Make Decisions for your Clients with Custom Fields

Page builder plugins are hugely popular. I’m going to say it, I don’t like them. It’s not due to many of the reasons most commonly stated like poorly coded, no standardizations or too complex. Even if all of those issues were solved overnight a bigger issue still remains. That is page builder gives your client too many decisions. Decisions over layout, colors and so on. The right way to set up your clients for success is to make good decisions for them while giving them the ability to control their content.

Instead use Advanced Custom Fields

The Advanced Custom Fields plugin superchargers the custom fields built into WordPress. As a developer it allows you to setup the admin screen with various extra field types. The result is a client experience which is finely tuned to their specific needs. Here is an example from one of my customer websites.

Limitations are good

The above example might seem limiting when compared to what a typically page builder can do. That’s the point. Limitations are good. It defines roles. Clients are in charge of managing content while web designers/developers focus on their craft. ACF allows web professionals to create an easy to use and comprehensive solution for clients.