What is Umbraco? An insight in to one of the world's leading CMS platforms...

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So, you’ve decided that you want a new website, but you feel a little overwhelmed with all the choices? Whilst we cannot cover everything that Umbraco has to offer, hopefully, as an Umbraco Gold Partner, we will be able to give you an insight into why it is one of the world’s most popular content management system (CMS) platforms

So, you’ve decided that you want a new website, but you feel a little overwhelmed with all the choices? Whilst we cannot cover everything that Umbraco has to offer, hopefully, as an Umbraco Gold Partner, we will be able to give you an insight into why it is one of the world’s most popular content management system (CMS) platforms.

Umbraco
Umbraco is a content management system (CMS), and is the preferred website solution for over 400,000 companies.

To make sure we cover all bases, a content management system is a program that makes it simple for site owners to create and modify content on their website. Not all websites will run off a CMS. However, for greater flexibility, and autonomy over content, a CMS is highly recommended. Otherwise, you may have to pay each time you want to update content on your website.

Open Source
Umbraco websites are open source, which means you don’t need to pay for a license. For some CMS solutions, you must pay for licenses (for example, Sitecore.) Here at CSI Media, we also develop websites on the WordPress and Sitecore CMS platforms. Whilst these platforms do serve a purpose — and your decision needs to consider multiple factors (your requirements, budget), Umbraco’s flexibility over design, functionality, integrations and content management make it arguably the best CMS solution for most businesses.

We need to be clear about this. Umbraco does need experienced web designers to ensure that your website is designed to accommodate the latest web standards, whether they’re in-house or at an agency. However, the flexibility over design makes it a great platform — with Umbraco, you can achieve pretty much any look and feel and of course, most agencies will encourage open dialogue and collaboration on the design, to make sure it meets your requirements. (See below for one of our latest Umbraco web designs, for the Cormar Carpet Company, the UK’s largest carpet manufacturer.)

Performance & Functionality
With Umbraco, the possibilities really are endless, the only restriction is budget… Umbraco can be integrated with pre-existing e-commerce, CRM and logistical systems for seamless processes between business functions. Furthermore, custom solutions can be built within Umbraco, whatever your requirements are.

Personalisation is a clever feature that dynamically presents content based on a user’s ‘profile’. The system will automatically choose which content to present to a user dependent on lots of criteria including user location, referral URL (where the user has visited from) or the completion of a specific action on your website. This functionality can be applied to any area of your website from landing pages, deals’ pages, offers, news articles, blog posts and FAQs.

Finally, Umbraco websites are fast. Fast page-loading times are essential for websites that want to keep visitors engaged, and the content cache boosts the performance of sites to ensure your visitors don’t get tired waiting for pages to load. This is another of our latest Umbraco websites:

Content Management
This is the bit where I get really excited as a content manager! Umbraco really is a dream for content editors and marketing managers; you can upload, modify or remove content whenever, wherever, and as frequently as you like. Learning how to post content, update your posts and add multimedia is a breeze, there is very little you need to know to get started and with a user-friendly interface, you’ll soon get to grips with system.

One of the neater tools is the page builder, where you are able to select and order design components / assets in any order, giving you the flexibility to create unique and engaging pages on your website…

Umbraco Page Builder Tool
The platform includes the ability to schedule content publishing for specific times and user permissions for different types of users. For example, you could give a junior marketer the ability to create content, but it must be reviewed by the marketing manager before it is published. There is also a media library where you can manage all your images and videos, keeping everything nice and organised.

CSI Media
CSI Media strive to develop websites that deliver an outstanding user experience for your users. But we also want you to have the ability to easily update content on your website. Which is why Umbraco is one of our favourite CMS platforms! If you would like to find out more about our Umbraco services, please request a copy of our Umbraco Digital Booklet by emailing us at enquiries@csimedia.net