Sitecore 6 Upgrade Tips - CMS News Roundup

There has been a flurry of action in the Sitecore world over the last few weeks.  Read on for a summary of the essential information.

Note: If you’re looking to get started in Sitecore and want a more complete guide to navigating this CMS product, our recently released Best Practices for Sitecore whitepaper can help guide you through a successful implementation.

Now, onto the news.

Upgrading from Sitecore 5.3 with the Sitecore 6 Conversion Tool

October 6 saw the release of the Sitecore 5.3 to Sitecore 6 conversion tool.  A welcome tool, this greatly aids in the process of upgrading to version 6.  A word of warning, however, that some steps still require manual effort. Taking full advantage of the new features of Sitecore 6 may require some coding or redesign work.

Just a week and a half later, on October 17, Sitecore version 6 was released.  Most notable about this release is that the dreaded cross-site link problem has been fixed, and the issue of publication targets being ignored has also been corrected.  Both are must-have fixes.

Sitecore Support Tips

The Sitecore Support team has added some useful hints to the SDN site to address some common problems/concerns relating to the new version.

A few excellent articles:

1. Staging and upper case file names
2. Obtaining the properties of an Active Directory group
3. Some considerations for file system permissions for Sitecore 6 packages.

Notes for developers

The development forums on SDN are always active, but the most active threads over the past few weeks have been about a customized sort by field capabilities and a new suggestion to work around the w3wp.exe crash by disabling performance counters.

Google Analytics goes enterprise

As many Sitecore and NLC clients are using Google Analytics, we thought you would like to know that Google has introduced new enterprise features for GA.  The new abilities for segmentation and the soon to be released API really move the product to the next level.   More information is on the official Google Analytics blog.

In Part I, I provided an overview of dynamic content management and key implementation ingredients. Now I’d like to share the stories of two recently-launched examples from NLC’s portfolio. Both projects make extensive use of metadata-driven dynamic content in different ways.

Case Study A | Personalized content

Client A came to NLC with the goal of mapping out and implementing a personalization strategy for their newly redesigned extranet site.  The site would be used by diverse groups of users with individual permissions, and would need to expose Client A’s rich content repository while limiting access based on those permissions.

NLC proposed a dynamic, personalization-centric solution that effectively addresses all the organization’s information needs while leaving “growing room” for new features and functionality.

Our solution included the following elements:

• CMS layer (Reddot CMS)
  • Pages and documents tagged with security and descriptive metadata as well as security-based constraints that will be executed in the presentation layer
  • Content authors select metadata from pre-defined keyword categories
  • Special usability features were added to the content authoring interface to make tagging easier, such as display of assigned keywords
• Presentation layer (Reddot Liveserver)
  • User profiles and logins managed by Liveserver
  • Personalized content served on each page via real-time evaluation of security constraints against user permissions
  • Session management integrated with Client A’s proprietary single-sign-on system
  • Site search respects page and document security constraints

Outcome

The new site provides users with a personalized experience and seamless access to various applications.

Case Study B | Faceted navigation

Client B approached NLC to develop a RedDot CMS-driven custom solution for their informational website, which they wanted to transform into an accessible and searchable online format. The original site was not scalable and poor site performance meant that use of online resources by the public was steadily decreasing.

NLC proposed a solution that included a dynamic presentation layer, featuring customized, faceted navigation and faceted search technology. This much-improved incarnation of the site also preserves Client B’s day-to-day business processes in Reddot CMS.

Our solution included the following elements:

• CMS layer (Reddot CMS)
  • Individual information resources are authored and tagged with metadata via a specially designed interface
  • Resources are then published as XML files to an intermediate location
  • A limited number of CMS-managed webpages publish directly to the presentation layer (these are pages over which the client wanted direct control)
• XML Indexer (ASP.NET/SQL Server)
  • Published XML files are parsed into and synchronized with the presentation layer database
• Presentation layer (ASP.NET/SQL Server)
  • Content is served dynamically from the presentation layer database based on faceted navigation selections
  • A sophisticated caching scheme ensures superior site performance

Outcome

The site’s new architecture has resulted in improved efficiency of up to 1000%. In some cases, page load times have gone from 9 seconds to milliseconds. The re-jigged site is easy to maintain, allows use of many plug-and-play functions and provides an intuitive, convenient navigation for users on the front end. Internally, the client can now add new features and extend the functionality of their site, as needed.

There are many points to be considered when conducting a pay per click campaign, this blog post is solely on Keyword Matching and recommendations should only be conducted in conjuction with other pay per click best practices.

Pay Per Click Keyword matching has 4 categories:

• [Exact Match]: keywords that only trigger ads when the exact keyword (s) is used as a search query, represented in brackets.

• “Phrase Match”: Keywords that only trigger ads when a search query is in the exact order, is represented in quotation marks.

• Broad Match: Keywords that trigger ads when a search query contains the keyword. Query can be for singular or plural terms of the keywords targeted as well as other relevant terms.

• Negative Match: Keywords that do not trigger an ad to appear, represented with a negative sign (-)

Broad match keywords bring the most amount of traffic as these trigger any search variant of the target keyword as well as other relevant terms. For example, the keyword real estate would trigger ads when a search query contains real estate and other relevant terms such as property.

This broader traffic base has both its pro’s and con’s.

Pros:

• Allows the advertiser to reach a wider variety of related terms by targeting the long tail of search.
• Occasionally, new niche keyword sets can be found and used both in pay per click campaigns and search engine optimization.

Cons:

• Targets terms not related to your business.
• Has a higher cost per click

Generally speaking, the cons of broad match keywords are minimized by using negative matching keywords, which lead to a reduction in non-related ad impressions and thus decreasing the number of non-related clicks.

Some of the most obvious keywords that usually come to mind for transactional sites are usually; “free” and “cheap”. However, a healthy PPC campaign should be using anywhere between 60 to 500 negative keywords (varies by industry and number of broad match terms targeted).

For example, the foreign exchange market (forex) typically has a lot of transactional queries but also a fair number of informational queries, such as; “how to learn forex” or “forex information”. In these circumstances, an e-com website such as a web based forex trading platform would need to focus a lot on transactional keywords and less on informational keywords which might bring non-targeted and or non-transactional traffic. In this forex example, adding negative keywords such as “how to”, “information” and “why” would decrease non targeted traffic.

Negative Keywords also increase the quality score of pay per click campaigns by targeting the users search query to the targeted broad match.

In short, by adding negative keywords we minimize the non-related ad impressions and realize the following improvements in campaigns:

• Increased click through rates
• Increased conversion rates
• Decreased conversion costs
• Possibly decrease overall campaign expenditure and cost per click.

As many of us know, two of the biggest barriers to website effectiveness are unfocused content and poor findability.

Corporate websites need to grab a user’s attention, demonstrate value and build loyalty; corporate intranets must allow users to find resources they need as quickly and as easily as possible.  A strategy that aims to address the needs of all users can dilute content effectiveness and frustrate those looking for specific information.

One effective way to minimize over-generalization and information overload, while directing users to their most relevant information is via dynamic content.

As always, a careful approach to content management is required, and some trade-offs are inevitable to increase site effectiveness, but a dynamic content strategy offers intriguing benefits. Read on.

What is dynamic content?

Dynamic content is created when two or more pieces of website content are selected and presented together on demand, according to user context. Instead of viewing a static webpage, users encounter specific content blocks that are dynamically assembled and displayed according to current navigation, the user’s profile or other contextual factors.

For example, a website may display a particular block of content if a user’s profile indicates they work in your organization’s Vancouver office; for others, this block of content would be hidden.  Conversely, a user may select “Low-Fat” and “Chicken” from a menu of recipe options; the website then selects and displays all recipes that have been tagged with the keywords “low-fat” and “chicken”.

The distinguishing element in these examples is that content display determined dynamically. The website reacts to the choices and characteristics of users, in real-time.

The most common contextual dimensions of dynamic content that we’ve seen:

• Personalization – displaying content based on a user’s profile or group membership
• Faceted navigation – navigational elements are only displayed when they contain content
• Filtered browsing – displaying content based on multi-dimensional filtres or categories selected by the user

The most robust and intuitive mechanism used to implement dynamic content is metadata tagging, wherein user profile metadata and content metadata are matched against context and content business logic to determine what is presented. More on that further down.

Benefits

Dynamic content offers benefits to both website users and content authors.

Easy to maintain

When a website consists largely of dynamic content, content authors become primarily responsible for ensuring that pieces of content are tagged correctly. They no longer need to worry about placement of items or layout details.

Intuitive user experience

Dynamic content provides a customized website experience for users and, if content is tagged intelligently, increases findability of crucial information. Users need not wade through untargeted content to find what they need.

Powerful use of information

When pieces of information are tagged with multiple metadata, their full context and topic reach is represented. Their appearance in certain contexts can indicate helpful information relationships or connections that may not have been obvious.

Managing Dynamic Content – Three Key Ingredients

In our experience, three ingredients are necessary for successfully managing dynamic content.

A content management system

A content management system should allow you to easily tag your content with metadata and govern content with workflows and authorization processes. Some systems have a built-in keywording mechanism; others may let you build a custom interface to allow content authors to apply metadata tags to content items.

Publishing content as discrete pieces requires a departure from the usual WYSIWYG nature of content authoring. Content authors may require extra training in order to ensure full understanding of the tagging logic.

Metadata and XML power team

XML is a powerful tool used to separate content from presentation logic. When content pieces and their metadata are published as XML, this creates an independent content repository that can be consumed by any presentation layer platform.

Intelligent presentation layer

An intelligent presentation layer completes the dynamic content picture, executing the logic that displays content based on metadata and business rules. Typically this will involve a mechanism that queries the XML data published out from CMS and manipulates and optimizes its presentation to the user.

Selecting a platform with powerful scripting, caching and integration capabilities, such as ASP.Net, will ensure a scalable and robust solution.

A final note

Implementing a dynamic content-driven website is not simplistic, but it can reap big rewards in terms of content findability and user experience. Additionally, for those needing to maintain some control over key areas of the site, such as the homepage, a hybrid solution can work well; selected pages can be managed and published directly by the CMS instead of being assembled by the presentation layer.

Continue to Part II