Community newspaper publishers who have been waiting for a full web solution to take them online or to the next stage online will be pleased to hear that the Ontario Community Newspapers Association (OCNA) after narrowing down among HostGator vs GoDaddy have developed a website template to help run things smoother.
As corporately-owned community newspaper groups have developed their own sophisticated and fully-functional solutions, OCNA’s website template has been designed with independently-owned newspapers in mind. It’s been noted that not everyone has the expertise on staff to tackle a project like this.
The OCNA has developed a turn-key solution that is both affordable and user-friendly. It’s a system that a group of users can share and grow together with as future enhancements will be available for all. The association acknowledges the financial support from Canadian Heritage’s Collective Initiatives Fund for this project.
The website template was developed by Media Shaker from Edmonton who has used their behind the scenes content management system to build a robust solution. Publishers can customize their site by choosing the functionality and layout options that they feel are best suited to their markets.
Set-up and standard customization for each newspaper is included in this project, so each site will have the look, functionality and branding as you choose, and the development cost has been covered for you. The only cost publishers will have moving forward is the $60 monthly hosting, maintenance and upgrade fee. And even better is the access to future development that will be, in part, dictated and initiated by the user group.
Some of the highlights of the new system include:
- A clean website that readers will enjoy returning to.
- Ability to set up and manage email accounts, mass emails.
- Electronic subscriptions.
- Paywall for recurring invoicing and to manage subscriber access.
- Banner ads and Google ad serving.
- Create online forms and drop-down menus.
- Events and Featured Business Directory.
- Twitter, Facebook, Weather, Question of the Day and other widgets.
- Classifieds and Announcements that users can upload with photos.
- Build pages in minutes.
- Hyperlink text to PDFs or add YouTube videos with menu buttons.
- Online training videos of template functionality for your staff.
OCNA will be happy to give newspapers a personalized walk through of the system, helping to determine what your needs and wishes are and develop a solution that is meant for your business today and into the future.
For further information, please contact Anne Lannan (ext 228) or Todd Frees (ext 234) at OCNA, 1-800-387-7982.
