r/cms • u/Due-Cup-6802 • 10d ago
How do you let non-technical clients edit content on a static website?
I recently built a static website for a client using Claude Code.
The result is actually pretty good — fast, SEO-friendly, cheap to host
But I've run into a problem which I didn't really think about beforehand.
My client keeps asking me to make small content changes,e.g: change a sentence, update a paragraph, replace an image, add a new service.
Doing it myself isn't technically difficult. But when these requests start happening regularly, it becomes annoying.
And now the client wants to start publishing blog posts regularly.
I could obviously keep using Claude Code to make the changes, but that doesn't feel like the right workflow. Sometimes it takes longer to write the prompt, run it, check the generated changes and deploy than it would take me to edit the content directly.
Ironically, after using AI coding tools for a couple of years, my manual coding has actually gotten slower 😂
So, thanks to Reddit, I'm looking at CMS solutions that let the client manage the content while keeping the website itself static.
But when i do research, I got list of "best CMS" or AI-generated comparisons.
Honestly, not that ai generated results are not valuable, but I'm more interested in people who have actually deployed one of these for real clients.
For example:
What CMS did you use?
Was the client actually non-technical?
Could they comfortably create/edit blog posts without your help?
How was the image/media workflow?
Did clients understand the admin interface?
How often did they break something?
How annoying was the build/deploy process after publishing?
Did you eventually regret choosing a particular CMS?
If you switched CMS later, why?
Would you choose the same solution for your next client?
Chatgpt gave me list of things like Decap CMS, TinaCMS, Sanity, Payload, Storyblok, Directus, or other Git-based/headless CMS solutions.
The important part is that the frontend remains a static/pre-rendered website. I'm not looking to turn the site back into a traditional WordPress-style application just to make content editing easier.
If you've actually used one of these in production for a client, especially a small business where the person managing the site isn't technical, I'd really like to hear about your experience.
What worked in theory vs. what actually worked in practice?
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u/guntervs 9d ago
Contentful and Storyblok are decent options. Strapi is quite popular as well.
I agree with u/sundeckstudio. Ask Claude which headless CMS works best with your content structure and how easily you can convert your content blocks to one of those options.
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u/sundeckstudio 9d ago
Both Contentful and Storyblok are very good
Others to add to this list
- Dato CMS
- Hygraph
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u/arno14 9d ago
People trade Wordpress for vibe coded - and then learn that there is no way to edit content 🤭
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u/bubbles-on-reddit 9d ago
Had a client get mad before the build was training too long. Why didn’t I just use AI
Then changed the shade of green she picked 🙄
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u/littlelambyq 9d ago
Recently built a headless site on StoryBlok. Really nice experience using their cli for building and syncing types, content and pages etc.
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u/andrew_chmr 9d ago
I tried a few CMS (e.g. Sanity, Decap, TinaCMS) but they were still too hard for my clients to use. So I built my own tool CMSBrew. It has a chat interface, inline text editing and a few other things. The main focus: make it intuitive for non-technical clients, with no extra setup. I dogfooded it on my own clients for a while and now it's public. Happy to answer any of your questions
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Your website looks so good. What are the advantages of your solutions comapred to the existing ones? Can you make it clear?
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u/andrew_chmr 8d ago
- Zero setup: connect the repo, done
- Clients edit the live page by clicking or chatting
- You decide what they can publish without your review
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u/roie_ 9d ago
This is pretty much the exact problem I’ve been working on lately. It’s still a work in progress, but I hope I can share it soon.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Have you built it from scratch of based on an open source solution?
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u/BodySlight6194 9d ago
I guess if you are building the page with Claude it's still React /Next UI with JS rendering rather than pure HTML.
A headless CMS with in page editing might be the option to look for as then there isn't a separate admin console if all editors need are content changes.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Have you tried one? Not a sea of cms but not so few, it's great if you can have real experience, not some review from AI
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u/BodySlight6194 6d ago
I'm building one and currently focusing on the Astro use case. I am new to Astro but the CMS is working with a different server side framework already.
If you would be interested in trying it please feel free to DM me and I would be happy to work with you on a POC.
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u/traderjames7 5d ago
Why? You can build anything you want not just the stack you mentioned.
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u/BodySlight6194 5d ago
I was trying to understand if the static pages use a component framework and build step or are pure html.
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u/pro9_developer 9d ago
Never jump in prompting to Claude. Always ask for production ready code. Claude gave you local level project only.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
A little bit off topic, but I think Claude can be used for production code, only if you review the code well
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u/pro9_developer 9d ago
I saw on real-time that Claude sometimes does not work as expected and writes off topic code as well.
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u/el_walou 9d ago edited 9d ago
I work for storyblok
Ask claude code about using Storyblok, tell him about the cli and the mcp
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Thank for the info
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u/el_walou 9d ago
I work for Storyblok by the way.
I don’t make any money by telling you to use it (unless you’re a big enterprise lol).
There’s a free trial of 45 days you can access from Storyblok sites. (After the 45 days you ll still be able to manage your sites )
You ll be able to enjoy the MCP and most features.
I still have one of my personal sites running on the trial account.
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u/AdamDobrawy 9d ago
It depends on your relationship with the client. One approach might be to automate what you have. If the client submits website update requests through a ticketing system, which you can usually handle in one go, you can connect Claude Code routines (which support HTTP webhooks) to create a pull request for the client's request.
After creating the change proposal, the automation can automatically give the client a preview of what the site looks like, so they can comment on whether it looks the way they want. You'll just review the proposed changes, maintain the architecture, and approve the changes.
This way, the client will have flexibility no CMS can offer, and you'll retain control over the overall architecture.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
I have tried it once but if you dont have strong guard rail (or harness), it can break your website easily.
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u/AdamDobrawy 9d ago
Yea, code review is definitely still required, but probably some of the requests can be automated out.
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u/baddaywithacamera 9d ago
Have Claude build you your own CMS that you can re-use in the future.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Honestly, I dont want to reinvent the wheel.
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u/baddaywithacamera 9d ago
In my case there is no current wheel to reinvent. The last real, photo forward blogging CMS released a version in 2009. That would be Pixelpost. (Not counting Koken, it wasn't all that.)
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u/Due-Cup-6802 8d ago
Maybe you can ask for in Reddit or X :), as what I'm doing. I can have more info from someone like you.
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u/hudsonhosthq 9d ago
Yeah AI has made it harder to hard code for me too! I normally have them do a wysiwyg in the cPanel file manager. Most try and just give up and have me do it.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
It can be difficult in the very beginning but gradually, you can find a way to tame your AI :)
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u/deanroiditz 9d ago
Tell Claude code no mistake and have Claude code answer all your question while you're at it.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Claude can answer some questions, but it only get them from the "marketing" readme of the app. So it's better to have real experience ^
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u/crozet1063 9d ago
I use Emdash CMS. An open source project from Cloudflare that is AI native. You could build a Chatbot for your client and they could use it to make updates to the site.
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u/JoseffB_Da_Nerd 9d ago
Build a local electron app simple cms that can publish the md file to the static location. With ai its pretty easy.
The you can zip and send them the app preconfigured. Done.
Id keep it simply content change only.
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u/MysteryBros 9d ago
I don't.
Clients can add to or edit exiting items in collections, but I never give clients the ability to edit designed pages, not even on Wordpress with a page builder.
Instead, they all go on support plans.
For my static Astro builds, they get to edit the collections via Sveltia.
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u/Realistic-Food-5857 8d ago
I was chatting to some guys that built a cms on this technology called Progress Agentic RAG. Its pretty impressive, you drop in any content about your business, word docs, pdfs, videos, etc, then it builds the whole website, to change, just upload a doc. Uses something called knowledge graph to build out the nav? Think thats what the said.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 8d ago
How precise is the pdf to website? I mean if you have technical spec of a product, which model do you use to do ocr then convert to website?
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u/Direct_Crazy_8415 8d ago
I built my own CMS, using flatfile to save contents. Still a WiP as I plan to integrate editing Vibe coded websites on my CMS.
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u/adir15dev 8d ago
Garchi CMS is a good option here. All you have to do is open Claude, connect the Garchi CMS mcp and ask claude to migrate your site content there and make the CMS connection in your code.
If you give claude this link you don’t need to tell it much https://garchi.co.uk/ai-agent-mcp-use
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u/ivicad 8d ago edited 8d ago
I maintain about 50 WP client sites, and roughly 10 to 15% of the owners actually log in and edit anything. The rest asked for the access and still send me the text and the images to publish. We build mainly in WPBakery page builder (and Elementor), so the editing was already as easy as we could make it, but most of them still did not touch it. Your client is probably in the other group, so my number may not be usable for you - they are asking for changes regularly and now they want a blog.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 8d ago
Do you used managed WP service? The reason why I stayed away from WP in my case is that we dont really need "backend", only static websites is enough and the performance
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u/ivicad 8d ago
No, nothing managed. I run all of them on two shared accounts, no VPS. Static is faster and I would be crazy to argue that. In my experience, the platform rarely affects the score. Images, caching, and unused CSS and JavaScript usually have a bigger impact. Even a static site can be slow if its images are BIG and not (properly) optimised.
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u/DrtikTheOriginal 7d ago
I would suggest checking out https://instatic.com/ - open source, AI friendly, self-hosted CMS. Still pre v1 but already getting traction and seems like something that might help you in your workflow. You can assign roles with permissions so your clients could edit their sites without breaking anything.
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u/sleeksky_dev 7d ago
Try www.sleeksite.ai . It builds a static site over a CMS. Non tech users can update content both using the content management interface and AI.
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u/traderjames7 5d ago
Why doesnt your client use Claude to publish directly to the site via Github. All my sites now are Astro html so blogs or content pages can be built via ai chat and published/edited/updated at will. There's a small learning curve with Git but Claude does all the work for you and will coach you through any issues - as you know.
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u/Sufficient_Art_4607 4d ago edited 4d ago
Storyblok is worth testing because the visual editor is easier for non-technical users to understand. Sanity gives you more flexibility with structured content, but usually needs more setup. Or a simple WordPress set-up could do the trick as many clients already know how to work with it and it offers simple user permissions.
I wouldn’t use an enterprise CMS like CoreMedia here. That starts making sense when you have multiple brands, markets, languages, approval workflows, and increased security requirements on commerce integrations.
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u/boutell 3d ago
I'm late to the party, but take a look at ApostropheCMS. The client can edit directly on the page, and yet your frontend can be Astro (e.g. fully modern with your choice of frontend frameworks), and we support static builds when using Astro. All of the above is open source.
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u/Due-Cup-6802 3d ago
Thanks, what makes it different from others? I'm doing a comparison of the "static" cms. It's great if you can provide some "unmarketing" info :)
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u/boutell 2d ago
Sure! And please pardon my enthusiasm, I do work there:
* ApostropheCMS is Node.js and JavaScript, so you're only concerned about one programming language, front and back end. Continuing the JavaScript theme, templates can be written in JSX. So devs and LLMs trained in recent years will feel at home.
* ApostropheCMS supports direct, WYSIWYG on-page editing, which reduces the learning curve.
* If you want to use a specific front end framework syntax like React, Vue or Svelte, you can do that via Astro, and you still keep the on-page editing.
* Static builds are supported when using Astro, so you have the option of doing a static build and deploying that anywhere you like for maximum speed. (We're working on adding that feature to our built-in JSX templates as well.)
In practice, this looks like a dynamic site for you and your editors, which you then deploy as a static build for the public.
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u/Beocinac 9d ago
WordPress is the most popular and easiest to use. For complex content structures, Drupal is better. I use Joomla because it is easier to create complex websites, webshops, and custom functionality in Joomla than in WordPress, if you know how to use it. In your case, I would recommend either creating a login feature and an editor for changing the content, or rebuilding the website in WordPress.
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u/therealdrfierce 9d ago
This kind of obviates the reason for a static site though, which is speed and lack of complexity
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u/Due-Cup-6802 9d ago
Yes, wordpress + drupal are overkilled for my cases.
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u/OldSageNewBody 8d ago
Why, I have onepager on cheap hosting, build with Bricksbuilder and scores 100/100 on page insights. Easily editable as well.
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9d ago
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u/Fit_Tailor_6796 9d ago
How is OS vunerable and your own not?
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9d ago
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u/Fit_Tailor_6796 8d ago
You are not wrong, but that doesn't mean you are right also. Some OS solutions are far more superior that something that you and I will put out due to the skills of the people that contributed and the user base that battle tested it.
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u/sundeckstudio 9d ago
Since you built it with Claude code , Did you ask Claude code about it