Accessing the Website Builder
Open Website Builder from the main menu. The builder uses a two-panel layout with controls on the left and a live preview on the right.
- Only admin users can access the Website Builder.
- Employee accounts do not see the menu item.
Getting Started
The Start area walks you through setup and shows industry-filtered starter templates.
- Event businesses see templates such as Signature Events and Backyard Parties.
- Lawn-care businesses see service-focused templates such as weekly maintenance, landscaping, and turf-program layouts.
- Applying a template pre-fills colors, fonts, page order, and starter copy.
- Template applications are saved in Publish History, so you can return to an earlier draft state.
Each template is built for a specific kind of business, but everything stays customizable after you apply it.
Pages and Sections
Your site can have more than one page.
- Each page has its own section order.
- The content for a section is shared across pages, but the order is page-specific.
- New pages start with an empty section order.
- Removing a section from one page only removes it from that page.
- If another page still uses the same section, Apex keeps that section available there.
That means you can reuse the same section content on multiple pages without copying it.
Builder Tabs
Brand
Set your business identity for the public site:
- business name and tagline
- contact details
- logo upload
- hero image
Style
Control the look and feel of the site:
- primary, secondary, accent, canvas, card, and text colors
- font pair selection
Sections
Your site is built from reorderable sections. You can toggle sections on or off, edit their content, and change their order.
Available sections include:
- Hero
- Featured Inventory
- Service Programs
- Packages
- Gallery
- Testimonials
- FAQ
- Quote Form
- Customer Portal
- Contact
- Custom
Inventory
Choose which items and packages appear on the site:
- featured inventory items
- featured packages
- quick actions to feature or clear common selections
- per-item overrides for display title, description, badge, and image
Pricing comes from your inventory, so you do not maintain a separate public catalog.
Photos + Reviews
Add supporting content:
- gallery images with captions
- testimonials
- FAQ entries
Quote Form
Configure the customer-facing request form:
- enable or disable the form
- show items, packages, or both
- require an event date when needed
- customize the submit label and success message
In quote mode, a submission creates a draft quote for your team to review. In recurring-service mode, the same form creates a service request instead.
Customer Portal
You can also show a customer portal section for existing customers. Portal access requests are separate from quote or service requests and can be enabled on the portal section.
Advanced Code
For custom HTML:
- switch to Code mode to replace the GUI-built site
- scripts, iframes, and inline event handlers are stripped for safety
- custom HTML is capped at 250 KB
SEO
Set public-site metadata:
- meta title
- meta description
Leads
Review website requests inside the builder:
- service requests
- portal access requests
DNS & Domain Health
Review the hostname details needed for your custom domain.
Publish History
Track draft history and restore earlier states when needed.
Publishing Your Site
Click Publish to make your site live. Before publishing, the builder checks that the current site configuration is valid.
Important validation rules:
- If the quote form is enabled and it exposes items or packages, you need matching inventory or packages before publishing.
- If you use Code mode, the HTML cannot be empty.
Your live site is available at:
- your tenant URL plus
/site - your custom domain, if you configure DNS
Click Save Draft to keep working without changing the live site.
What Customers See
Visitors to the published site see:
- your branding and hero section
- featured inventory, packages, or service programs
- supporting content like gallery images, testimonials, and FAQ answers
- a quote request, service request, or portal request flow, depending on the site setup
After they submit a form, the request appears in Apex for your team to review.
Spam Protection
The public forms include built-in protections:
- rate limiting
- a hidden honeypot field
- validation that requires the right customer and request details
Gotchas
- Draft is not live. Saving a draft does not update the public site. You still need to publish.
- Page order is per page. Dragging a section on one page does not change the other pages.
- New pages start empty. Add sections to the page you want instead of expecting the home page layout to copy over.
- Code mode is sanitized. Unsafe markup is removed on save.
- Template changes are reversible. Use Publish History to recover an earlier draft state.
- Limits are real. Gallery images, testimonials, FAQ entries, service programs, state size, and custom HTML all have caps.
- Preview submissions are not live. The builder preview shows the form flow, but it does not create a real request until you publish.