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A Case Study: CushyCMS
Last month a Houston lawyer in desperate need of an online presence contacted me. Her timeline was tight, her budget - like many entrepreneurs’ - was limited, and her knowledge of WordPress was nil. I did not want to throw away the opportunity to work with Melissa G. Martin, P.C. for a number of reasons, not least of which were the facts that she was referred to me by the University of Houston, took the time to completely fill me in on her project, and was so hands-off.
But I was essentially between a rock and a hard place. How would I provide my client with a simple, yet appealing design along with the capability to manage her own content, while at the same time honoring my own internal budget? Enter CushyCMS, the WordPress developer’s dream solution for small business owners, smaller budgets, and impending deadlines.
The Story Behind CushyCMS
I signed up to CushyCMS last month during its beta period, shortly after the fledgling content management system gained massive online exposure. An interesting side story is that while the service was only open via invite at the time, by simply watching the introduction video to CushyCMS, I was able to sign up using the invite code featured in the video.
CushyCMS appealed to me because of its versatility, ease of use, incredibly fast implementation time, and price. The service is absolutely free, but Guy King, founder of CushyCMS, notified me in an email exchange that a paid option which will allow designers to use our own logos, colors and subdomains will be available very, very soon.
CushyCMS Is Versatile And Easy
One of the most amazing features of CushyCMS is that it allows developers to explicitly and easily define which portions of a website may be edited by a client. For the Law Office of Melissa G. Martin, P.C. project, the only sections of my client’s website that I wanted her touching were the main content blocks, as well as the photos.
I worked long and hard to ensure that the navigation panel on Melissa’s website worked in every major browser, so it was important to me that that part of the website remained safe from accidental edits. This is truly where CushyCMS shines. By simply adding the cushycms class definition to any document object that I wanted Melissa to have control over, I was able to secure her website from unwanted editing errors while at the same time provide Melissa with a dreadfully simple method by which to make small or large content edits on her website. It was truly as easy as that.
A Glance At The Control Panel of CushyCMS
For every website setup on the CushyCMS platform, designers have the option of choosing which pages will be editable to their clients. Melissa needed control over every one of the seven pages on her website, so I added them all.
Now by simply clicking on the titles of each page, Melissa is able on the CushyCMS platform to edit the content of her website as if she were typing in a simple text editor.
I wish there were more to say about how easy it was to set up my client’s website using CushyCMS, but there really is not. By defining editable page regions during the site building process, inviting my client to my CushyCMS panel as an editor, and giving Melissa a short tutorial on how to change the content on her website, I was able to skirt major budget and timeline issues on my end and also avoid headaches for Melissa when she decides in the future to change information on her new website.
The Bottom Line
It is said that it is difficult to teach an old dog new tricks, and in my case it’s true. I am extremely partial to WordPress for a million and one reasons, but sometimes it is overkill for a small project. One of the most difficult aspects of running my business over the last few years has been coming up with cost-effective and time-effective solutions for small business owners with regard to having control over the content of their websites. CushyCMS seriously bailed me out and I’m grateful that it appeared at the time that it did.
When the honeymoon is over between me and CushyCMS, I am sure that I will long for certain features, namely the following:
- The ability to brand my control panel (think Basecamp) (in the works)
- Domain branding (in the works)
- The option to turn off visual editing as the default (I prefer code views)
- The ability to add more information about my content editors and myself (phone number, address, etc.)
- Notifications via email when a content editor makes changes to their website
- The ability to turn off editing capability for case-by-case content blocks (for example, allowing my client to edit certain blocks while I have the ability to edit other blocks of content)
All of these enhancements to the CushyCMS system would make it that much better, but at the same time I realize that the reason I love it so much is due to its simplicity. Ultimately, I’m thankful for the system that is available at the moment and I’m looking forward to the new branding options that are set to launch in the next few weeks.
Post Date: May 8, 2008