Wordpress backend usage manual for Gray Line licensees

Warning:

The site editor has the power to modify the website. Therefore, any modification such as editing, deleting, enabling, disabling (whichever applicable) on any content, pages, widgets, custom areas/configurations, plugins, SEO etc. which may be permanent in nature is in the responsibility of the site editors. Palisis is not responsible for the recovery or reset of any data or configuration.

What does it mean?

In this article, we show you how to create pages, change the appearance, and add modifications to the WordPress template used for Gray Line licensees.

Where do I find it?

To access your Wordpress instance and edit some aspects of your website, you need to access your website URL followed by /wp-admin/, for example, https://grayline-live.com/wp-login.php, with the provided credentials.

If you still don’t have credentials, please, contact our support team by emailing support@palisis.com.

Getting started

1. Open the browser and enter the URL for the website and add ‘/wp-admin’ as a slug.

a. Ex. https://www.<root -domain>.com/wp-admin.

2. Visiting the URL, you will be prompted with a basic authentication (browser) pop up. Enter the username and password provided, and click on the Sign-in button.

a. Note - Palisis will provide you with the basic authentication username and password

3. After the basic authentication, you will be prompted with the WordPress authentication screen. Enter your username, password and press the login button.

The Dashboard

Legend:

Header

Side menu

Dashboard

User Profile

Users

To view existing users, go to SIDE PANEL> USERS> ALL USERS

To create a new user and assign roles (permissions) go to SIDE PANEL> USERS> ALL USERS and click the ‘Add New’ button

Enter all the required details, select the adequate role and click on ‘Add New User’

Roles

Each role has a set of predefined permissions. These permissions allow users to access the backend functionalities.

Homepage

How to create a page?

Please note that this section does not apply to tour pages, which should not be edited solely for SEO configuration.

To add a new page, you need to navigate to Pages > Add New Page. If you just want to edit an existing page, then go to Pages > edit the corresponding page.

Please, note that when you add a new page, the “Default template” is preselected. According to this template, there are a few elements that can be configured and added to the page when using the ‘Default template’.

On this page, you will find the following elements that can be added:

1. Add title – Title is referenced in Slug, Browser tab title, Plugins, etc.

2. Type “/” to choose a block. Content can be added using blocks. Blocks have multiple options like HTML, paragraph, headings, tables, media, etc. It has multiple styling options for the content.

3. Tour Search Keyword & Title.

This section's output is a list of tours that can be displayed in various ways, depending on three distinct methods.

Method 1: The tours are listed according to their tour IDs. You need to enter these tour IDs in the corresponding field. In this example, tour IDs 1, 2, and 3 will be displayed.

Method 2: Tours are listed according to the category.

Method 3: Tours are listed according to the location.

Special offers: if you select this checkbox, it only shows tours that are on special offer.

Size of List: you can define here the size of list, which is 3 by default.

4. Custom values, keywords, fields, etc. - Users can create custom fields, keys etc. from this section. Few are already created as mentioned below:

a. Destination Landing Banner

b. Destination Landing Link

c. Destination Landing Essential Blog

d. Destination Landing articles

e. Destination Landing Google Map

f. Destination Landing Video

g. Destination Custom uploader

h. Yoast SEO

For more information, please visit the section 'How to configure SEO for pages?'

i. Footer Content

Page settings

On the right-hand side, you'll find various settings, including the title, featured image, publish status, template and parent page.

Block Configuration

Select block to view the configuration settings.

The settings are displayed based on the type of block / content selected. Examples:

i. Paragraph attributes – size, colour, background, font face, anchor tags, CSS 10

ii. Image attributes – Style (Square, Round), Alt text, Image size, etc. iii. Heading attributes, etc.

3. Once the Page content and setup is complete, it can be previewed, saved as draft, or published.

To add new blocks to the page, you need to click on the plus button on the top left side to view the block inserter section.

We do not recommend this, as adding new blocks to the page would deviate from the original template design.

How to configure SEO for pages

For SEO, the YOAST plugin is being used. You can download the plugin by going to Plugins under SIDE PANEL> PLUGINS and then search for YOAST.

For every page to set the SEO elements like focus key phrases, SEO title, slug and meta description the user has to go to the ‘Yoast SEO’ section and enter the SEO details.

How to edit a page?

To edit a page, hover over the page name and click on the edit link in the page view list.

On clicking the edit link, page contents will be displayed in edit mode which can be edited the same way as the create page.

How to delete a page?

Users can delete a page by hovering over the page name and clicking on the trash link in the page view list. To delete the page permanently, the user can go to the trash bin and delete the page.

Tours

You can find all the tour pages under the Tours section:

All tours are automatically synced from TourCMS once daily. This task updates any new tours, removes tours (if not present in TourCMS), and updates data in existing tours, including content and media.

The user has the option to update tours manually, outside of the standard sync interval as follows:

Update all tours manually

1. Go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

2. Click on the Sync Tours button

Update individual tours manually

1. Go to SIDE PANEL> TOURS

2. Search for the tour to be updated and click on the edit button.

3. On the edit page, in the right section under ‘publish’, click the ‘update’ button.

However, for SEO, users can update the configuration for each tour. To check how the SEO is configured please refer to How to configure SEO for pages?

Tours custom fields

Tours custom fields can be used to display different flags on your tour pages and distinguish descriptions used on your own website from descriptions used on 3rd party (e.g. agent) websites. Actually, only the 2 first custom fields are displayed on the website: “a1 Easy cancellation” and “a2 Product Badges”. You can find them in TourCMS PRODUCTS > TOURS > DESCRIPTIONS & IMAGES > CUSTOM FIELDS

a1 Easy Cancellation custom field

In the “a1 Easy Cancellation” you can enter “false” to remove the “Free Cancellation” message for that tour. For example, the “✅ Free Cancellation” message has been removed for the “WS: Minimundus & Schiffahrt” tour.

a2 Product Badges custom field

Here you can enter one of the following codes for the “a2 Product Badges” custom field:

"SO" => __('Likely To Sell Out', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

"NT" => __('New Tour', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

"BS" => __('Bestseller', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

"ET" => __('Essential Tour', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

"MS" => __('Must See', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

"PT" => __('Private Tour', 'wp_grayline_tourcms_theme')

How to configure Tour Enquiry in the tour page?

For that, you need to follow the steps:

Tick the ‘Enable Tour Enquiries’ check box

When tour enquiry is enabled, a button is displayed above the booking widget in the tour details page.

On click of this button, an enquiry form is opened where customers can enter details and questions.

Data Synchronization

The following actions are currently configured to automatically update the data on the website in regular intervals.

1. Sync tours – this job is executed daily at a fixed time and it will synchronize the following TourCMS data with Wordpress

a. New tours added

b. Tours that were deleted

c. Tour data in existing tours (media, descriptions, etc.)

2. Currency JSON caching (Open Exchange Rates) - This job is executed daily at a fixed time to update currency exchange rates.

3. TourCMS URL uploads – This Job is executed daily at a fixed time to update TourCMS tour URLs

Blogs

You can find the Blogs on the ‘Posts’ section:

How to create a Blog/Post?

Go to SIDE PANEL> POSTS

To create blogs, click on the ‘Posts’ in the side panel and follow the steps below:

1. Click on the ‘Add New’ button.

2. Add title and start adding content by adding blocks below the title.

a. Blocks have the option to add and configure items like text, media, design, widgets, themes, etc.

b. Blocks design structure can be set through the block configuration.

3. Add SEO configs by adding data in the Yoast SEO section below the content part of the post.

4. User can add / update the following from the right panel

a. Summary

b. Tag Categories

c. Add Tags

d. Add a featured image

e. Add excerpt description (this is displayed as subtext in the view post pages list)

f. Discussion – enable / disable comment section for the post

5. Once the post content and setup is complete, it can be previewed, saved as draft or published.

Appearance

In the appearance menu, users can set the theme, customize, widgets, menus, etc.

How to use Customize?

Go to APPEARANCE> CUSTOMIZE

Here the user can change the appearance with the help of predefined and custom-created items.

1. Site identity: to set

a. Site title

b. Site tagline

c. Site icon

2. Colors

3. Background images: to set the background image

4. Menus: The user can set the primary and other menus (Refer to the menu section for more details)

5. Widgets: The user can customize widgets using this section (Refer to the widget section for more details). To customize the widget for a page:

a. Navigate to the page for which the widget is to be customized from the Customize UI

b. The left side panel will display the widgets used in the navigated page

i. in the UI, a pencil icon will be displayed on the left top corner of the widget.

c. The user can either edit the widget from the left widget list or from the UI directly, by clicking on the pencil icon

6. Homepage settings: The user can set the homepage (landing page) for the website

7. Additional CSS (Currently not in use)

8. Yoast SEO Breadcrumbs: The user can configure breadcrumbs for the website

How to use Widgets?

Go to APPEARANCE> WIDGETS

Users can view all the widgets directly from this section. All the widgets used in the website are listed here and can be customized.

Custom widgets are predefined in which content can be edited/deleted by clicking on the collapse icon.

Users can change/edit/delete the widgets’ content from here by adding blocks. In blocks, users can use elements and custom links.

How to create / edit Menus?

Go to APPEARANCE> MENUS

Users can create/edit primary and other menus here.

All the existing pages are already listed - users can create customer link menus for external / internal URLs.

Steps to create/edit the menu items.

1. Select the menu to be edited. In our example, we have selected “Tours”.

2. Select the items to be added to the menu from the ‘Add menu items’ section.

3. Click on ‘Add to menu’ - the items will be displayed in the Menu structure section.

4. In the Menu structure section the user can drag & drop menu items and so modify level and sequencing of the items.

For more information about the menu on the home page, please visit the following article:

WP Template - Homepage

Go to APPEARANCE> WIDGETS

Here, select Add a Navigation Menu, Select the menu and add a title, for instance About, Destinations or Tours. Please, note that the footer menu is already created in the Menu “Header theme 2024”, but you can change it.

Cache

We explain when you should clear the cache and how to do it.

When to clear the cache?

The cache should be cleared after an update has been done to data in TourCMS:

1. Channel information

2. Payment gateway

3. Any search keywords

4. Contents etc.

 
After updating a payment gateway, the cache needs to be updated manually and immediately, in order for payments to be able to process.

How to clear the cache?

Go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN and click on the ‘Clear Cache’ button at the bottom section of the page.

You can click on ‘Clear cache’ and then ‘Sync tours’. However, ‘Sync tours’ does not update availability; for that, you need to go to the tour page and click the ‘Update’ button.

There are two levels of caching: one on the TourCMS side and another on the WordPress side.

If you wish to clear the cache for a specific tour, then go to Page > Tours and click the ‘Publish/Update’ button in the right-hand menu.

Please, note that updating a tour pulls data from the TourCMS cache, which is refreshed every 12 hours.

You can adjust this time interval under ‘Clear time (seconds)’.

Google ECommerce Tracking

To configure Google e-commerce trackings, please follow these steps:

Go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE TOURCMS LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

1. Check the GA4 (data layer) radio button

How to configure Facebook Pixel

1. Login to business.facebook.com

2. Select the option to manually add pixel code to a website

3. Copy the Pixel code

4. Login to WordPress and go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE TOURCMS LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

5. Enter the Pixel code into the Facebook pixel tracking ID field

To track

1. Install the Facebook Pixel Helper chrome browser extension to verify the events

2. You can check the tracking details in the plugin by clicking on ‘ViewContent’

How to configure Bing Ads

To do this, please follow these steps:

1. Login to WordPress and go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE TOURCMS LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

2. Add UET (Universal Event Tracking) Tag Script into Header Script text box

3. Enable Bing Ads UET Revenue under Bing Ads settings

How to enable/disable Feefo Reviews

To do this, please follow these steps:

1. Login to WordPress and go to SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE TOURCMS LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

2. Check the checkbox below ‘Feefo Switch’ to enable the Reviews and uncheck the checkbox to disable.

How to configure Google Maps on the tours page?

To do this, please follow these steps:

1. Login to WordPress and go to SIDE PANEL> APPEARANCE> WIDGETS

2. Expand Tour Map Widget

3. Click on ‘Add’ to add a block and search for a legacy tour map. Click on the legacy tour map.

4. Enter Title, Zoom and Google Maps API Key and click on ‘Update’ (the Google Map usage API key is paid and to be purchased by the user)

5. To remove google maps, delete the block from the widget

Note – This is required as per GDPR compliance and if a Gray Line licensee keeps this plugin disabled, the licensee is legally liable.

Mail chimp plugin

To install the Mail Chimp plugin for WordPress (MC4WP), please follow these steps:

Go to SIDE PANEL> PLUGINS > ADD NEW

Then, search for MailChimp for WordPress (MC4P) and Install it. After that, click on the “Activate” button.

Now, you have the MC4P on the side Menu.

Please, go to SIDE PANEL> MC4WP to configure the plugin by entering the API key.

Apart from that, you need to enter the short code for mailchimp in SIDE PANEL> SETTINGS> GRAY LINE TOURCMS LICENSEE TOURCMS PLUGIN

Troubleshooting

Where can I edit the contact details?

You can edit the contact details on the website going to Appearance > Widgets

How to configure the "Recommended tours of the week"?

The configuration of "Recommended Tours of the week" displayed on the Home page.

Steps: Login in admin panel > Appearance > Customize > Widgets > Page Title Section

Search

Where do I find it?

Getting started

Steps to login

The Dashboard

Users

Pages

Pages categories

Homepage

How to create a page?

How to configure SEO for pages

How to edit a page?

How to delete a page?

Tours

Update all tours manually

Update individual tours manually

Tours custom fields

How to configure Tour Enquiry in the tour page?

Data Synchronization

Blogs

How to create a Blog/Post?

Appearance

How to use Customize?

How to use Widgets?

How to create / edit Menus?

Create/edit main menu

Create/edit footer menu

Cache

When to clear the cache?

How to clear the cache?

Google ECommerce Tracking

How to configure Facebook Pixel

How to configure Bing Ads

How to enable/disable Feefo Reviews

How to configure Google Maps on the tours page?

How to enable/disable Cookie Consent?

Mail chimp plugin

Troubleshooting

Where can I edit the contact details?

How to configure the "Recommended tours of the week"?

In this article

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