ForumsMerchant Services

Saageworks, thanks for the info. I guess I've always seen two tiers within your description of "pre-fab":

(1) What I considered pre-fab before I read the article, i.e., a five-page, industry or application-specific site with all the design assets, feature functions, and navigation links in place -- so about all the business owner has to do is paste content into pre-formatted blocks. (A lot of hosting sites for independent craftmakers, artists, musicians, MLM reps, etc. have a pre-fab tool like this, with which nearly anyone can create a specific type of website very quickly.)

(2) What I'd consider a true DIY product (perhaps like the Squarespace product you referenced, though I'm most familiar with NetObjects Fusion) -- i.e., a development tool that is basic and intuitive enough for a near beginner, yet powerful enough to create almost anything a professional developer could create if the user wants to take the time to learn how. (This approach seems like a good option for a business that manages large sites with dynamic content when those sites are mainly informational -- as opposed to being the firm's primary revenue-producer, like a high volume e-commerce site, in which case an in-house IT person or outsourced developer would likely be cost-justified.)

Anyway, I enjoyed the article and look forward to the future installments!

All,
Thanks for the comments on my blog post. Appreciate the thoughts. DJM0231 excellent point about CMS, Squarespace actually serves as a great CMS and there are certainly more out there, my personal opinion is Squarespace does an excellent job. Some of them are a little more complex than I felt qualified for a "prefab", for example Drupal. I think there are so many options in the open source world that it probably deserves its own post. I do however consider some of these options to be not as user friendly as systems that have already developed modules. I really appreciate your reply and hope I can incorporate more thorough info in this guide for those less familiar with web development.

If anyone is looking for more information on small business and web technology/applications check out my blog www.saageworks.com. It is new but growing quickly!