How roles work
Every major CMS separates what people can do. WordPress, for example, ships with five standard roles.
| Role | What it can do |
|---|---|
| Administrator | Everything, including settings, users and plugins |
| Editor | Publish and manage everyone's posts and pages |
| Author | Publish and manage their own posts |
| Contributor | Write and edit their own posts, but not publish them |
| Subscriber | Manage only their own profile |
Other systems use similar ideas with different names. The principle is the same. Give each person the least access their job needs.
A sensible setup for a small business
- Owner. Full access, plus the domain and hosting accounts.
- Office manager. Edits content, hours and prices.
- Marketing help. Writes and edits posts and pages.
- Agency. Builds and maintains, on its own named login.
Each person gets a personal login. When someone leaves, you remove one account and nothing else changes.
History and undo
Mistakes happen when several people edit. A good CMS keeps a change history. WordPress stores revisions for posts and pages. Git-based systems like Keystatic save every change as a commit with a name and a date. You see who changed what and can roll back any edit.
Good example. A dental group gives each office manager an editor login for their own location page. The owner reviews changes in the history each month.
Bad example. Five staff members share one admin password. Someone deletes a page, and nobody knows who or when.
Keep ownership in your name
The person who owns the admin account controls the site. Make sure that is you, not a former employee or an agency.
Read who owns the domain, hosting and files. Our web design team sets up named logins and roles for your whole team at launch.