This getting started article will help Users customize their Client Portal using the TDClient and TDAdmin interfaces. The user must have the administrative permission in TDAdmin or the Add and Modify Service permissions within TDClient.
Overview
The Client Portal allows TeamDynamix users to have client or public-facing content for better interactions with clients who either do not have TDX accounts or do not have TDNext access.
Clients might visit the Client Portal to submit a project request, log an incident, check on their existing ticket or project, or read articles in the knowledge base. The Client Portal is positioned to help your users help themselves.
The styling and branding of the Client Portal can only be modified in TDAdmin. The home page is the area that usually requires the most thought and effort. It can be a series of out of the box widgets, or it can be heavily customized via the use of HTML modules. Once branding has been completed, it is advised to communicate with the marketing department for approval of the public homepage.
Organizations can create multiple instances of the Client Portal Application. This may be done to display only relevant services to a specific client group. For example, an organization may choose to create a Client Portal Application for Human Resources services and a separate Client Portal Application for their IT Services.
Transcript
The Client Portal module will go over using the TDAdmin interface to design the look and feel of your client portal applications. You will learn how to configure your portal application security roles, add a header and a footer to your portal, as well as make decisions on site settings. You'll learn how to set up pages on your portal using the included content objects or by creating your own HTML modules.
Features
Where to Find This
This feature appears in the TDAdmin and TDClient interfaces.
TDAdmin is where Administrators will configure the application settings, style and layout. TDClient is where Users and Administrators will create any new content including services and Knowledge Base articles.
Where to Start
Existing Client Portal Applications
When your Business Entity is created a Client Portal application will be created within your environment. This initial Client Portal application will be marked as the default, meaning that any legacy URLs and API requests will automatically use this application. New development using Client Portal-related API methods should reference the Client Portal application's AppID.
Client Portal Applications in TDNext
For users in TDNext, all their assigned Client Portal Applications will show in the Applications menu. As of version 11.0, the Applications menu does not contain direct links to the knowledge base, service catalog, and Questions sections of the Client Portal. For users who use these links, we recommend creating and assigning an external application that links to that section of the Client Portal.
Within each Ticketing Application, any service or article searches will be limited to the Client Portal application(s) selected in the ticketing application's "Related client portal application" setting, but lookup pages will allow you to search any Portal you can access.
Creating a New Client Portal Application
Follow these instructions to learn how to create a new Client Portal Application.
To successfully rollout the Client Portal, you will need:
- An idea of how you want your portal to look.
- TeamDynamix Administrator access.
- Access to your organizations branding guidelines.
- Some understanding of web design.
Creating Client Portal Pages
Each page added to the portal will appear within the horizontal page toolbar. Each page can contain its own content and layout within the TDClient application.
To create a new Client Portal page:
- In TDAdmin, click Applications > [Client Portal Application]
- Click Desktops & Pages and select Pages
- Click the green +New button
- Add a Name and Description and click Save
- Click on the Content tab to edit the page layout and populate the page with Available Content. The left side will represent the available content, the right will be content, such as HTML modules or widgets, that are on the page.
- Click Edit Layout to adjust the how content will be displayed on the page
- Drag content from the Available Content column into the desired section of the page.
- Click Save
Customizing the Design
To increase adoption to the site, the Client Portal should closely match the branding of the organization. Within TeamDynamix, you can style your site, and build HTML content.
To add a logo:
A logo can be added in two ways. The first method will update the logo across all applications within TeamDynamix.
- In TDAdmin, select the BE home screen by clicking the name of your organization
- Click the green Edit button to modify the environment.
- Scroll to the Logo Path and click Browse
- Select the new Logo image file from your workstation and click Open
- Click Save
The Client Portal logo can also be changed using the following steps. This will be used if you have multiple Client Portals that require different logos.
- In TDAdmin Click Applications > [Client Portal Application]
- Click Styles
- Within the section titled Custom Logo Click Browse
- Select the new Logo image file from your workstation and click Open
- Click Save
To customize the design of the Client Portal:
- In TDAdmin Click Applications > [Client Portal Application]
- Click Styles.
- Modify styles and branding for each designated section of the page. Use hexadecimal codes for colors, or utilize the color picker by clicking on a color field.
- Preview changes by Clicking Preview
- For the changes to be applied to the Client Portal, click the Save and Enable buttons.
Adding a Favicon:
- In TDAdmin Click Applications > [Client Portal Application]
- Click Styles.
- Within the section titled Browser Favicon Click Browse
- Select the new Logo image file from your workstation and click Open
- Click Save
Adding Standard and Custom Content
Various modules or custom content can be added to enhance the functionality of a page and give users more information.
Adding Modules or Widgets to the Homepage
To add modules to the homepage:
- In TDAdmin, Applications > [Client Portal Application]> Desktops & Pages > HTML Modules
- Click the +New button.
- Ensure Client Portal is selected as the Category
- Enter the Name
- Make selections for the following
- Show Border: This will display a boarder around the HTML module on the Client Portal Page
- Show Name: This will show the Name at the top of the HTML module on the Client Portal Page
- Sanitize Content: Sanitized desktop modules have potentially dangerous HTML tags (script, iframe, etc.) stripped from the module contents when it is rendered on a desktop.
- Insert HTML content into the Content area.
- Click Save
To add HTML modules or widgets to the homepage:
- In TDAdmin, Applications > [Client Portal Application]> Desktops & Pages
- Click on Home from the available pages
- In the Edit Page Details popup, click the Content tab.
The left side will represent the available content, the right will be content, such as HTML modules or widgets, that are on the page.
- Select the desired HTML modules or widgets. Drag-and-drop them into the appropriate column on the right side.
- For the changes to be applied to the Client Portal, click the Save and Enable buttons.
- To see the changes made, visit the Client Portal and refresh the page.
Learn more about creating and modifying HTML modules.
Adding a Header or Footer
To add a header or footer:
- In TDAdmin, Applications > [Client Portal Application]> Settings
- Populate the Client HTML Header and/or Client HTML Footer with the HTML you'd like.
- Click Save
Learn more about custom HTML headers and footers.
Setting Client Portal Public Content
For each item, there will be three values: Visible, Not Visible, or Auto. Auto means that the application will be visible if it includes any public content.
To review permissions:
- In TDAdmin, Applications > [Client Portal Application]> Settings
- Navigate to the Public Client Portal Sections section.
- Select the visibility for public users by selecting the desired radio button for each content section
- Click Save
Tracking Use with Google Analytics
To use Google Analytics, identify the Web Property ID and go to TDAdmin > Organization Settings > Site Settings > and populate the Google Analytics Configuration.
Learn more about Client Portal site settings.
Client Portal Applications
The Projects, Services, Knowledge Base, and Questions are the four main applications that can be used in the Portal to interact with clients. Each has settings to determine whether its content is visible to unauthenticated users, and there are additional restrictions that can be applied.
Projects
This application allows users to monitor project status from the Client Portal. Although most project management functionality exists in TDNext, this Portal view provides a way to monitor project health and perform actions for project members without TDNext access.
Projects marked as Public will appear in the Client Portal. The Client Portal Visibility setting can be changed by users who have permission to manage the project.
The visibility setting supports the following values:
- Public – The project is visible to all users, even those who are not logged in.
- Published – The project is visible to all logged in users, regardless of project membership.
- Membership – The project is only visible to users who are logged in and are listed as a stakeholder on the project.
Services
This application allows clients to submit service requests to technicians. Services can be configured so that when requested, a work item with the corresponding information will be created in the TeamDynamix system to be processed by a technician. The type can be configured in the Request Application/Type field that appears in the Settings tab of the service edit page in the Client Portal. These can be created for projects, tickets, and links, although all three work differently. Each type is detailed more explicitly in the following sections.
Get started with your service catalog.
Project Request Service
This type of service causes a project request to be submitted, which is later approved or rejected. The approver of the project depends upon the Type that is associated with the request. Each project type has an evaluator who is responsible for reviewing and acting on all project requests which are submitted with that type.
The evaluator for a specific project type can only be configured by an administrator. This can be performed in the Admin tool by navigating to Portfolio Planning > Types, then clicking on the name of the type, and changing the value of the Evaluator field. It is a required field, and all project types have an evaluator for those types of project requests.
Please note that the information submitted with a service request can be configured. The form to be used on the service can be changed in the Form tab when editing a service. Administrators can create or edit the forms themselves in the Admin tool by navigating to Portfolio Planning > Request Forms and editing the field list as needed.
Any changes to a form will not update previous instances of it. The new fields associated with the form will only be used the next time that the form is applied to a service.
Ticket Request Service
This is the most complex form of service, as it supports all ticketing platforms configured for an organization. The specified platform determines the application in which the ticket is created after the service request is submitted. Please note that the primary reviewer of the ticket depends upon the Type specified for the service.
As with project requests, the form to be used on the service can be configured in the Form tab when editing a service. However, the forms that are available depend on which ticketing application has been selected for the service. Administrators – whether organizational or application – can create or edit the forms themselves in the Admin tool by locating Ticketing Applications > [Application Name] > Request Forms and editing the field list as needed.
Any changes to a form will not update existing instances of the form. The new fields associated with the form will only be used the next time that the form is applied to a service.
Link Service
This is the simplest type of service because no work item is created. Rather, when you click the button to submit a link service, a new browser window opens that takes you to the URL configured for the link. It should be used when the issue can be resolved at the provided web address. A TeamDynamix work item therefore does not need to be created.
Knowledge Base
The knowledge base application allows users to create articles that convey information to clients and to create documents to troubleshoot common issues or document standard processes or procedures. Users can also create content as needed.
Learn more about the knowledge base.
Questions
Questions can be used to encourage communication between the technician and the client. Users and clients no longer need to email support representatives directly. The user community and TeamDynamix support team respond in the threaded question comments.
The Questions application makes it easy to respond to a question in the Client Portal. At the bottom of every Questions page in the Portal, you will find a Contribute an answer button.
Lear more about Questions.
Gotchas & Pitfalls
- Depending on the styling desired, there can be a lead time to include someone at the organization who knows HTML or CSS.
- If there are no web standards, defining the Client Portal style can take a while.
- If there's an organizational approval required for a logo or other style data, that can add time to this module.
Examples
Below are examples of Client Portal homepages from TeamDynamix customers:
See the whole list of live Client Portals.