Executionists, Inc.

What is a Content Management System? (CMS) If you’ve ever had a Myspace page, a personal Yahoo!, My MSN or iGoogle page, a membership to a dating site or used eBay, then you’ve used a CMS.

My MSN Myspace

CMS allows a person untrained in web development and coding to upload/edit content on a website. It makes it easy for the average Joe/Jill to manage their online stuff.

We are often asked to build CMS for websites. But here’s the bad news… No matter how “easy” the CMS is designed, it’s still work for the end user. It takes time and focus to log onto an online CMS, prepare your content, text and graphics, and upload it to the system.

Many clients initially think they have the time to do the CMS on their site but usually run into problems like: forgetting username and password, writing crappy text, unable to optimize images correctly, etc. Many times these clients come back to the developer to ask them to manage the content for their site.

So the client pays $X,000 for a CMS and ends up paying a developer $X,000 to make the edits.

We always caution our clients before building a CMS. They need to realistically think about the ongoing site maintenance tasks and determine if the added cost of the CMS and the manpower on their side is worth it instead of paying their developer for edits on an as-needed basis.

Starting in 1997 with a whimsical Felderman and Keating website, Executionists kicked off a successful decade of designing for architectural construction firms. We’ve won several design awards for these projects, including a Realcomm Digital Media Award for Best Website and Macromedia Shocked Site of the Day.

Since then we’ve launched more sites, with the numbers constantly growing. Here are a couple of our most recent projects…

Felderman Keatinge + Associates
(www.fkadesign.com)
Launched 2007

Pinnacle Contracting Corporation
(www.pincon.com)
Launched 2007

SAA
Currently in progress
Launch TBA

We love print designers! I designed print for 10 years myself and have great respect for those talented and brave enough to make it their profession.

BUT… though it may seem convenient to have your print designer design your new website, be forewarned here are some of the inherent differences between print and web designers that we’ve experienced.

1) Print designers typically don’t understand efficient navigation and website usability issues.

An key goal of online design is moving prospective visitors through the site in the most efficient and intuitive manner possible. In print design there is little need to move visitors through multiple pages except in a linear, one-dimensional way.

A print designer may be good at capturing and presenting site navigation in a design but the real usability of that navigation may not reflect best-practices developed from experience designing for the online environment.

2) Print designers tend to create graphics that can only be updated through hands-on Photoshop work, not through a combination of more expedient HTML and graphic elements.

Print designers tend to develop collaged images that are well designed, but because they are unified image and text they are basically one graphic. These page graphics are often slow to download. Utilizing a combination of system text and judicious graphics is a more web-friendly approach because they are easier to update and better for search engine results.

3) Many print designers design for an 8.5 x 11″ printed page which often does not translate well to browser specifications.

The majority of browsers use the current screen resolution standard of at least 1024 x 768. In non-web design speak, 14.2 x 10.67″.. a completely different format than 8.5 x 11″. Getting graphics in 8.5 x 11 format from a client is a sure indication that they were developed by a print designer.

What this means is that your developer will have to redo the page layout to make it optimal for web-browsing and the screen resolution.

The bottom line is… if you hire your print designer for your new website design, the potential is that you’ll end up spending more money and more time when your web designer has to redo it. If you love your print designer and want to use them for your website, call your web developer and introduce them early on. This way you can combine their experience and get a better end result.