Purpose
A Basic Page is your most commonly used content page for creating a variety of informational pages.
When to Use a Basic Page
This page type is suitable for any content that doesn't require complex functionality or frequent updates. It's ideal for content that remains relevant for long periods, such as:
- About Us page
- Contact Us page
- Services offered
- Team introductions
- FAQs
- Etc.
Elements of a Basic Page
- Title: When creating your page title it's important to choose a good title as well as keep in mind that a page title can be up to 80 characters because line breaks are currently not available to be created on page titles.
- Note: For guidance on how to choose a good page title, please navigate to Iowa.gov Style Guide
- Short title: optional, shorter version used in menus, breadcrumbs, etc. Limited to 35 characters.
- Body: All content, load any media library or component library informational blocks.
- The WYSIWYG editor allows embedding various microcontent types, providing flexibility in page creation.
- Summary: used on search engines and social media shares. Limited to 160 characters
- Featured Image: single image that captures or relates to the page topic. Used in teasers and social media shares. Limited to one.
- Topic & Division: Used to categorize content for filtering and search. Optional
- Status: Certain author levels are limited to saving a page as Draft, Review, Published, and Achieved.
Understanding Content Status Settings
You can search for content by their saved status within either of the two content library sections:
- "Overview" This is were content saved with the "Published" status will be show here.
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- "Moderated Content" This section is content with the "draft, review and archived" status will appear in this tab
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There are a total of 4 different save settings available for agency managers and publisher to save content as which are:
- Draft: This status is used for any edits authors would like to save on a page but don't want the public to see those changes just yet.
- Review: This status is used similarly as draft because any changes or edits made on the page set as review will not appear live to the public. Setting a status as review is a label to use so your team knows the content is ready for them to look over.
- Published: This status is used for pages that you would like to be seen live by the public. This is also the status that agency managers or publishers will change draft or review pages if they would like to approve the draft or review version to go live.
- Archived: This status is used if you no longer want the public to see this page but you would still like it to be saved within the backend of your site in the content library moderation section.
Short video:
Longer video:
Log in to your site
Everyone who writes things on this website has a special title. These titles give them certain abilities, like who can edit, review and publish what. You can ask for a different title or take one away from someone using the user manager.
Navigate to the Content tab
You can add pages to your website by navigating to the content button but make sure you are logged in so that you can have access to that tab.
You can sort the pages that you've created using the filter button as well as edit the pages you've created for your website by selecting the edit button within the content list page:
(Example of Content list page)
Create a Basic Page content type
Create a new Basic Page by navigating to Content then to Add Content and from there you can select the Basic Page.
When creating a basic page, make sure to add all required fields.
We recommend you click "save" often.
Editing, Publishing, Scheduling Content
Authors will have the ability to edit content based on different privileges.
Here is a table that demonstrates what each author type or content managers can do:
| Writer | Editor | Publisher | Agency Manager | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Create this content | X | X | X | X |
| Edit own content | X | X | X | X |
| Edit anyone's content | X | X | X | |
| Publish this content | X | X | ||
| Unpublish this content | X | X | ||
| Delete own content | ||||
| Delete anyone's content | ||||
| Schedule this content | X | X |