DEV Community: Core dna

When Should you Use a Headless CMS?

Core dna — Tue, 30 Aug 2022 06:38:16 +0000

Your website or app uses a JavaScript framework (React, VueJS, etc.)
JAMSTACK's growing popularity has accelerated the adoption of headless CMS, letting developers best choose how content is provided.

You need to design dynamic, personalized digital experiences
A headless CMS serves as the underlying repository for structuring content flows in order to deliver tailored, integrated experiences. This is especially beneficial for eCommerce businesses.

You have a Jekyll, Gatsby, or another static site-generated website
Headless CMS simplifies the management of a static website. It isolates content from presentation and delivers all of your content via content APIs.

You have a native app (iOS, Android, Windows Phone)
You can distribute content from a headless CMS to all your websites and applications for a once-and-done distribution. Content providers have a web-based dashboard to generate content for iOS and Android apps. This assures message consistency and device-agnostic reach.

You want to add a CMS to your eCommerce stack (Shopify, BigCommerce, Commercetools, Hybris, Magento2, etc.)
A headless CMS is great for eCommerce retailers that wish to future-proof themselves. It also helps teams design and deliver consumer experiences and update marketing campaigns quickly.

You Need Robust Content Management
As stated throughout this article, a headless CMS provides robust abilities to create, manage, and recycle content across different devices and different contexts.

Why should you NOT use a Headless CMS? Find out in our original article below!

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

Headless CMS vs Traditional CMS

Core dna — Thu, 18 Aug 2022 05:51:51 +0000

Advantages of headless CMS
Supports modern front-end frameworks to be used by developers today for a wide variety of applications
It can be used with Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) to seamlessly get and send content between third-party systems. By exchanging information with these systems, you can often obtain customer data to use in your personalization efforts.
Efficient and fast
Ability to create targeted entities
The separation of design and data layers provides enhanced security.
Content can be defined the way the administrator wants it without confining them to the structure of the CMS.

Read this next: Headless CMS Use Cases

Disadvantages of headless CMS
Headless CMS is designed for developers and, as a result, is usually tricky for marketers to use if they don't have a technical background. Headless offers a limited number of traditional marketing tools, such as content preview, collaborative functionality, and on-page editing.
Requires third-party tools to create static pages quickly
It doesn't include security, caching, and infrastructure-based features.
You can't preview content.
Initial integration and configuration effort is more time and resource-intensive

Advantages of traditional CMS
Quick and easy to deploy and install for small businesses
Design templates make systems user-friendly for non-developers
Simple content management and collaboration
The platform centralizes all content, so you can easily plan, publish, and edit from one interface.
Lots of communities and resources to tap for support

Disadvantages of traditional CMS
Loss of flexibility as your website grows
Limited to creating web content
Requires additional resources for maintenance
Developers must have CMS-specific knowledge and skills

Conclusion: Choosing your CMS
A traditional CMS is an excellent place to start if you're a marketer or work on a small team beginning to design a website. However, if you are working with developers and don't want to rely on templates for your site, or if you need more advanced functionality, you could do well to go with a headless CMS. Choosing this option is only recommended if you have the time, resources, and expertise necessary to configure the system successfully.

There is also a third option: a hybrid CMS, a platform that gives both marketers and developers the freedom they need to deliver content across multiple channels. A hybrid CMS gives you the best of both worlds, providing marketers access to interfaces they're familiar with while allowing a developer to prepare content for third-party other applications. Whatever course you choose, take your time, test the systems and select the option that best fits your needs.

Original article published here

What are the Best Types of Content of This Year?

Core dna — Tue, 16 Aug 2022 03:42:00 +0000

Content marketing has been huge in 2021 and all signs point towards a very similar growth in 2022. The big issue is, because of its huge success, it means that the market is becoming saturated, making it very difficult for content marketers and businesses to stand out. The question now becomes, how do you make your content stand out in the coming year? What content is going to work best with audiences?

In this blog post, I’m going to share the top types of content that are going to work best in 2022.

In a hurry? Here are the best content types for 2022:
Video and live streaming
Interactive content
Webinars and online courses
Micro-influencers

The content marketing strategy of 2022

Before getting started with the best types of content that will work in 2022, I think it’s important to stress the importance of creating a content marketing strategy.

With so many businesses and marketers employing content marketing, creating a good content marketing strategy can make a big difference to your success. In fact, a study by the Content Marketing Institute has found that strategy issues and a lack of strategy are the major factors affecting the lack of success of content marketers.

So, this year, before beginning to create your content, start by putting together a content marketing strategy to help you achieve your results, more efficiently.

In order to have a good content marketing strategy, you will need to have the following:

A list of your goals from content marketing: What do you want to achieve? Do you want to get more leads from content, or are you simply looking to increase your brand awareness? Is your goal to get more traffic to your blog or to improve customer retention? Whatever your goals are, by putting them into perspective, you will be able to better plan out what steps you need to take in order to achieve them

A study of your target audience: In order to have successful content, you need to tailor it to your target audience. But what do you know about them? What are their interests and passions? What are their needs? What do they want to read about, or learn about? The more you know about your audience, the better you will be able to target your content to them.

Content Creation: What types of content are you going to create and when? Plan out your content creation in an editorial calendar and it will help you make sure you’re always providing content when you need to and it will also help you save time.

Content Promotion: How are you going to promote your content? Have a clear plan for how to promote your content and it will make your job that much easier for when you’ve published a new piece of content. Make sure to account for all different types of content, as some will require a different promotional strategy to others.

Analytics: How are you going to measure the success of your content? It’s important to stay on top of your analytics as it will help you make necessary changes and adjustments to your strategy as needed.

Now, let’s get into the types of content that will help you stand out in this coming year:

Read this next: The Future of Content Marketing: 10 Biggest Content Marketing Trends that Will Dominate 2022

Best content type #1: Video and live streaming
One of the biggest trends in content this year is sure to be video and live streaming. Watching videos is one of the main activities that people take part in online, with as much as a third of all online activity being spent watching videos.

(Video and Live Streaming)

2022 has also been a huge year for live streaming, with many of the major social networks adding it as a focus (Facebook, Twitter) and others showing signs that they are planning to address it in the very near future.

The issue with live streaming is that because of the massive push from Facebook, it might mean that the trend will start to implode over the coming year. There are simply too many live streams popping up in all of our news feeds, which makes it difficult for any one of them to really stand out.

That said, videos will be a great option in 2022 and it works great both for blogs and websites, as well as for social media. The best part is, it’s also much easier to create videos as a beginner, using tools like Animoto or Biteable.

Best content type #2: Improve engagement with interactive content
Interactive content is fun and can really help you improve your engagement, as you get your readers involved in the process.

(Black and Blue or White and Gold Dress)

Social media is full of polls left and right, some getting amazing engagement and some not at all, but websites and blogs are not making nearly as much use of this form of content. This year, try to add a few pieces of interactive content to get your audiences excited and engaged, such as polls, quizzes, lists, or interactive maps, among others.

There are plenty of tools that you can use to create this type of content, such as ContentTools or Boombox.

Read this next: eCommerce Quizzes: The Secret Weapon To Drive Sales & Engagement

Best content type #3: Offer more value with webinars and online courses

Another way to stand out in 2022 is to strive to offer more value to your audiences. One of the ways that you can do this is through webinars and online courses. The e-learning industry is huge, surpassing $100 billion in 2016, and yet, it feels like it’s massively underused.

(Buffer Email Courses)

Creating an online course is definitely much more time consuming and a lot more work than most other types of content; but, it’s also a very successful form of content and one that your competitors are much less likely to be using as well. Not to mention, it can even become a new form of monetizing your knowledge online.

Like with any other type of content, there is a plethora of tools that you can use to help you develop your own webinar or online course, such as Teachable or Thinkific.

Best content type #4: Content amplification and influencer marketing

When it comes to content amplification, influencer marketing has been huge in 2018 — and will most likely continue to be so in 2022. Influencers can be of huge help when promoting content, but the issue is, influencer marketing is simply becoming too popular; saturating the market.

One of the ways that businesses can work around this in 2022 is to make more use of micro-influencers. These influencers might have a smaller audience, but they are still influential over this group of people, and in fact, their group of fans and followers will likely be more targeted than the biggest influencers in your niche.

(restoring_radiance Instagram Profile)

It’s also a good idea to make better use of brand ambassadors, meaning users who are fans of your business and your content and helping you promote it. You can use a tool like Agorapulse to discover potential brand ambassadors and influencers already in your list or Buzzsumo for finding the top content and influencers in your niche.

Conclusion

2022 might be a tough year for content marketing because so many businesses and marketers have acknowledged the effectiveness of this form of marketing. That doesn’t mean though that you can’t still be very successful and drive amazing results from your content marketing campaigns; it only means you will need a bit more planning, more varied content and more quality content. What types of content do you think will be most successful this year?What will make or break a content marketing strategy in 2022?

Want to see how high-growth companies use Core dna’s all-in-one content management platform? Let’s chat.

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

How CMS Broke the Web

Core dna — Mon, 08 Aug 2022 00:36:46 +0000

Having a CMS sounded so nice at first.

It ensured that you wouldn’t be locked out of your own website, and you’ll be able to make changes whenever you need to. However, when all the developers started arguing about which language and framework should be used to build the website and system, you knew something might be wrong.

But you couldn't possibly have been prepared for what came next. The website got finished (albeit it took far longer than you would have liked). And you quickly learned that while the CMS allows you to add, curate, and publish content, that’s about all it lets you do.

Most CMSs are great at two things: (1) Letting you add content and (2) restricting you from breaking anything. Here’s the problem with most CMSs and what you can do instead.

CMSs still need developers
Most businesses choose a traditional CMS for one reason and one reason only:

Because they want to build and maintain a website without managing code (back-end) and front-end development systems.

For that, CMSs are great.

They’re great for the small-scale blogger who wants to update content every week and cares little about lead generation or conversion rates. They’re great for the person who wants to build a simple content-creating website with minimal customizations.

But that’s about as good as a CMS gets, unfortunately.

Traditional CMSs are extremely restrictive, only allowing you to make HTML, CSS, and JavaScript changes if the CMS approves. So you’re constantly fighting against the platform when it comes time to make changes to content, design, or optimize for conversions.

I know. I know. This looks simple.

(Image Source)

And this doesn’t...

(Image Source)

That is, if you’re not a developer. But here’s what most CMS vendors don’t tell you.

They don’t tell you that you’ll still need developers for fixing the inconsistent code of a mashed-together WordPress theme and plugin concoction. They don’t tell you how much this mix will slow your website down or create unintentional conflicts of code, and even leave your website open to greater security risks.

The whole reason that many businesses use a CMS is to lower the cost of front-end developer work and simplify website maintenance, updating, and customization processes.

The reality, though, is that a CMS actually makes all of these processes harder, not easier.

Since CMSs are so restrictive, they often make the whole website build process more technical than it may have been with a website built by a developer. Perhaps the most noteworthy problem with CMS “solutions” is that they do a cruddy job of protecting you from security breaches.

With all of the plugins and themes mashed together to create a (hopefully) cohesive whole, all that hackers need to access your website is a bit of forgetfulness.

Mossack Fonseca and Equifax experienced this first hand. Equifax was recently hacked, affecting 143 million people in the process.

What caused the breach?

Well, Equifax hadn’t updated one of their web applications for two months, and that slack was enough to create an entry door for vicious hackers to steal valuable information.

After the hack, one man said, "I really don't have a lot of faith in putting my last six numbers of my social security number on an Equifax website after what happened.”

Yikes.

Similarly, Mossack Fonseca, a law firm based in Panama, “did not encrypt its emails with Transport Layer Security protocols". They were using a version of Wordpress that was three months out of date and a customer portal, Drupal, that was also out of date, creating a security breach that leaked 11.5 million confidential documents.

While most businesses would like to sit back and relax after building and organizing their traditional CMS, the reality is that they can’t — not if they want to actually protect their website.

If not maintained — which sort of kills the point of getting the CMS in the first place — CMSs threaten your website’s security, seriously hinder website speed, and restrict necessary customizations.

But that’s only the tip of the iceberg.

Read this next: Using WordPress as an Enterprise CMS: 9 Things You Should Know

Leads make poor decisions
The problems with CMSs are spread far and wide. Wordpress accounts for 31% of all CMS websites.

(Image Source)

And even more shocking is that Wordpress accounts for 27.6% of all websites. One of the issues with all of that traditional CMS action is that CMOs and IT leads start to feel like they understand the website better than their front-end developers.

What happens next isn’t pretty.

Instead of allowing the front-end developers to make decisions about the language, framework, and systems to use, they make decisions on their own. But by choosing web applications, plugins, and themes based off of well-written sales copy for the particular product instead of real-time data, those decisions are nothing better than a shot in the dark.

The better thing would be for CMOs and IT leads to consult their front-end developers.

The problem with CMSs is that they make everyone feel like they’re an expert. But often, the person calling the shots doesn’t fully understand how their decisions are affecting the website’s speed and functionality on the back-end.

That’s a loss for your business and a loss for your team.

Read this next: How to Choose a SaaS CMS: The 9-Point Checklist

A CMS can be your best friend or your worst enemy
You’d think a CMS would make non-technical people happy.

However, that choice can often backfire. Too often, the people in charge make decisions with incomplete information. And the end result is that the marketing team gets stuck with a solution that’s not quite powerful enough, yet not quite flexible enough, either.

Which is exactly the opposite of what you want for your business.

It’s no secret that companies today strive after quick movement, efficient processes, and, above all else, agility. But with a traditional CMS, that desire for a quick-paced system remains nothing more than a dream.

Everyone is stuck.

The developer is stuck because of the restrictive framework that the CMS forces them to operate within, limiting their ability to make the changes they need to make. The designer is limited for much the same reason. They can’t design the website in the way they’d like to because the theme is practically set in stone.

And the lousy UI that most CMSs offer doesn’t allow for the kind of design that a truly effective designer wants to make.

And the content creators are stuck because they can only create certain kinds of content without going through a challenging and convoluted process to add a unique touch — like a correctly-sized infographic or a customizable CTA button.

Since everyone is stuck in their own hell of coding, designing, and creating, everything takes ten times longer than it should.

Which isn’t a healthy system for your business.

Alternatives to a traditional CMS
Okay. So you don’t want to use a traditional CMS. Good call. But what can you do instead?

Here are two options that will solve all of your CMS woes.

Alternative #1: Use a static website
At the beginning of the internet, the static website was the only option.

No one knew what the heck a CMS was yet. And they didn’t care.

They just learned the language of computers and designed a website that did what they wanted it to do. But, over time, marketers and salespeople and entrepreneurs wanted to be able to design their own websites without spending years learning the language of their robot counterparts.

Which is exactly why and when the CMS was created. The traditional CMS was built to cater to people who wanted to easily build, run, and maintain their website.

And, to some degree, that worked. But more and more people started becoming interested in static websites as the awareness of tradition CMS solutions, and their shortcomings skyrocketed. Here’s the Google Trends interest data in “static website generator.”

A static website is great… for some businesses.

If you’re the kind of business that only makes monthly changes to your website and you have a reliable front-end developer who can make these changes for you quickly and easily, then a static website is a good option.

As interest in static websites surges, so too does the market for them.

Jekyll is probably the most popular option for people interested in generating a static website. But Hexo is another option to consider and so is Hugo. The other thing you can do is simply hire someone to design a static website for you.

Copywriter Jacob McMillen uses a static website for his landing page.

He worked with a designer to create it, and it does exactly what he wants it to do. It ranks on Google for “expert copywriter,” and because of that, it consistently generates leads.

Jacob’s website works because he rarely publishes new content on it. If he does, he can simply reach out to a front-end developer and ask them to update it for him.

Of course, a static website won’t be for everyone. Most likely, your business’ website requires consistent iterations and content creation. If that’s you, then a static website just won’t cut it.

A static website will allow you to customize it however you like. But the disadvantage is that doing so is usually quite slow. It takes a long time to publish content since there’s no user interface to work with.

The solution?

A headless/cloud CMS.

Alternative #2: Use a headless or cloud CMS
What if there was a CMS with a helpful user interface that allowed for all of the customizations your front-end developers could possibly dream of? What if the CMS still allowed for easy content creation while also allowing UX and UI teams to use their full developer skillset?

Well, there is.

And it’s called a headless/cloud CMS.

Basically, it’s the customization potential of a static website mixed with the usability of a CMS. As you know, when it comes to CMSs, you have three options.

The first is a CMS that’s built in the cloud and managed by the vendor of your website. The seeming advantage of this solution is that your website will be flexible to change when you need to change it.

But the reality isn’t quite so compelling.

The reality is that any updated code that you send the vendor still needs to go through their processes to get tested, altered, or approved before the actual change is made. These vendors will often claim that the processes within their system are fast, but they likely aren’t. And your business will end up paying the price for that lack of agility.

In short, these CMSs are customizable but highly inefficient.

The second option you have is a basic, traditional CMS, which basically means you “buy” the technology - think Magento or Drupal.

We’ve already discussed many of the problems that these types of CMSs pose, such as website-slowing code discrepancies created by a convoluted mixture of themes, plugins, updates, and other web applications.

The CMS is packaged in a pretty box, but it doesn’t get the job done for a business that needs to move quickly. In fact, this kind of CMS makes building out your website more complicated than a website built by a front-end developer.

They are highly efficient, but only if you don’t want to make many customizations to your website. Which, if you want to build a successful business with a supporting website, you do.

And the third is the option you’ve been waiting for.

The majestic unicorn of all CMS solutions: the headless/cloud CMS. It offers a friendly UI combined with all of the customization potentials you could possibly want for your website.

By working with a front-end developer regularly who will help you make hefty changes to your website, a headless/cloud CMS will offer the developer what they want, the designer what they need, and the content creator what they require.

Most notably, a headless/cloud CMS will save you money in the long run.

How?

Because it incorporates multi-tenancy. Which basically means that since the website is built in the cloud, the processes for handling higher traffic and a bigger customer base won’t cost you any extra money like it would using a website hosted by a vendor.

Plus, your business will be able to efficiently make changes and keep up with the rapid pace of the internet — a requirement of any successful business today.

It’s still a CMS. Just not one that you’ll get stuck within.

Hint: Core dna offers exactly this kind of website CMS.

Our platform has pre-built web applications - more than 80 of them - meaning that you can quickly deploy and easily maintain your website. Plus new features are added every week without the need to “update” on your end.

Headless CMS lets UX and UI developers to customize your website while also streamlining content creation and website maintenance. Which means you’ll stop losing customers because of a hefty load of confusing “solutions.”

At first, the traditional CMS seemed like the perfect solution.

You thought it would allow you to customize your website without using a developer. You’d be able to go into the UI with your massive lack of coding knowledge and edit the appearance and content of your website.

And at first, it worked. After talking with someone in IT, you quickly realized why CMSs have broken the web. Namely, CMSs still need developers, leads make poor decisions, and, in the end, everyone is stuck.

Also, let's talk about the vendors for a bit. The vendors were forced to build platforms that had to be flexible to allow the developers who used these platforms to do whatever they wanted. So, in the end, everyone built the same thing 100 different ways, using different approaches, frameworks and coding styles. The net result was the same, but how they got there has now created major issues for the vendors and the customers of these platforms.

The vendors have to have backward compatibility with the original versions of their products. While customers end up with solutions that can only be managed by their internal teams.

Compounding the mess is that the developer wants to develop solutions the same way twice. So, those agency/development companies are now stuck supporting a variety of solutions that do the same thing but will have been coded many different ways.

Here's my question to you all:

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

Why isn't anyone complaining?

The agencies pass on the costs to customers as "technical retainers" while the customers just expect to be charged for "maintenance" of platforms.

This is where the disruption has to happen, don't you think?

Want to see how high-growth companies use Core dna’s all-in-one content management platform? Let’s chat.

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

Contentstack: Things You Should Know

Core dna — Thu, 04 Aug 2022 01:46:27 +0000

Deciding on your next content management system can depend on several factors, including your current tech stack, the requirements of different departments, your current priorities and where you see your business heading in the future.

In the world of headless CMS platforms, Contentstack has been grabbing a few headlines in recent years with a recorded $31.5M in venture capital funding to date and a host of new initiatives.

However, while good press coverage can be valuable, it doesn't necessarily tell the whole story about how well a product can meet your business's needs.

In this article, we'll dive into Contentstack to uncover everything you need to know and see if it truly stacks up to the demands of modern enterprises.

Want to know more about Contentstack? Here’s what you’ll learn in this article:

What is Contentstack?
Contentstack is a customer experience platform (CXP) that is redefining how content is created, managed and published in an enterprise environment.

It facilitates personalized and engaging interactions between businesses and their customers on websites and other digital touchpoints in the customer journey.

Contentstack has been used by brands such as Chase, Cisco and Sephora. A founding member of the MACH Alliance, Contentstack features a user-friendly interface that aims to help central content teams provide more autonomy to subject matter experts and other content creators within an organization.

Is Contentstack a headless CMS?
Yes. Contentstack now categorizes itself as a customer experience platform, citing the shift from developer-focused headless CMS platforms to more customer-oriented platforms that provide marketers and non-technical team members with the tools they need.

However, at its core, Contentstack is an API-based, headless content management platform that enables businesses to deliver content to multiple devices, including websites, mobile devices, IoT, AR, VR and more.

Read this next: Hybrid CMS: A Headless CMS, But With a Front-End

Does Contentstack have a headless commerce capability?
As a headless CMS, Contentstack does have headless commerce capabilities. While not native, Contentstack can seamlessly connect to an eCommerce platform.

For eCommerce stores, all product-related content can be managed from within Contentstack, including product descriptions, website, marketing and blog content.

Orders, pricing and cart details can then be managed within the integrated eCommerce platform, such as commercetools which Contentstack recommends.

Read this next: How to Choose an Enterprise eCommerce Solution

What is Contentstack best used for?
Contentstack is ideal for websites that include customized designs across multiple pages. If you're building large websites that require high volumes of content, want to achieve omnichannel content delivery and easily integrate third-party apps while still maintaining a high level of security.

How much does Contentstack cost?
Contentstack's pricing plans start at $995/month for the starter package. This works with teams managing single-property sites.

The grow package meant for teams managing single-property sites, apps, and IoT starts at $4500/month.

Pricing for the final scale package meant for enterprise-level organizations requires contacting the sales team.

Want to know the pros of Contentstack? Or even a comparison against Core dna? Visit our original blog for more below!

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

7 Ways to Improve API Performance

Core dna — Mon, 01 Aug 2022 03:12:25 +0000

Performance problems are common. Below are 7 ideas to consider to help improve API performance.

Add pagination to solve relatively large response payloads
Breakdown APIs into micro-services
Create synchronous APIs
Use connection pooling
Add Caching
Deploy APIs within auto-scaling groups
Switch to asynchronous error-logging

Asset Management
To help increase website speed, it's essential to manage what goes on your web pages. For example, what size are your files? What type of images are you using? Even the most minor details matter when it comes to site speed.

Below are our best tips when it comes to assent management:

Always manage the amount of content you have per page. Clear, succinct content is almost always the way to go.
Be careful with rendering images. A poor rendering performance can translate into a relatively high bounce rate.
The best image format is WebP. WebP provides superior lossless and lossy compression for images. You can use WebP to create smaller, richer images that make the web page faster.
You always want to optimize images for different device sizes.
Use real-time scaling for perfect sizes and widths.
Size matters. File size, that is. The file size is the amount of space your file is taking up on your hard drive. Smaller images contribute to webpage faster load time.

Channel Management
Mobile vs. Desktop vs. IoT

You can learn how to speed up a website by addressing how you manage various channels. Of course, the way you manage your mobile site versus your desktop site will be different. As a general rule of thumb, desktop sites usually contain a wide range of content and information. Mobile sites typically include only the most important and time or location-specific functions and features. And what about the Internet of things (IoT)? IoT devices are the network of tangible objects that collect and exchange data in real-time using embedded sensors. IoT Device Management makes it easy to securely register, organize, and monitor data in the IoT environment. There are dedicated device management platforms you may want to consider.

Building a System for Various Channels: Increase website speed by ensuring your system is compatible with various communication channels. There's nothing worse than going on a mobile site and seeing extra-large images and unorganized content because the website owner didn't optimize the site for various channels. It's also a good idea to maximize the capabilities of the browser (like browser caching) to your advantage!

Minimize the Amount of Network Traffic: Nothing slows down a site like an incoming boom of unexpected traffic. You can reduce bandwidth by setting access restrictions, malware scanning, and identifying bandwidth hogs.

Read this Next: eCommerce API: What Is It & How to Harness the Power of the eCommerce API Economy

The Infrastructure
Next on the list of things that can make or break your page load speed is the infrastructure or the hardware, media, and software responsible for connecting computers and users to the internet. So yes, this one's a big deal. How your content as assets are distributed matters. Visitors expect a consistent experience.

Here's what your site's infrastructure should include for optimal page speed and performance.

Caching policies
Security policies
Malicious traffic detection and blocking (web application firewall) to reduce traffic bottlenecks
Unauthorized access identification and rectification
Auto Scale for traffic spikes to maintain consistent response
Redundancy for failures
Reporting and monitoring (to identify abnormal behavior or poor performance 24/7 support and continuous upgrades)

Platforms
Finally, the platform you use will influence your site speed. Choosing a platform that will increase website speed while delivering everything you need can be a challenge.

Not sure what to look for in a platform? If a platform can check all the boxes below, it's considered adequate; if not, you may want to consider switching.

A good platform should:

Have architecture designed for speed without bloatware.
Reduce external systems.
Stay updated with the latest software systems and upgrade platform components like operating systems, language, and latest DBs.
Have the ability to deliver the tech without plugins.
Reduce the need for 3rd party systems that slow down the experience.
Have a modern framework for micro-services.
Improve search performance and use tools like Elasticsearch etc.
Offer flexible integration with other systems.
Provide content modeling that meets your needs.
Have a division of real-time vs. background activities to ensure that the user experience is maximized.
Offer reporting to provide optimization opportunities. For example, reports should identify slow parts of the system and upgrade to tune results.
Boast continuous platform updates for speed and security.
Have performance SLAs that cover the speed and the uptime of the platform
Provide ongoing performance tuning to ensure that the platform is working at peak performance and that any changes have not altered its performance.

Read this next: How will a SaaS CMS help my brand

Why Are Some Websites Slow?
There's a lot to consider when trying to figure out why your site's website speed isn't up to par. Response time and performance contribute to its success, so taking the opportunity to improve your site is well worth the extra effort.

Are you looking for a service that can keep up with your performance needs? Core DNA is a platform for modern websites featuring a Headless Framework, built-in native code ( no plugins), SAS, and speed. Core DNA handles everything from hosting, CDN, security, and upgrades (new features). The best part? It's ultra-fast to deploy - it won't take months to build your website.

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

Learn from these Headless CMS use cases

Core dna — Thu, 28 Jul 2022 01:06:23 +0000

Learn from the most successful headless and decoupled content management system (CMS) use cases to incorporate into your business strategy.

What are the different types of headless platforms
Over the past 4 years there has been an explosion of new headless CMS platforms. These platforms can be divided into 2 categories. 1. Open source headless CMS platforms and 2. SaaS or Cloud headless CMS platforms.

Open-source headless CMS platforms
Software released under an open-source license allows developers to directly modify the source code. This control over the platform lets developers customize a CMS to meet their team’s needs.

Since developers from all over the world work collaboratively with the source code in an open environment, those that are new to the platform or have specific questions about how it works can reach out to experienced programmers within the community to get their answers. Let’s take a look at three leading open-source CMS vendors:

1. Strapi

(Strapi Homepage)

Strapi is an open-source CMS platform that’s built on Node.js and works with the database and self-hosting solutions of your choice.

The primary goal of Strapi is to build a solid API, while offering an intuitive admin panel. While Strapi has capabilities to ease the task of managing user sessions and applications, users have encountered occasional problems with the drag-and-drop interface and array data types.

Strapi is ideal for small companies that need a flexible API for their front-end.

Top Strapi features:
Built-in support RESTful and GraphQL APIs.
100% JavaScript for front-end and CMS.
Intuitive admin console for content editors.
Highly extensible with a built-in plugin system.
Simple for developers to use and review.

2. Cockpit

(Cockpit Homepage)

Cockpit is a free, open-source, lightweight CMS that’s built to work with NoSQL databases like MongoDB and SQLite. It’s headless and API-first, meaning the CMS focuses only on back-end APIs to manage meta-data and data entries.

There’s no presentation layer, so developers have total freedom to review and manage the front-end. Cockpit works well for clients who want a simple installation and require an adaptable content structure. Cockpit is also well-suited to support content on multiple devices.

Cockpit is ideal for small digitally-forward businesses.

Top Cockpit features:
Simple installation and self-hosted.
API-first CMS with JSON content.
Language and database agnostic.
Flexible content models and no predefined models.
Modern and clean UI.

3. Directus

(Directus Homepage)

Directus is an open-source software platform suitable for projects that use customized database structures, as it comes with a wrapper to serve content from SQL databases via an API.

Directus also allows non-IT users to manage content through the Admin App. The platform has a strong version control system, allowing for rollbacks and retrieval of previous versions. While it does allow for uploading files, Directus occasionally encounters problems with long-form videos.

Directus is ideal for small to mid-size businesses that use traditional SQL databases.

Top Directus features:
Every aspect of the CMS is extensible and customizable, with no limitations.

Multilingual content management, with 10+ languages supported out of the box.

Built-in authentication and support for other SSO services.
Intuitive and secure admin app for content creators.
Unopinionated, so there are no practices or specific languages required.

SaaS headless CMS platforms
With SaaS headless CMS platforms, developers are not allowed to modify the source code. Users need a specific license key to implement these systems, either on-site or through the cloud, and rely on the vendors for further customization or extensions of the software.

SaaS headless CMS platforms ease the burden for IT teams, as the vendor is responsible for updates, maintenance, and technical support.

1. Core dna

(Core dna Homepage)

Core dna is not just a CMS, but a digital experience platform (DXP) that supports eCommerce, intranets, extranets, customer portals, and digital workplace solutions.

The platform has features for customizable templates, WYSIWYG content creation, image editing, search engine optimization (SEO) management, and more. With its APIs, Core dna can be integrated with third-party tools that support eCommerce, social media promotion, digital marketing, customer relationship management, and more.

Core dna targets the mid-size and enterprise-level markets with high-traffic and complex requirements, boasting clients such as Tivoli Audio, Stanley-PMI and SEEK.

Top Core dna features:
All-in-one DXP for websites, eCommerce, intranets, and more.
Personalization features that make dynamic websites quick to launch.

Webhooks make integration with other systems straightforward.
Pre-built solutions for a variety of industries.
Over 1500 new features added every year.
Check out the rest of the article on our website below:

Original Cora dna article can be found here.

What is a Headless CMS?

Core dna — Wed, 20 Jul 2022 06:00:59 +0000

The headless content management (CMS) space has gained traction in recent years, leading to the renewed excitement around a content management model that can help brands handle the relentless number of emerging devices and channels. Old debates about the relevance of headless content management have reignited. But with new jargon, comes new levels of confusion. So, let’s break it down:

What’s a headless content management system?
What’s a decoupled content management system?
Headless vs decoupled: What’s the difference?
Decoupled vs headless content management: Pros and Cons
Disadvantages of a headless CMS
Advantages of a decoupled CMS
Why headless and why now?
What’s API-first and a headless API?
What does front-end agnostic mean?
What’s a hybrid CMS and a hybrid headless CMS?
What’s a content-as-a-service (CaaS)?
Does a headless CMS help with omnichannel marketing?

So, what is a headless CMS? Well, If a traditional CMS was a body, the “head” would be the front-end components like the front-end framework and template system. If you chop that head off, and you’re left with a headless CMS.

This type of platform has no default front-end system to determine how the content is presented to the end-user. Instead, a headless CMS is front-end agnostic, meaning that your content is raw and can be published anywhere, through any framework.

By getting rid of the front-end delivery layer, your CMS is suddenly a content-only data source. It produces content and then sits there. Waiting.

This is because there is no default “head”. Front-end developers are free to build as many heads as they like…To retrieve the content for each channel, the headless CMS responds to API calls.

What’s a decoupled content management system?
Consider headless content management as a sub-set of decoupled content management (as decoupled CMS is headless, and then some).

A decoupled CMS (a.k.a. hybrid CMS), has your content managed separately and is front-end agnostic, just like a headless CMS. Yet, it has front-end delivery tools in the box, like templates for you.

The difference is that the back-end and front-end are not “coupled” to each other through a database like with a traditional CMS. Instead, the front-end and back-end communicate to each other through calls to an API.

So, remember when we chopped the “head” off a traditional CMS to make it headless? Well, imagine the same here, except keeping the head. It’s not attached to the main body as with a traditional CMS - but you aren’t totally left to your own devices when it comes to front-end delivery, like with a headless CMS, either.

Read this next: Contentstack: Everything You Need To Know Before Using Contentstack as a Headless CMS

Headless vs decoupled: What’s the difference?
A headless CMS has modelling and editorial tools to create and edit content. But the concept of “publishing” content just means making it available via an API. It assumes that you and your nerdy front-end development can handle the rest with whichever frameworks & tools.

A decoupled CMS, on the other hand, doesn’t assume anything. It does everything headless does, but it doesn’t stop there. It also says, “Hey, we’ve got some templating tools here so you aren’t working from scratch.”

That’s just good manners, right? Blend Interactive CSO, Deane Barker, summed up the difference quite succinctly:

“A decoupled platform is proactive — it prepares content for presentation and pushes it into a delivery environment. A headless CMS is reactive — it manages content, then just sits and waits for some process to ask for it.”

For marketers, this subtle difference can be significant. While the decoupled system uses the templates, WYSIWYG editing and other traditional CMS system tools; many of those tools are not available in headless architecture. However, purely headless systems allow more control over how the content appears on each device. So, more fun for eager front-end developers, less fun for non-tech savvy marketers.

Decoupled vs headless content management: Pros and Cons

Advantages of a headless platform

Front-end agnostic
A headless or decoupled CMS is front-end framework agnostic. That means you can publish content on any device or channel via API calls. Plus, front-end developers are free to use their favorite frameworks and tools.
APIs
Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) enable two technologies to speak to each other. Both use APIs to connect and communicate with other softwares and channels, allowing for content delivery. But that’s not all. APIs can also be used to send data from those channels, devices, and touchpoints back for processing, analysis, and re-distribution.
Future-proof
APIs aren’t just ready to talk to any existing software or device, they’re prepared to speak to any new device or channel that emerges in 2019 and beyond. Thus, your content will remain future-proof, no matter what innovative device next hits the market.

Read this next: eCommerce API: What Is It & How to Harness the Power of the eCommerce API Economy

Read about the disadvantages of a headless CMS and more here

Decoupled CMS Explained: Pros and Cons

Core dna — Tue, 17 May 2022 00:48:11 +0000

In today’s multi-channel environment, where content is consumed across various digital touchpoints, the legacy or monolithic CMS is no longer the only option. Instead, we’ve seen terms like headless CMS, decoupled CMS, agile CMS, hybrid CMS and more thrown around as new CMS architectures continue to be designed, leaving companies spoilt for choice.

To make things easier, in this article, we’ll dive into the decoupled CMS, explaining what it is and highlighting the differences between headless and decoupled architectures. We’ll also look at the pros and cons of a decoupled CMS for your business compared to legacy and headless platforms.

Find out how a decoupled CMS can transform how you think about web content, the difference between headless vs traditional CMS, things to consider when choosing a CMS, and many more.

What is decoupled CMS?
A decoupled CMS is a CMS that has uncoupled the front-end delivery system from the back-end business module.

Historically, CMSs had been tightly coupled between the front and back end. In most cases, the front-end was the presentation layer, responsible for delivering content to a website or other front-end presentation channel.

On the other hand, the back-end was where all the computation was stored and where users could create, edit and generally manage content.

This traditional or legacy architecture was the most prominent system for quite some time as the back-end languages were designed to process large amounts of information but not create front-end experiences.

However, as new systems evolved, new front-end frameworks were developed that took advantage of more enhanced browser capabilities. This resulted in the front-end requiring greater skills to create the optimum user experience.

Today, most UX innovations occur at the front end, with frameworks like React, Vue, and Angular leading the charge.

In addition, some new and advanced frameworks like Stencil, a compiler that generates web components and builds high-performance web applications, and Svelte, an open-source front-end compiler, have been introduced to improve the user experience even more.

What are the differences between decoupled CMS vs headless CMS architecture?
A decoupled CMS may have a front-end framework built into the system.

For example, Core dna supports templating through Smarty and Twig. A templating engine for PHP, Smarty facilitates the separation of presentation from application logic code. Meanwhile, Twig provides a modern templating engine that is easier to learn, faster, and more secure than PHP.

On the other hand, in a headless CMS system, the interface is generally connected through an API. Also, there may be no provisions for a front-end framework to support accessing the API in some cases.

In essence, everything must be constructed from scratch. Still, many headless platforms provide SDKs that provide access to the API using some of the more commonly available and popular frameworks like React mentioned above, Vue, and others.

The Core dna approach to headless is to give the developers the flexibility to deliver solutions in a pure headless using their own front end approach and to also give those developers looking for a quick solution a way to use the templating to deliver their outcomes.

Want to read more about decoupled CMS? Click here!

What do you wish to see?

Core dna — Wed, 04 May 2022 04:19:53 +0000

What content would you like to see from us or more of? 👀

Let us know below! 👇

We love hearing from you 😊

Elasticsearch: A Beginner's Guide

Core dna — Mon, 02 May 2022 02:05:37 +0000

Search functionality is an often underappreciated facet of the digital user experience. Whether potential visitors are trying to locate a blog article on a specific topic or scouring an eCommerce website for products, having an on-site search engine can be beneficial.

Most users are already accustomed to using search engines such as Google, which processes approximately 5.8 billion searches per day. They expect the websites they visit to offer a similar quality search experience.

eCommerce and enterprise companies include this search functionality on their websites through something known as Elasticsearch. But Elasticsearch is more than just a search engine.

In this article, we’ll provide some guidance on what Elasticsearch is, explain how it works, and some of its benefits.

In a hurry? Here’s what you’d find in this article:
What is Elasticsearch?
What is Elasticsearch for?
How does Elasticsearch work?
Benefits of Elasticsearch
Benefits of Elasticsearch for content marketers
Benefits of Elasticsearch for eCommerce
Elasticsearch real-life case studies

What is Elasticsearch?
Elasticsearch is an analytics and full-text search engine that provides search functionality for web applications, including blogs, eCommerce websites and more. It is distributed, open-source, built on Apache Lucene and written in Java.

Elasticsearch is also one component of a set of open-source tools known as the ELK Stack. The others in that stack are Logstash and Kibana, and together they combine to provide data ingestion, storage, enrichment, visualization and analysis of data.

What is Elasticsearch for?
Elasticsearch is used to query and analyze data of various types, both structured and unstructured. Unlike other search tools that rely on text searches, Elasticsearch provides fast search responses using the same technology powering Google’s search engine, called inverted indexing, and other best-in-class algorithms.

Elasticsearch provides high performance, distributed architecture, scalability and speed.

It analyzes billions of data points in seconds and can provide aggregations to explore trends and patterns within the data. This enables several use cases such as search functionality for applications, websites and enterprises, logging, infrastructure metrics, analytics and more.

How does Elasticsearch work?
In order to understand how Elasticsearch works, it’s essential to learn more about some of the key components and how it organizes data.

In Elasticsearch, data is stored as JSON documents and separated into fields similar to rows and columns in a database. A blog article or data log of job descriptions would be examples of documents.

Next, we have an index. An index is similar to a database and is a collection of documents with similar properties or characteristics. Elasticsearch stores that document and adds a reference that makes it searchable in an index.

Data in an index isn’t stored directly in strings. Instead, documents are split into their individual search terms, and these terms are mapped to the documents.

For example, when trying to find all of the times the word “human” is mentioned in an encyclopedia, you would have two options. Scan the entire book or turn to the index at the back that catalogs all of the words mentioned. Data in Elasticsearch is stored similarly to an encyclopedia index, allowing Elasticsearch to quickly find best-matches even when scanning large data sets.

General benefits of Elasticsearch
Search functionality is essential, but what makes Elasticsearch so popular within the enterprise? Here are a few of the general benefits.

1. Optimizes the user experience (UX)
Elasticsearch makes it possible for anyone to sift through large volumes of data quite easily. Not only can this data be searched, but Elasticsearch also organizes and filters that information to give it context.

It also provides a structure that pulls disparate data sources into one view. For example, when searching on an eCommerce website, Elasticsearch can push products with the most popularity or a five-star rating towards the top of the search results.

2. Enhances visitor engagement
Keeping visitors engaged can make the difference in converting them from simply a visitor and turning them into a customer. Elasticsearch can help visitors to find things they’re searching for faster than if they’re merely browsing.

Built-in features also allow it to correct typos, rectify spelling mistakes, and even autocomplete searches that customers may have been conducting.

3. Search result reporting
Search results or reports in Elasticsearch are boosted by the fact that different sorting and weighting methods can be introduced. It also facilitates advanced querying that enables users to retrieve a combination of queries and return more precise results from search.

Advanced search functionality, especially on busy eCommerce sites or similar applications that make heavy use of faceted search is resource-intensive on the server side. A moderately busy site can keep a server tied up serving search information back to users.

Elasticsearch has built-in support for scaling it across multiple servers, both to expand capacity and provide fail-safe redundancy. It does this by using shards, a way of splitting data up and providing data integrity (a single source of truth) and redundancy (distributed on many machines).

Benefits of Elasticsearch for content marketers
Content marketers can leverage the power of Elasticsearch to get more out of specific marketing campaigns and existing content.

1. Quick searches
Loading time is a critical aspect of the user experience, and that includes the time spent searching. With Elasticsearch, searches through extensive website content are quick and present accurate info with little effort, allowing visitors to conduct their business quickly.

Read this next: eCommerce Web Design: A 36-Point Checklist to Create The Best eCommerce Site

2. Data visualization
Kibana is a data visualization software that provides a browser-based interface to sift through Elasticsearch data. This enables you to create visualizations of the information that is queried and produce nice reports. These visualizations can then be placed into a custom interactive dashboard that makes finding patterns and details within the data much more straightforward.

3. Error corrections
How often have you misspelled a search query, yet a search engine still knows what you wanted to find? Elasticsearch allows site visitors to make spelling mistakes and still find the information they were looking for.

4. Alternative searches
With autocorrect, you can suggest alternative searches based on the previous search. Suggested terms and categories will be displayed that match the search intent of the site visitor.

5. Real-time analytics
Elasticsearch allows you to build real-time analytics that can provide unique customer insights such as customer visit patterns and more.

Read the rest of the article here!

eCommerce CMS: 32 Must-Have CMS Features (& Why Most Commerce Platforms Aren't Good CMS)

Core dna — Thu, 28 Apr 2022 07:39:32 +0000

There's eCommerce, and then there's eCommerce CMS.

When you start looking into eCommerce platforms to grow your online store, you'll be immediately greeted by countless platforms touting their accessibility and vying for your business.

But have you thought about a content management system? How will you easily manage content and grow your website?

Spoiler alert. A lot of well-known commerce platforms don't make great CMS platforms. So we're diving into what makes a CMS great versus not so great to make things easier.

Choosing an eCommerce CMS? Here’s what you’ll learn in this article:
Why some popular eCommerce platforms don't make the best CMS platforms
eCommerce CMS checklist: Features that make the best content and eCommerce CMS

Customer attribute features
Site attribute features
Administrator attribute features
Integration attribute features
Scale attribute features
Security attribute features
Return on investment features
Questions to ask your eCommerce CMS vendor
Bonus guide: 100+ questions to ask your eCommerce CMS vendor
From pricing to site management, this list has every question and more you should be asking yourself and the eCommerce CMS vendor.

Why some popular eCommerce platforms don't make the best CMS platforms
A content management system lets you (the shop owner) create, edit and publish digital website content without being a JavaScript connoisseur or a Python genius. While all CMS systems don't require the users to write any code, crucial eCommerce capabilities can differ.

Here's why some of the most well-known platforms drop the ball when it comes to content management.

1. Some platforms rely on 3rd party "plugins" and "apps," which they don't have control over
Third-party apps and services are created by companies or developers that are not the commerce platform you're working with. These 3rd party "plugins" and "apps" may pose a security threat - which leads us to the question, is it time for platforms to ditch third-party apps altogether?

2. CMS and Commerce should be separated
eCommerce functionalities and CMS functionalities are different. CMS is there to help you manage content, and the eCommerce platform is there to allow you to sell online.

CMS strives to handle everything from content and comments to themes and reviews on your website. Many major commerce platforms cannot allow you to manage everything specific to your online store on a single platform.

Read this next: Content and Commerce: Exploring The Secrets of High-Growth eCommerce Brands

**3. Most popular eCommerce platforms are exactly what they sound **like - commerce-first platforms
They are not CMS systems from the get-go. To create the best possible content and user experience, look for an eCommerce platform that already serves as a reliable CMS.

eCommerce CMS checklist: Features that make the best content and eCommerce CMS
When trying to narrow down the options, eCommerce CMS software can make or break your online business. Not sure which must-have features you should consider when choosing a CMS? When you break it down, here's what you should look for in a great CMS platform.

Single Customer View (SCV)
Group or segment users
Personalized content creation
Intuitive site navigation & search function
SEO basics
Personalization
Multi-language and multi-site
Schedule posts & pages
Content workflow
Preview content
Rich text & HTML editor
APIs
Integrations with other apps or software
Synchronize with your CRM
Workflow trigger
Consistency
Shared data (CDN)
Flexibility
Omnichannel
Load balancing
Patched and maintained by the CMS vendor
Web Access Firewall (WAF)
Bug bounty program
Penetration testing
SSL certificates
Multi-layer infrastructure
Log analysis
Consistent integration
Out-of-the-box features
Single codebase
Consistent architecture

Customer attribute features
How much do you know about your customers? Your CMS platform should make collecting and using visitor data simple, easy, and effective. Be sure your CMS includes the following.

1. Single Customer View (SCV)
Imagine a single view of customer data. Now, imagine how much easier a single view across CMS and eCommerce platforms will make your life. SCV collects data from various sources and matches and merges the data to create a single, accurate record for each customer.

2. Group or segment users
Get to know your customers better. User segmentation separates your audience into distinct groups or segments based on common characteristics.

Common types of customer segmentation:

Demographic segmentation: Gender, age, occupation, marital status, income
Geographic segmentation: Country, state, or city of residence
Technographic segmentation: Preferred technologies, software, or mobile devices
Psychographic segmentation: Attitudes, interests, or personality traits
Behavioral segmentation: Actions, spending habits, usage frequency, browsing history, order value
Ecommerce CMS: User group

Each segment is unique. Once you have this group of people lumped together, you can use it for marketing purposes.

3. Personalized Content Creation
Create a target market for your product or service. Once you have market segments, you can personalize content and/or price based on user groups. A good CMS will use visitor data to your advantage to provide relevant content that increases user satisfaction.

4. Intuitive site navigation & search function
Without site navigation, your users can't figure out where anything is. Website navigation allows your browsers to find what they're looking for quickly.

If it takes more than a couple of seconds to find something, rest assured they'll move on to a competitor site.

And another insider's tip; people love search functions. Consumers expect to do a quick search on your site and immediately find what they're looking for.

(One of our customers, Randy’s, their users are care mechanics and engineers, so they’re making it easy for them to find the parts they’re looking for)

Read this next: eCommerce Web Design: A 36-Point Checklist to Create The Best eCommerce Site

5. SEO basics
SEO capabilities are essential to boost your ranking on search engines. Google should crawl your website's pages, understand what your site is about and link the pages to relevant keywords.

If you want your website to rank on Google's top 10, look for these top 3 SEO basics in a CMS.

Customizable URLs: You should have the opportunity to make your URL SEO-friendly.

Canonical tagging: You should add a canonical tag if you have similar content on your site. For example, let's say you have an eCommerce store that sells T-shirts. Most of your products are similar but have slight differences; canonical tags allow search engines to know there's a similar copy to avoid "duplicate" content appearing on multiple URLs.
Image optimization: Make sure your site looks good! Optimized web images provide top-quality images in the proper format, dimension, and size.

Read this next: Is SEO Dead? The Answer Is Yes, And No

6. Personalization
Showcase your products or services according to the needs of your target audience. Content personalization offers a better user experience while targeting specific content to specific people.

Just like you probably wouldn't buy your vegan friend a burger, you can tailor experiences and communications based on what your audience cares about.

[Read this next:] eCommerce Personalization: Why Demographic-Based Personalization is on Its Way Out (And What to Do Instead)

7. Multi-language and multi-site
Your CMS platform should be able to reach global audiences with multilingual sites. Connect with your global audience in their native language.

If your websites have various languages, a good CMS will configure the languages of each site when you edit the languages of all of your sites at once.

Read this next: Multi-Store eCommerce: Why You Need It, And How to Manage It

Administrator attribute features
As the site owner, you want a CMS platform that will make administrative tasks manageable and straightforward. Below are the features that will make your day-to-day a whole lot easier.

8. Schedule posts & pages
Your CMS system should help you organize your workflow. Set posts and pages to be automatically published. Admins can select a specific date and time in the future for the post to be published.

9. Content workflow
With a content workflow, you can set roles and permissions for various users. Regardless of the type of content that needs to be delivered, you should be able to create workflows for Approval, Approved, Published, and Archived content.

10. Preview content
Never blindly publish content. A good CMS platform will have a preview feature so you can see what any piece of content will look like for the end-user before you hit the publish button.

11. Rich text & HTML editor
If you're not a coder, WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) allows you to edit content as it would look when printed or displayed as a finished product on your website. Look for a CMS with a modern WYSIWYG editor that is extendable.

Integration attribute features
As customers go through their shopping journey on your website, every interaction matters. You want to edit and manage content on every page of your store to create a tailor-made, pleasant experience. The following will help you achieve it.

To read the other 20 tips, click here