, as it can divide up your day in to tiny segments of work.  You also lose time emailing back and forth to make sure your changes are what the client wants, and it cuts in to your time spend designing new sites.

Client does the edits

Clients using Dreamweaver must have a good command of the program in order to make changes correctly and upload them via FTP.  Contribute is of course easier, but may still require that you provide training and support to your client.  Also, with this approach, if you're asked to make design modifications, you may have to reconcile your client's changes to the site with your local machine's files.

Limitations of straight HTML sites

Besides these limitations, as client needs grow, straight HTML sites provide diminishing returns.  Here are some common requests from small business clients:

• Search Engine-Friendly page titles and URLs
• Automated meta tag generation
• Event listings
• RSS feed
• Staff directory
• Testimonials, with randomized display
• Link or resource management
• User-managed column ordering and sidebar content
• Document management,

Most of these requests cannot be met efficiently within a straight HTML site. Some of them can be tacked on with JavaScript solutions, brought in to the site via an iFrame, accessed by links to sites that provide the services.  However, a straight HTML approach to these requests cannot be handled in a comprehensive and automated fashion—you're have to code everything.

Enter the Content Management System (CMS)

Unlike a collection of HTML, JavaScript, and image files, a CMS is a system for comprehensive management of a web site.  All of the above features are easily created within a CMS.  To use this approach, one follows the same initial steps:

• A mock-up in Photoshop
• Slicing the images in to graphics

Instead of creating HTML templates however, special templates are created which incorporate HTML, JavaScript, images and a set of tag-based commands which tell pages in the site what content to display.

Separate from all this, a group of entry sets is created in to which the content of the site ("body" content, not the header, navigation, footer, or other design elements) is entered directly from a web browser.  This can be done initially by either the designer or the client.  A WYSIWYG editor is provided for field containing formatted text, and other field types are available.  Content tagging, categorization, staging (i.e. keeping entries in draft mode until ready for publishing), and various other features are available.

A big advange here is that content is kept separate from design.  If you're familiar with Web Standards, you already know the benefit of separating these elements.  You're probably already using CSS to keep page styles separate from content.  A CMS goes a few steps further, by breaking content in to discreet pieces, for example, each event in an event listing is entered separately.  It also lets your client enter and manage content completely independent of design elements.

Benefits to your clients

By offering your clients a CMS-based site, you're not only providing a comprehensive solution for their web site, but providing an easy-to-use tool that allows them to manage the bulk of their site without needing your help at every step.  A CMS empowers your clients to keep their site updated, allows them to make changes at any time and even establish a workflow from draft mode to publishing.

Benefits to you, the designer

Offering CMS-based sites expands the range of services you offer, allowing you to attract more lucrative contracts.  It also frees you from day-to-day maintenance, allowing you to focus on pursuing new clients and working on new designs.  You may feel that not doing site maintenance amounts to a loss of revenue, but in fact, making small changes to client web sites can break up your day in to tiny, inefficient segments.  You're more productive when you focus on producing good designs.

Services we offer to designers

Versa Studio offers a full range of services based on our CMS of choice, ExpressionEngine. We offer anything from basic set-up and configuration to a full package which takes your design and turns it in to a dynamic, extensible web site.  For each new site we build, we use best practices based on hundred of hours of CMS experience, in other words, we've got it down to a science.  We can also provide training via web conference to help jump start your project.

Our customized ExpressionEngine installation includes:

• WYGWAM Rich Text Editor with spellchecker
• Meta-tag management
• Specialized add-ons if required
• Standardized file paths
• Removal of "index.php" for more readable URLs*
• Customized login screen
• Streamlined and branded control panel

Writing about a CMS, however, doesn't do justice to the impressive features it offers—you should see them for yourself.  To set up a free, no-obligation demo of our CMS capabilities, and to discuss pricing, please get in touch.  With a short web conference, you can see the benefits of a CMS for yourself.

* Depends on server configuration.