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Routes - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
As we've discussed, webpages in Rock don't exist as files on the server's file system. Instead, they are dynamically created as they are requested from the database to be individually tailored to the permissions of the current user. In the past this meant some really ugly URLs with numerous query parameters. For instance, some similar systems may have used an address like this: http://www.mysite.com/index.php?page=152&groupId=12 Not only are these addresses unattractive, they are also not very friendly for search engines visiting your site (aka SEO friendly). Rock uses the concept of Routes to help beautify its addresses. The default route for a page will look something like: http://www.rocksolidchurchdemo.com/page/123 But you can do better. Let's say page 123 in the example above was actually a promotional page for an upcoming car show. You could add a new route on the page property dialog ( on the page's admin bar then look under Advanced Settings) with the value of carshow. This would enable the link http://www.rocksolidchurchdemo.com/carshow to also work for this page. Multiple Routes In fact, you could create several routes for the same page. This is especially helpful in tracking the success of each of your marketing pieces. If the mailers, mass email and invite cards each have a different address, you can measure which is more successful at getting people to your site. Avoid Multiple Page Routes for Indexed Pages Having multiple routes present for a page that you wish to be indexed by search engines can be significantly damaging to...
Designing Themes - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Themes are beautiful things. They allow you to quickly and easily change the look of your site using the latest web best practices. Before we get too far, let's look at the contents of a theme. Contents of a Theme Theme Directory The .system file tells Rock that this theme is a system theme. This prevents it from being deleted in the Themes list. The Assets folder is used for all of the images, icons and other support files needed by your theme. This folder also contains a Lava child folder for all of the Lava files needed for your theme. The Layouts folder contains all of the layouts your theme supports. For external sites, your theme should define implementations for all of the standard layouts covered in the Looking Deeper At Layouts chapter. The Scripts directory will be used for any custom scripts your theme requires. Be sure to only place unique scripts here that are not contained in the global scripts folder. Finally, the Styles folder contains all of the files needed to generate your CSS. Specifics of these files is discussed in depth below. Using Images in Themes When using images in your theme design, they will typically be implemented as an IMG tag or a CSS background. Use of an IMG tag, with accompanying ALT attribute text, is optimal if the image is part of the page content or has semantic meaning. This will allow search engines as well as screen readers to interpret the image....
Content Channels - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Rock's static content tools are great. We've already seen how we can customize our messaging using the HTML editor. Sometimes though, you still need the ability to add structured dynamic content to your site. In the old days that meant firing up a development tool and writing your own code. While custom coding is certainly an option in Rock, in many cases it's simply not needed. Let's take a look at how Rock's dynamic content tools can have you extending Rock in no time (and without learning C#). Here are the three main components we'll review: Dynamic Content Diagram 1 Content Channel Types Channel types define the structure for the dynamic content tools. They define what attributes are available on both the channels and content items. Rock ships with several content channel types ready to use out of the box. 2 Content Channels Content channels are implementations of the channel types. For instance, because there is a channel type of Blogs, you can make blog channels for the organization's website, a specific person and/or a specific area of your organization. 3 Content Items These are the specific data elements that make up a content channel. For a blog channel these would be the specific blog posts; for the website ads channel these would represent the specific promotions. Channel Types The first concept we'll discuss is channel types. As you work on your site, look for repeating data patterns. Items like web promotions are well-structured, having data items like title, image,...
Getting Social - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Read any blog on web design and you'll find plenty of posts on the importance of search engine optimization. While it's certainly true that your site must be search engine friendly, it also needs to be social media friendly. Below are some tips on how to ensure your Rock pages play nicely with the most popular networks. One Thing You Must Do If you can only do one thing, we highly recommend adding a description to each page you believe will be shared on social media. This is quick and easy to do by accessing the Page Settings from the Admin Toolbar at the bottom of each page. Without a page description, the social shares will try to figure out a description for your page by stripping the first chunk of text from your page that looks to be the main content. But why make the social networks guess when you can give them the exact description you'd like? Getting Deeper Setting the Page Description is nice, but that's just the start. Each social network allows you to describe how your page should be shared using meta tags in the page's header. Unfortunately, there is little consistency in how this is done. Below we show you how to optimize each page's social network share information using Lava. Simply put these tags in any HTML block on the page and your site will be socially beautiful. Adding Make Up For Facebook Let's start with Facebook. The three main attributes you want...
Managing Dynamic Content - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Rock's advanced dynamic content tools allow you to extend the application without having to write any code. That’s kind of a big deal, right? You can customize Rock for your organization without any programming knowledge! You may have already read a bit about content channels in the Admin Hero Guide and Event & Calendar Guide. We're going to talk about how to manage content that is added to content channels, then dive into how to set those content channels up. But first - a quick overview of the components that make up Rock's dynamic content features. Components of Dynamic Content Rock's dynamic content tools are made up of three components. Dynamic Content Diagram 1 Content Channel Types Channel types define the structure for the dynamic content tools. They define what attributes are available on both the channels and content items. Rock ships with several content channel types ready to use out of the box. 2 Content Channels Content channels are implementations of the channel types. For instance, because there is a channel type of Blogs, you can make blog channels for the organization's website, a specific person and/or a specific area of your organization. 3 Content Items These are the specific data elements that make up a content channel. For a blog channel these would be the specific blog posts; for the website ads channel these would represent the specific promotions. Now, let's jump right into adding and managing content items. Managing Content Items While it's possible to add new...
Landing Pages - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Now that you have the tools in your belt for adding content to pages, let's look at a special type of page that you can use for specific purposes: Landing Pages. What Are Landing Pages and Why Should I Use Them? Landing pages are designed to drive people to a single focus, usually for a specific event or resource. For instance, you might set up a landing page with information about your Christmas services, to register for a conference, or to join a small group. It's different from your external website's homepage because your homepage has a lot of information about your church in general, with links to more specific areas the visitor might be interested in. A Landing Page is designed to be self-contained, with very few links off of the page, and usually gives all of the information someone might need about the topic on a single page. This is important because it helps you make sure that you're providing your visitors with exactly the information they're looking for, without making them search through your entire site for it. It's a better experience for them, and helps your message reach the people who are looking for it - talk about a win-win! If your goal is to get your visitors to take a specific action, such as joining a group or filling out a form (referred to as a "Call To Action"), you'll be able to add those items to these pages as well so that they can...
Personalization - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Churches need to focus on getting the right content to the right people, both during the weekend and throughout the week. That's why Rock's personalization features are critical to your digital strategy. They enable you to have content on your site that is dynamic and custom tailored for the person viewing it. This ensures visitors to your site are seeing relevant content personalized for them, even when the person isn't logged in. For instance, you might want to prominently feature information about childcare to adults who have visited your children's ministry page recently. Or you might want a special welcome message that only shows if it's the first time the person has visited your site. These are just a couple of simple examples to get you thinking about how personalization can be used in your organization to show relevant content that directly applies to the person viewing it. The pictures below show an example of personalization that's based on an IP address of a college campus. Showing Content for Students We're showing the above content only to university students. We are able to identify the visitor as a student because their IP address comes from the university. Showing Content for General Public This is the same page as shown to the left, except this person isn't coming from the university so the content appears differently for them. Before you can start using Rock's personalization features there is some configuration you'll need to do. You'll need to set up Personalization Segments...
Content Collections - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Let's say you have a content channel for blog posts, and a content channel for sermons. You can group those two content channels together under a single collection, known as a Content Collection. Content collections put the content for those channels in one place, unlocking the ability to search for content across both channels at once. So, if you have a blog post about finances and a sermon about finances, a person could search your content collection for "finances" and find both items. You can add any number of content channels to your collection, as well as calendars. Content Collection View The Content Collection View block is where content collections come to life. As pictured below, this block provides robust search and filtering capabilities across all the items in your content collection at blazingly fast speeds. Out of the box this block is not applied to any pages. Content Collection View 1 Search Rock provides full text indexing to allow a person to search for words or phrases across all of the content contained in the collection. This happens so quickly, the list of items below the search bar are updated in real time as you're typing. 2 Attribute Filters The Speaker search filter is actually a content channel item attribute. Later on, we'll cover how to use item attributes as filters. 3 Year Filter The year filter comes for free, but you can disable it in the block settings. 4 Content Channel Items This is the list of items...
Interactive Experiences - Designing and Building Websites Using Rock
Interactive Experiences are your key to creating engaging and dynamic church services. With this feature, you can foster real-time connections through interactive questions in your church’s Rock Mobile app. You can choose between anonymous or personalized responses, enable your pastor to connect with the congregation in real time, and add a new level of engagement to your services. Let’s look at the general process before we get into specifics. Interactive Experience Devices 1 Interactive Experience This is a visitor’s phone using your Rock Mobile app. Right now there’s a question listed, and the person can provide an answer on their device. This is the main component of the interactive experience. 2 Live Questions As the questions are answered, the answers appear in Rock in real time. This might be a pastor’s iPad on the stage, so they can monitor the answers coming in. 3 Interactive Experience Manager An administrator controls when questions appear and how long to keep the question open for responses. 4 Real Time Visualizer This displays the question and a list of answers intended for the big screen on stage. The answers can optionally be moderated and reviewed for approval. In that case, only approved answers will appear here. Pictured below is an example of a poll question. That’s one type of Action that your Experience can have. Another type of Action is asking a short answer question. Action on Device Aside from Actions, there are other customizable screens that the person can see. For before the...
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