Custom website (Advanced): Build a website

Our intuitive built-in website editor allows you to create your own customized site and set it live, no programming or technical skills required. If you’ve thought about building a landing page but have been procrastinating because it seems too hard, then creating one on TaxDome might be just the thing for you.

Covered here:

• Let TaxDome host your landing page or existing website for free
• Moving your existing website to TaxDome
• The ABCs of building your first website
• Adding a contact form
• Creating a blog
• Customizing SEO settings
• Saving, previewing and publishing your site
• Unpublishing your site
• Who can do this?
• Downloading and restoring a backup
• Having issues setting up your landing page? Let us do it for you

Let TaxDome host your landing page for free

• Our subscription includes website hosting on TaxDome, with no third party involved. Use our intuitive website builder to set up your landing page.
• It comes with a secure SSL certificate: All Web traffic will be SSL/TLS-encrypted, and clients can verify that you are the owner of the website.
• Your site can be accessed via your firm’s TaxDome URL or your own. To use your own website address, you’ll need a custom domain. If you already have one, set it up so that it points to your website on TaxDome, then use your client portal as a subdomain (portal.domain.com).
• Having trouble setting up your landing page and/or custom domain? We can build your website for you. For more info, go here.

Moving your existing website to TaxDome

If you’ve already built your own website, move it to TaxDome where we host it for free! Using the Import feature of our website builder allows you to migrate your website without even backing up your files.

Note: Only the front end of a website (all visible content on a site) is importable. Our Import feature won’t work for websites that require databases or any other kind of backend feature.

1. Go to Settings > Site builder from the left menu bar. Click Start editing Website.

2. Click New/Reset, then select Import.

Or you can click New/Reset, select Change template, then Website import.

3. Enter the URL of your website, click Import, then wait several minutes for the import to complete.

Once the import is done, the website pages will be displayed inside the website builder, where they can be edited. Below, see Saving, Previewing and Publishing Your Site.

The ABCs of building your first website

Note! You can create a website draft with a trial subscription, but publication is only possible after purchasing a subscription.

OK, ready? If you want to build your own site on TaxDome, we break it down for you here. Follow A through G to become a TaxDome website-building pro. Don’t worry, it’s not rocket science; it’s intuitive! 

• A. Select a template
• B. Create pages
• C. Add content to your page
• D. Edit element and block properties
• E. Edit copy
• F. Move, lock, duplicate and hide page elements
• G. Create links

A. Select a template

Building a landing page from scratch is time-consuming, so we’ve done most of the work for you. All that’s left is making some choices: First, select a template for the basic layout, then customize it to make it look even better.

1. Go to Settings > Site builder from the left menu bar and click Start editing Website.

2. Browse the templates to find your favorite. To see what it will look like, hover your mouse over the template thumbnail, then click Preview. To apply a template, hover your mouse over the template thumbnail, then click Select.

Tip: The Business category contains several templates specifically created for accounting firms.

Once the template has loaded, start customizing it inside the editor window of the website builder.

B. Create pages

To add extra pages to your site:

1. Go to the HOME button in the upper-right corner of the page, click the down arrow, then select Edit in the drop-down menu.

2. Click New Item, enter the item name, then specify the item type by selecting Page or Link.

3. Enter the properties, then click Apply.

Don’t forget to add a link to your portal: /app

Add an /app page link (e.g., yourfirm.taxdome.com/app) to your site menu. This way, clients will be able to access their TaxDome portal from the site; the app page redirects them to either the login page or—if there’s an active session—their client account portal (e.g., yourfirm.taxdome.com/app/dashboard).

Once a page or link is created, specify whether you want it to show up in the site menu. Also, define the order of your pages in the menu by dragging-and-dropping items.

C. Add content to your page

There are two ways to build a page. Use one or combine them:

• Add single elements like buttons, links, shapes and images. These also include interactive elements like Google Maps, social icons, galleries, embed videos and more. To choose elements for your page, drag-and-drop the appropriate toolbar button to the desired position. To make sure your elements are positioned correctly, use the Layout option. It helps to mark the location of the page elements.
• Add blocks to speed up the process of prototyping and page-building. A page block is a predesigned block of content that is used for a certain section, such as for Testimonials, About Us or Services. A page block has images, buttons, links and other elements that can be easily edited or deleted. You have 100 percent design control, but you don’t have to build from scratch. To add a page block, click Blocks, select a category from the list, choose the block design, then click Add.

D. Edit element and block properties

Every element and block added to your page has editable properties. To access them, click on the element or block, and the properties are displayed in a panel on the right. The properties that are available depend on the object type.

To make sure your website looks great on all devices, set the  Width and Height at auto and select the Allow to adjust size automatically checkbox.

E. Edit copy

To edit a text element, double-click on any text box in the preview screen. Write the copy. Once you’ve finished, click Done or anywhere outside the text box.

F. Move, lock, duplicate and hide page elements

To move an element on a page, point your cursor on the edge of an element, then drag it.

To lock the element in place, hover your mouse over the element, right-click, then select Lock from the drop-down menu. Once the element is locked, it won’t budge. To move it again, return to the drop-down menu, then select Unlock.

To duplicate an element, hover your mouse over it, right-click, then select Duplicate from the drop-down menu. The element will appear below the original one. If you’d like to paste a copy somewhere else, you can use the Copy and Paste Element commands instead.

Page elements are deletable. Hover your mouse over the element, right-click, then select Remove.

To hide certain elements on a page according to the device used, hover your mouse over the element, right-click, select Visibility, then choose the device type.

G. Create links

Anything on a page can have a clickable link that will bring visitors to another page:

1. Click the element, then select Link in the panel on the right.

2. Click the edit icon next to the URL, specify the link properties, then click Apply.

Adding a contact form

Adding a contact form to your website allows current and future clients to enter their contact info and email you. Many templates already have a Contact Us form installed, and one can also be added to our website builder by going to Blocks, selecting the Contacts section, then choosing the appropriate element.

Then you’ll need to set the contact form up so that you receive messages at your email address:

1. Click the gear icon at the top right, then copy the URL from the  Copy this URL field to enable contact form submissions.

2. Click in the area of your contact form in the website builder. At the right menu, fill in the following fields:

• Submit form to. Select URL from the drop-down.
• URL. Paste the URL that you copied in the previous step. 

So, when a visitor fills out a contact form on your site and clicks the submit button, the data from the form is sent to a specified server at that URL. This allows you to receive messages from the contact form to your email address or another specified server that handles these requests.

You can also adjust: 

• Form sent Message to customize the message your site visitors will receive once they’ve submitted the form.

• Team Members to determine which team members will receive form submissions (by default, they are sent to the firm owner). Click the gear icon at the top right, select the team members and click Save.

Creating a blog

Blogging is a great way to attract visitors to your website and increase visibility on search engines. The more content you have on your blog, the more chances search engines will peg your site as a valuable resource.

If your site is hosted on TaxDome, add a blog at no additional cost. Create the page where you want it to be, click Blog, then select your favorite layout. Once you click on a blog element, customize it by changing things like color, using the settings in the panel on the right.

• To edit default posts and add new ones, click the Edit posts button in the panel on the right.
• Or open any of the existing posts, then click the Edit link on the categories list.

Customizing SEO settings

Using our website builder, customize titles, descriptions and keywords on your website. Click the down arrow to the right of the gear icon in the upper-right corner of the page, then select SEO from the pull-down menu. Click Default (for all pages) on the left to fill in the website info, then click Apply. Select the site pages one by one and fill in their titles, descriptions and keywords where needed.

To find out more about search engine optimization, visit our How to Improve Your Website Visibility on Search Engines page.

Saving, previewing and publishing your site

To save your changes, hover your mouse over the Publish button, then select Save Draft.

Once you finish working on your site, preview it. Click the Preview button to see what it will look like on different screens. Click Close to exit the preview mode.

Tip: To make sure your site looks great with all resolutions, select the Switch to vertical layout on smaller screens checkbox for your horizontal layouts.

If you’re happy with what you see, click Publish.

Once the site is published, visitors can get to it by navigating to your firm’s TaxDome URL.

Unpublishing your site

You can temporarily hide your site so that clients won’t see it. Toggle off Enable Website at the top of the page.

Who can do this?

A firm owner and admin can create a website hosted on TaxDome. If you’d like one of your team members to do it, you’ll need to give them access rights to manage the site.

1. Go to  Settings > Team & Plans from the left menu bar, open theTeam members tab, then click on the team member’s name in the list.

2. Click the pencil icon in the  Edit Access Rights section and toggle on Manage site.

3. Click Save.

We’ve got your back in case you lose your local backup. Request your data from our Customer Support Team as long as your subscription is active. If your subscription is expired or past due, backups are stored 30 days, then deleted.

Heads-up: We can’t restore your backup if you cancel your subscription or request to delete your firm.