Allow your clients to edit your Webflow sites using new CMS tool Selector.io

Hi

I just came across this new tool called Selector.io

It allows you to edit your HTML5 websites using an incredibly easy to use tags editor.

“Selector automatically figures out how to make your website editable — without breaking your design.
All you need are HTML files on an FTP server and Selector does the rest for you”

I tried it with one of my websites i created using Webflow and its dead simple to use. Only drawback is the changes you make on the server files obvioiusly dont update on the Webflow side.

Try it out and provide feedback here.

Cheers

7 Likes

Thats amazing. Seriously, I’m gonna try this out.

This is awesome. Thanks for sharing this. I need to find a solution to allow clients to edit!

are you able to update your content ? mine keep telling me changes not saved :confused:

Interesting Tool. It works pretty well… with a couple small / minor fixable issues. Not really sure why “this text” in my reply is bold ??? I didn’t make it bold.

You can end up with some erroneous code.

For example: if you have this text “Responsive Website” without the quotes and

  • you highlight “Responsive”… Bold it
  • then highlight “Website”… make it Bold

Do this a few times…

and (Like Many Other Editors) you “can” end up with something like this:

<b><b>Responsive</b><b> </b><b>Website</b></b>

Also - notice… it uses “<b>” instead of “<strong>

It also doesn’t work on Folders… so if you have a Demo Folder… not gonna work.

It will only pick up the website in the root.

Changing / Cropping photos works well. Not sure why this text is bold also ???

Editing a Modal window is also an issue… as it doesn’t place an overly under the modal window.
— ie: you cannot really see what you are editing.


You cannot edit non-visible things - like Title / Meta tags or JS.

Changes are immediately (on save) uploaded via FTP to your site

  • and replaces existing code. So you have to be careful.
  • It provides to “No Version Control

Adding a user (to edit) the website is easy…

  • but it also gives them full control.

A user can change the ftp user name / pw… and can add users themselves.

They can add other websites as well.

Editing for users is as simple as replying to an email.

  • Nice and easy… however - there is No password required.
  • Their (selector.io’s) validation is a simple email address passed via a string.
  • That should worry you.

I am eager to see how they implement their PHP system… since that’s mostly what I use.

  • their php system is still under development.

Appears to be a 2 person company.

1 Like

Hey i tried to add my own website , but its getting me the same error everytime , the changes are not updated or something like that ! what could be the prob ?

@Wadih_Hajj
Happy to say the problem is fixed, let me know if you need anything else!

@Revolution

Thanks for making this list, I’d like to point out:

Actually, people you invite can only edit the tags that you’ve selected, they can’t do anything else. Your account is the only one that can change settings. For example, users can’t view or edit any FTP settings, add any more users, or change what tags are editable, all of that is solely under your control.

As for folders (to be clear for anyone else reading this), Selector does support folders, it just can’t be limited to a single folder yet. For example, you can edit website.com/demo/ just fine, but other places like website.com/page.html would also be editable. Until we add proper support for this, subdomains which map to a folder like: demo.website.com are a good way to test Selector out.

Inviting users with a secure email token (rather than by email address) is a top priority! Editing modal windows and an option for <b> vs <strong>, etc. would be cool too :+1:

A lot of people have been asking for version control, do you usually keep a Git repo on your server? How would you like it done?

Happy to answer any questions. :smile:

Cheers,
Hans

3 Likes

I’ve seen serval of these and they are definitely cool and exciting but what if the client would like to add extra pages to the from a template you created. Is that possible ? For example say you have a music site and your client wanted to add another artist. Could they duplicate a page you’ve already created and just change the content ?

@David_Moore
Cool idea but not possible yet. We’ve got some features planned to tackle this later though, the ability to add new content is exciting. Thanks!

I am using Minorit.com - it is even better for clients, because there is no administration section…

1 Like

Is it possible to use for sites, which has webflow domen?

I dont think any of these types of editors can be used when you are hosting on Webflow. Reason being is that they need FTP info and Webflow does not allow that when hosting with them. The way to use these is to have separate/ftp hosting, export your Webflow site, then use that for the CMS editors above.

I am also in the camp that i would love to have these editors available for Webflow hosted sites.

Is their a possibility that one can get around it? or should we have to beg webflow for FTP info? I am a newbie on this site. But I had builded a site before and its kinda hard to focus just on design when small business and all ask for the whole nine.

Sorry this conversation got left in the dust a bit JonthueM, but currently you wont really be able to get a CMS when hosting on Webflow. My best advice would be to work hosting cost into your pitch for clients. Web hosting/domain fees are a mainstay so a client in most cases shouldn’t be thrown by the cost. Even if they are, you can kindly explain that hosting and domain related fees are not something you can control (which is true). It functions much like cable TV; you are providing the TV and its setup, but they will have to pay monthly for a cable service.

If/once they are ok with that, you can export your Webflow code, use an FTP to put it on their newly purchased hosting and then you can use one of the above services to allow them CMS based access. This is really the best way to use Webflow at the moment. I would assume the devs are working on things like CMS and maybe even allowing certain HTML based access, but the above is a solution in the meantime. I personally cant wait for some type of CMS service for Webflow. Once they have that, I’m set!

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Because of the problems I have faced integrating a 3rd party CMS, I gave up. Surreal is probably the best of the bunch but I’ve not tried the new one mentioned here (and don’t plan to). I am so friggin aggravated that we don’t have a CMS built in. How hard would it be for them to add the option for us to share a login with a client with less access? I really don’t understand why they haven’t given us something.

If it wasn’t for my near hatred of Wordpress amd Adobe Muse I would be using one of those.

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I would love a dedicated CMS in webflow. Frankly, I am beside myself with 2 website builders that use little to no code. Webflow in many cases is superior, but the need for CMS is so great its making me consider the lesser builder!

I know Webflow is working on a CMS solution as they have mentioned it, but it does feel slow. To their credit, CMS structures can be quite complex and they need to make it easy for clients to understand (otherwise, whats the point?). However, I know its been a long time since any update on it so I may just use the other site builder in the meantime.

Yeah, I’ve been exploring other options too. I’ve yet to find a perfect solution. I’m testing out an HTML page builder from Themeforest but I’d still have to integrate a CMS. The couple of issues that I had with Surreal and other CMSes from webflow generated sites, who knows, may work better with other site generators. And that’s not to say that it’s webflow’s fault. Our work practices and how we “position” things can cause issues when we try to integrate a CMS. Trust me, I know from experience.

Yes, Git would work, or any other way to be able to reverse some bad clicks a client may have done…
Alternatively would be good if you can somehow go back in time in order to be able to compare changes and if needed to reproduce these changes in your web flow version of that site… I guess web flow’s own versioning is very good at that (it’s like time machine on a mac in a way)…

Thanks, really appreciate the feedback on Git! Will keep that in mind when adding versioning support :smile: