Why Joomla #6 – Link Management

Posted by: bizguy in MyBlog on Sep 18, 2009

The Joomla CMS provides a built in link management component that allows you to add links to external websites and a description of the website. These links can be sorted into categories for easy navigation by site users.

• Menu items setup to the link section, will display a list of categories, with the number of links in each category automatically displayed beside the category title
• Selecting a category title will display all the links in that category, with the link description of the website and the number of hits the link has had. The hit counter is automatically tracked by Joomla and displayed. At the bottom of the category page, Joomla automatically displays links to the other categories and link counts as well.

• Links and categories may be set to published (and displayed on the site) or unpublished.

• Links may be sorted in each category in a specific order.
• Categories may be sorted in a specific order.
• Links can be set to open in a new browser window (which means your visitors are also still on your site)

Joomla's included links management system is a good way of managing links to external sites for many website owners. If more functionality is needed, extensions in the JED can add many more features to the basic links display.

Complete directory extensions are available that allow sites to:

• collect a fee to be listed,

• charge for various listing features (like logo display, mapping, description, etc.)
• offer featured listings in ad banners displayed on the site outside of the directory,
• directory tree display layout,
• featured listing display order in a category
• automated link back requirement and tracking
• etc.

Determining what you want each section of your website to do, will help you decide if the functionality built into Joomla is enough to accomplish that, or if your will need to extend Joomla through 3^rd party extensions.

Having worked with Joomla and developing the understanding of it as I have, adds to my desire to be the top listed company under the search phrase the best web designer in Canada. If you have thoughts or questions, add a comment.