Balancing Efficiency and Complexity in Cloning Higher Education Websites
I launched an e-commerce site for a higher education institution that leveraged Drupal as its content management system. Soon after the launch, the institution requested another website identical to the one we launched but with a slightly different configuration.
The request was to clone the website with the course offerings, put it behind an authentication system, and introduce a layer of role-based pricing matrix.
Cloning digital properties is relatively straightforward, but we also need to consider duplication of efforts when web editors and marketers maintain their content. With 50+ course offerings, digital content management quickly becomes a maintenance issue.
To help content editors with their work, we designated the original website CMS as the “master” to manage the content for both websites. Updating content on the master would reflect on both websites, removing the need for the content editor to manage the same content on multiple websites separately.
Using technology to assist editors in handling content across multiple websites is a valuable application of technology.
It makes no sense to ask a team of web editors to update the same content on two websites separately. With this approach, we enabled editors to choose which website to publish their content on without leaving their master admin panel. The less we make users bounce between sites and screens, the longer they stay in the flow and do what they do best, create content.
In addition to having one master CMS, we also tied both websites to the same database (Salesforce CRM) to publish course dates and other relevant data that the business maintains. Again, the benefits of using a single CRM system are echoed, allowing the business to run from a single source of truth at all times.
In Conclusion
Sometimes, it’s not easy to see the complexities stemming from a simple request; in this case, we could clone a website and deliver the project in half the cost and time by putting the burden on a team of content editors and business admins. However, the shortest distance does not always provide us with the best result. Listening to multiple teams and having an understanding of their workload allows us to deliver finer results.
Contact me
If you are looking for an easier content management for your cloned websites, reach out to me, I can help.