Craft CMS Quick Guide

There are four main sections you'll need to access. They are all situated in the main navigation usually found on the left hand side of the screen (desktop) or in the main menu pop-up (mobile).

• Entries - Manage and edit pages, articles and other content types
• Globals - Manage global content like header, footer and contact details
• Assets - Manage your uploaded images and files
• Utilities - Clear caches and manage the task queue 

Sections

Your content is organised into different sections (e.g., Pages, News, Events). Ensure you choose the right section before creating an entry.

Duplicating Entries

To duplicate an existing entry, select the checkbox on the left of the entry row and then click the cog menu located at the bottom of the entries panel. This will show a drop down menu which includes an option to duplicate the entry (either on it's own or with any associated child entries too).

Preview

Use the live preview feature to see how the content will look on the page. Click on the "Preview" button to split the screen, showing you the editing fields on the left and the page preview on the right.

You can also click "View" which will open a new window with a preview version of the page with the draft changes you've made before you save it.

Drafts & Revisions

Save your work as a draft if you’re not ready to publish. Revisit existing drafts from the Drafts & Revisions menu.

In addition to this, Craft automatically saves past versions of entries. You can restore an earlier version from this menu if needed.

Entry Settings

When editing an entry, you'll see the entry settings located on the right hand side of the screen. Here you can edit the entry slug, post date and expiry date. You can also update the status of the entry, change the entry type and add any notes required.

Examples

When we take your team through the website management and content authoring training, we'll often point you to a page of content and design examples. We recommend saving this link so you can easily refer to it when creating new entries and you're not sure what content to add and what it'll look like.

SEO Fields

It can be useful to fill out title tags and meta descriptions for certain entries and pages. These can contribute to search rankings and help your search engine results look good and useful to the user. Ultimately, we just recommend writing really good content and the search engines will do the rest but if you're looking for little one-percenters, then this is for you.

Here are some helpful hints for managing the files and images uploaded to your website.

Upload your way

Drag and drop files directly into the Assets panel or upload them while editing an entry - do whatever seems natural to you.

Neat and tidy

We highly recommend keeping your assets collection organised nicely by using folders to make them easy to find and doing regular clean-outs of un-required files.

Use the image editor

Use the built-in editor to crop, rotate, or resize images directly in Craft.

Add alt text to images for accessibility

When editing images, ensure you add good alt text to ensure your site hits the mark for accessibility.

Replace files rather than creating new ones

Use the "Replace File" option in the file edit menu so you reduce clutter in your assets collection.

Drag-and-Drop Sorting

In sections like Structures or navigation menus, simply drag and drop items to reorder them.

Asset Links

Double-click an asset in the "Assets" section to copy its URL for easy linking.

Bulk Actions

Select multiple entries or assets to apply bulk actions like moving, deleting, or reordering.

Error Notifications

Watch for warning or error messages while editing—these can provide quick guidance if something isn’t working as expected.

We're only an email or a phone call away so please don't hesitate to get in touch if you need additional support as you're working in Craft CMS. We'll be happy to help get you back on track!

The Craft CMS website also has a brief tutorial on editing content which may come in handy too.

Logging In

We'll provide you with the link to Craft CMS back-end during training. Always make sure you save this, along with your login details, to your password manager. (We recommend 1Password)

Dashboard

After logging in, the dashboard is your "home base". It provides quick links to your most-used content and recent activity. You can customise your dashboard by clicking the gear icon to add widgets like "Recent Entries". Widgets are particularly useful for seeing new activity for form submissions or ecommerce purchases.