» Getting started

Step 1 – Login to the CMS

Login at http://mysites.travel to manage your site.
TIP: Editing your site is best using Google’s Chrome browser. Other browsers may not allow scrolling and other features.

Step 2 - Settings

1. From the main navigation menu on the left side, click “Settings”
2. Notice from the 5 tabs in the top right corner, the first one “Main” is selected. In this section, you should enter your Site Title, Tagline and upload your logo and a favicon (if you have one).
3. Next, click the “Social Media” tab and enter your live chat script. If you do not have live chat we highly recommend as research shows higher conversions. Click here to sign up for the best FREE live chat on the market. Next, enter the web address of your social profiles. Eg: https://www.facebook.com/TripAdvisor
4. Then, click “My Profile” and enter your business info. Note, the email address and Phone Number will display on the front page of your website. You do not need to enter the Postal address details unless they are different to your business address and you wish users to know the difference.

Theme Settings:

1. Click the “Themes” tab and then click your active theme. Notice at the top of the page there are 6 tabs and the “Main” tab is selected by default. Click “Colours” to customise the colours of your site. TIP: Hover over the i icon to reveal a tip for what each fields colour will relate to. It’s best to have your site open in a new tab so from the main navigation menu on the left side, click the globe icon in the very top left corner (you can also click the site name) and this will open your website in a new browser tab or window. Your CMS (backend) will now be open in one tab and your website (frontend) open in another tab so you can easily switch between them and view your changes.
2. When changing the default font, be sure to check the booking process is clear. Some Google fonts will distort the page because they have irregular width/height.
3. Background images differ between themes but adding one image will create a static site and adding multiple images will create a slideshow effect. Adding text and links to the background images will display on your homepage so this is a very important section to edit correctly. Adding a video is a great feature but will slow your site down a little. To add a YouTube video, only insert the video ID. So, for this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGFimiB4bVQ just enter the ID cGFimiB4bVQ which comes after the = sign.
4. The Footer info is important as it will be displayed on every page. Use it to enter such things as contact details, SEO content or try a cool Instagram Photo widget
5. The CSS Editor should only be used by experience web developers. It allows you to further modify and customise your theme.

Step 3 –Shop Settings

From the main navigation menu on the left side, click “Shop”

Notice from the 3 tabs in the top right corner, the first one “Orders” is selected. Click the last tab, “Settings” and then click the green button “Edit Email Settings”.  Notice from the 2 tabs in the top right corner, the first one “Receipt” is selected. The receipt is the (automatically generated) email that your customers will receive with every sale. (Tip: the From field is your sales email address and make sure to click the green “Save” button at the bottom left of the page).

Next, click the “Notifications” tab in the top right corner. This is the (automatically generated) email you will receive informing you of a new booking. It will contain the customers email address and booking details.

Step 4 – Pages & Menus

From the main navigation menu on the left side, click “Pages”. Notice the list of default pages starting with “Home” at the top. This list will become your websites main menu by creating pages and nesting them under each other. Ordering pages from top to bottom in this list will display the page names as links from left to right in your main menu. Each page can either be displayed or hidden from the main menu in the page settings.

Adding a new page:

1. Click the green “Add new” button.
2. Option 1 allows you to set the page as the top level or underneath another page. Your top level page is usually the one you want to display in the main menu and underneath another page will create a sub-level menu – so when you hover over the top level, the sub-level page will appear.
3. Option 2 allows you to set the page type. Notice the first one “Category Page” is selected. Most of your pages will become Category Pages as these are the only page types you can add products to and use to display content tiles of other sub-level pages. Sound confusing? Let’s clarify with a live example: “Uluru Tours” is the top level page and all the image tiles on that page are simply sub-level pages (underneath another page). If you hover your mouse over “Uluru Tours” in the main menu, you will notice that the sub-menu options are the same as the image tiles on that page. So, subpage = submenu. If you click on the first tile “Red Hot Deals”, that page will load with all of the products on sale. Both “Uluru Tours” and “Red Hot Deals” are “Category pages”, they are just displaying different content based on how the page is setup, which we’ll look at next.
4. So, with “Top level” and “Category page” selected, click the green “Create” button (bottom left). The new page will be created and the default name will always be “New Category Page”. You first need to change the “Page name” and notice the “URL Segment” below will also change, along with the “Navigation label”. If you want your page name to display differently in your main menu, change the “Navigation label” otherwise it’s best to leave them the same. You can add a “Header image” to the page and/or a “Thumbnail image” which will display if this page had a top-level page such as “Uluru Tours”. There is also a section at the bottom for “Metadata” which is great for telling search engines (Google) exactly what your page is about. Now click the green “Save & Publish” button at the bottom to save your changes. Always click this button before navigating away. TIP: You can change the editing preview by clicking on the icon in bottom right of your screen:
   
   Note: Editing in Split mode can slow the CMS slightly and sometimes create loading errors on slower internet connections. If you're on a slow internet connection it is recommended to just use Edit mode.
   
   
5. Notice at the top of the page there are 6 tabs, 3 at the top and 3 below. The “Content” tab at the top and the “Content” tab underneath will be selected by default. You can later add products to your pages by clicking the “Products” tab and “Add existing” button. Note: You need to first upload your products before adding them to your pages, so let’s do that next.
6. We are in the process of adding a “Terms & Conditions” page by default. Until then, try adding a new page now (select the second page type as “Page”) and name it “Terms & Conditions” and add in any relevant T&C’s you may have for users when booking. Once that’s been saved, from the main navigation on the left click “Shop”, then “Settings” tab in the top right, then the green “Edit General Settings”. Select the “Terms & Conditions” page you just created. This will generate a checkbox which users have to select and agree to before making a booking.
7. We are in the process of adding a “Contact Us” page by default. Until then, try adding a new “User Defined Form” page now, name it “Contact Us” and click “Save and publish”. TIP: The “User Defined Form” is the second last page type when adding a new page.
8. Click the second tab named “Form” and add fields to your form. In the example below, all fields are “Text Field” except the “Email Field”. Once you create a field, click “Show Options” to select Validation “Is this a required field” and set the number of rows. In the example, all rows are set to 1 by default except the “Message” field that has 10 rows. Make sure to save your form before continuing.
   
   
   
   
9. Next, click the “Configuration” tab and enter a message to the customer in the “Show on completion” field. This is the message the customer sees after their message has been sent. You will then need to click the green “Add Email Recipient” and fill out the fields such as the example below. TIP: use your email address in the “Send email from” and “Send email to” fields as you are the recipient of the customers’ enquiry. The body field can be left blank, as the customer will enter a message. Click “Save”.

 

 

Step 5 – Products

From the main navigation menu on the left side, click “Products”. You can either search for one product at a time in the search field, or click the green “Add multiple products” to add up to 5 at a time (more on faster internet connections).

Adding multiple products can be a slow process as the system is importing all of the content, images and rates/fare types. Be sure to click the “Exit” button when finished importing to view your product list.

Editing a Product:

1. Click on the product to load the details. Notice there are 8 tabs across the top and the first one “Main” is selected. This is where you can change the product name (if desired), publish/unpublish from your site, add a discount alert (as you saw on “Red Hot Deals” products) and modify price variations (if desired). To set the default price to display, click the blue (right) arrow icon to the right of the rate/fare. To edit the rate/fare simply click the one you wish to change and a new screen will load with a checkbox to override the price. Note: A product will automatically unpublish if you set the RRP below the Net Rate. To exit, click the “Back” button. You can proceed to edit the product details if desired from the tabs at the top. To add a product to a page, click the “Category Pages” tab (last tab far right) and click the green “Add existing” button to add it to the a page you created earlier. TIP: Adding products to pages can be done either from within the product itself or from the page you wish to display it.

Step 6 – Creating the Homepage

From the main navigation menu on the left side, click “Pages”. Notice the list of default pages starting with “Home” at the top. Click “Home” so the page is active - you can add custom content to the page but the real feature of the Homepage is the “Featured Homepage Sets”.

1. Click the “Featured” tab at the top, then click the green “Add Feature Set”.
2. Add a Title to display on the homepage and then select the set to display Products, Pages or Packages. Note: some themes will only allow 4 items to display across the page, others will allow more and drop the extra items into a new row. Then click the green “Create” button at the bottom of the page. You will have just created your first featured homepage set. TIP: By adding more sets to this list, the set at the top will display as the top featured set on your homepage. You can change the order by selecting the “Allow drag and drop re-ordering” and then moving the sets up or down the list as desired.
3. To add Products, Pages or Packages to your Featured Sets, select the set you wish to edit, then click the “Add Existing” button to reveal a list of your (imported) Products, Pages or Packages. You can also re-order the display of your Products, Pages or Packages here by selecting “Allow drag and drop re-ordering”. Make to click the green “Save” button at the bottom of the page.

Handy Tips

1. Install Google’s Chrome browser to access the CMS
2. Always remember to save your changes, especially when changing the order of your sites pages in the menu or anytime you “Allow drag and drop re-ordering”. Pages may not appear on your website if you did not click the green “Save & Publish” Saving a page does not publish it, so if it’s not displaying correctly, make sure it is not in draft mode or has a “Modified” label - “Save & Publish”
3. If the CMS becomes slow when navigating around sections, simply refresh or reload the page.
4. You can add a product to a Category Page via the product settings or the page settings. Some users find it easier to import the products first and then add them to pages, some users prefer to create the pages first and then add the products in later. There’s no correct order.
5. Relax and have fun with it! Don’t get upset if you forget where something is located in the CMS. Try to use your logic and much of what you may forget can be located in the “Settings” tab and “Theme Settings”.