Frequently Asked Questions

Product Information & Web Portals

What is a web portal and how does it differ from a regular website?

A web portal is an online site that aggregates information from multiple sources, often serving as a data-rich repository for a specific topic or audience. Unlike regular websites, which typically have a single purpose or message, web portals can be general (covering a wide range of topics), commerce-focused (enabling transactions and inventory management), or knowledge-based (curating content around a specific theme, such as company intranets or industry news). For more details, see the original blog post.

What types of web portals can I build with Hygraph?

With Hygraph, you can build general portals (aggregating broad information), commerce portals (for transactions and inventory/order management), and knowledge portals (curated content for specific topics or internal company use). Hygraph supports both internal and external knowledge portals, as demonstrated in customer case studies like 2U and Startups.com.

What steps are involved in building a web portal with Hygraph and GraphQL?

The main steps are: 1) Map the information and data sources, 2) Decide on the tech stack (including a headless CMS like Hygraph), 3) Build out your content model using Hygraph's Schema Editor UI, 4) Design the portal for user experience, 5) Build the frontend using frameworks like Next.js, and 6) Deploy your portal using services like Vercel or Netlify. For a detailed walkthrough, see the blog post.

How does Hygraph support content federation and structured content for portals?

Hygraph enables teams to federate content from external services or migrate data into the CMS, making it accessible via GraphQL queries. The Schema Editor UI allows you to build structured, modular content models, supporting both simple and complex data needs. For more, see content federation and structured content resources.

Features & Capabilities

What are the key features of Hygraph?

Hygraph offers a GraphQL-native architecture, content federation, scalability, and a user-friendly interface. It supports integrations with popular tools (e.g., Netlify, Vercel, Shopify, AWS S3, Cloudinary), localization, digital asset management, and AI-powered features. For a full list, visit the Hygraph Features page.

Does Hygraph provide an API for content management?

Yes, Hygraph provides a powerful GraphQL API for efficient content fetching and management. You can learn more at the Hygraph API Reference.

What integrations does Hygraph support?

Hygraph supports a wide range of integrations, including hosting and deployment (Netlify, Vercel), eCommerce (BigCommerce, commercetools, Shopify), localization (Lokalise, Crowdin, EasyTranslate, Smartling), digital asset management (Aprimo, AWS S3, Bynder, Cloudinary, Mux, Scaleflex Filerobot), personalization and AB testing (Ninetailed), AI (AltText.ai), and more. See the full list at the Hygraph Integrations page.

How does Hygraph ensure performance and scalability?

Hygraph is optimized for rapid content delivery, which improves user experience, engagement, and search engine rankings. Its architecture supports scalable content distribution and responsiveness, reducing bounce rates and increasing conversions. For more, see the performance checklist.

Pricing & Plans

What is Hygraph's pricing model?

Hygraph offers a free forever Hobby plan, a Growth plan starting at $199/month, and custom Enterprise plans. For the latest details, visit the Hygraph pricing page.

Security & Compliance

What security and compliance certifications does Hygraph have?

Hygraph is SOC 2 Type 2 compliant, ISO 27001 certified, and GDPR compliant. These certifications ensure enterprise-grade security and data protection. For more, visit the Hygraph Security Features page.

What security features does Hygraph offer?

Hygraph provides SSO integrations, audit logs, encryption at rest and in transit, and sandbox environments to protect sensitive data and meet regulatory standards. For more details, see the Hygraph Security Features page.

Use Cases & Benefits

Who can benefit from using Hygraph?

Hygraph is ideal for developers, IT decision-makers, content creators, project/program managers, agencies, solution partners, and technology partners. It is especially valuable for modern software companies, enterprises modernizing their tech stack, and brands scaling across geographies or re-platforming from traditional solutions. (Source: ICPVersion2_Hailey.pdf)

What business impact can I expect from using Hygraph?

Customers can expect time savings through streamlined workflows, ease of use with an intuitive interface, faster speed-to-market, and enhanced customer experience via consistent and scalable content delivery. These benefits help businesses modernize their tech stack and achieve operational efficiency. (Source: ICPVersion2_Hailey.pdf)

What pain points does Hygraph solve?

Hygraph addresses operational pains (reliance on developers for content updates, outdated tech stacks, conflicting global team needs, clunky content creation), financial pains (high operational costs, slow speed-to-market, expensive maintenance, scalability challenges), and technical pains (boilerplate code, overwhelming queries, evolving schemas, cache and OpenID integration issues). For more, see the product page.

Can you share specific customer success stories with Hygraph?

Yes. Komax achieved a 3X faster time to market, Autoweb saw a 20% increase in website monetization, Samsung improved customer engagement with a scalable platform, and Dr. Oetker enhanced their digital experience using MACH architecture. More stories are available on the customer stories page.

What industries are represented in Hygraph's case studies?

Industries include food and beverage (Dr. Oetker), consumer electronics (Samsung), automotive (AutoWeb), healthcare (Vision Healthcare), travel and hospitality (HolidayCheck), media and publishing, eCommerce, SaaS (Bellhop), marketplace, education technology, and wellness and fitness. See more at Hygraph Case Studies.

Technical Requirements & Getting Started

How easy is it to get started with Hygraph?

Hygraph is designed for easy onboarding, even for non-technical users. You can sign up for a free-forever account and access resources like documentation, video tutorials, and onboarding guides. For example, Top Villas launched a new project in just 2 months. See Hygraph Documentation and Top Villas case study.

What technical documentation is available for Hygraph?

Hygraph offers comprehensive technical documentation covering all aspects of building and deploying projects. Access it at the Hygraph Documentation page.

How do you set up a GraphQL endpoint with Hygraph?

To set up a GraphQL endpoint, create a new project in Hygraph, define your content schema, add content, and your endpoint will be generated automatically. Hygraph includes an interactive GraphQL playground within the app. See the Flutter GraphQL blog for details.

Support & Implementation

What customer support does Hygraph offer?

Hygraph provides 24/7 support via chat, email, and phone. Enterprise customers receive dedicated onboarding and expert guidance. All users have access to detailed documentation, video tutorials, and a community Slack channel. For more, visit the Hygraph Contact Page.

What training and onboarding resources are available?

Hygraph offers onboarding sessions for enterprise customers, training resources like video tutorials, documentation, webinars, and Customer Success Managers for expert guidance. See the Hygraph Contact Page for more information.

How does Hygraph handle maintenance, upgrades, and troubleshooting?

Hygraph provides 24/7 support for maintenance, upgrades, and troubleshooting. Enterprise customers receive dedicated onboarding and expert guidance, and all users can access documentation and the community Slack channel for additional support. See Hygraph Contact.

Customer Proof & Case Studies

Who are some of Hygraph's customers?

Notable customers include Sennheiser, HolidayCheck, Ancestry, Samsung, Dr. Oetker, Epic Games, Bandai Namco, Gamescom, Leo Vegas, and Clayton Homes. See more at Hygraph Case Studies.

Blog & Resources

Where can I find the Hygraph blog and what content does it offer?

The Hygraph Blog provides developer tutorials, product updates, and essential guides to content modeling. Visit the Hygraph Blog for the latest news and insights.

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How to Build a Web Portal with GraphQL

In this post, we investigate the different types of web portals and how to build a portal with GraphQL and Hygraph
Emily Nielsen

Written by Emily 

Nov 24, 2021
how to build a web portal

The term web portal is a broad term that serves as the core web application that houses information surrounding a specific topic, often from multiple sources. Portals can serve a broad list of use cases, typically under the domain of Knowledge Management, such as company intranets, FAQ sections, support portals, and media hubs, for example. Building a portal is a complex task that requires teams to consider what types of information will be housed, how the data should be organized, what platforms will people consume this information, and who would be creating content with which level of authentication, to name a few. In this post, we will break down different types of web portals and how to build a web portal with GraphQL.

#What is a Web Portal?

Websites typically have a single purpose or message. There are some websites that can bring together resources from across the web to become a data rich repository of information called portals. Web portals are online sites which bring together pages either from a specific brand, or from across the internet, including search engines and thematic content hubs.

Web portals can also be thematic content hubs or more curated platforms which bring together sites with a specific theme, such as health information, journal articles, and banking information.

#Types of Web Portals

The various types of portals indicate the type of information they house and the audience they serve. We’ll take a look at three types of portals: general portals, commerce portals, and knowledge portals.

General Portals

General portals are portals that serve information which covers a wide array of topics and interests. Search engines can be examples of a general portal. The goal of a general web portal is to connect the users with information from multiple sources that contribute relevant and helpful information around a particular topic. Using web portals makes more content accessible to users.

general portal yahoo finance.png

Commerce Portals

Commerce portals are portals that allow companies to conduct transactions at any time and house up-to-date information on inventory or order management. This allows users to place orders with ease and makes the order process more reliable. Commerce portals are particularly helpful for B2B business transactions. They typically are intended for larger orders than a normal eCommerce site or for sites with extensive product offerings.

commerce portal costco.png

Knowledge Portals

Knowledge portals are one of the most common types of portals. They house curated content around a specific topic while pulling information from a broad range of sources. Many companies have intranet portals where employees can access all of the information pertaining to the company in one place. Knowledge portals can also give users information on an industry, government actions, or current events. In having a specific topic of purpose, knowledge portals realize the goal of creating an accessible wealth of information on a particular topic.

BioCentury Realtime UI screenshot

#How to Build a Web Portal

The details of building a web portal depend highly on the use case and the information that teams are looking to serve. In this example, we will keep things simple and discuss how to create a basic portal for people who are looking for information around Digital Experience Platforms similar to BuildyourDXP project maintained by Hygraph.

Step 1: Map the Information and Data Sources

In order to choose the best tech stack for your use case, it is first important to consider what kind of information you will be sharing and where that data will come from.

Important considerations include:

  • Is the content static or dynamic?

  • Is it media heavy?

  • How should the data be organized to provide a meaningful user experience?

  • Will all of the data come from a single source or will the data be federated from multiple sources?

  • Should it include ‘Search’ functionality?

  • Does the content need to be localized?

Step 2: Decide on the Tech Stack

Based on the answers to these questions and having a greater understanding of what functionality you need the tech stack to provide. In simple use cases, teams will typically need a backend content platform or flexible headless CMS to organize, federate, and store the data, a modern frontend framework to build engaging user experiences, and additional services to provide additional functionality such as Search, Personalization, and Chatbots.

Step 3: Build out your Content Model

Hygraph is a GraphQL native content platform that enables teams to federate content from external services, or migrate data into the CMS, and have it queried in the frontend making it easily accessible.

To build your content model within Hygraph teams use the Schema Editor UI to add the fields that are relevant to the particular content model to build a structured content model. While some teams may choose to use the schema editor to build out pages, it is recommended that teams take a structured content approach, keeping data modular and flexible. We take a closer look at modeling data in Hygraph in additional blog posts.

For BuildyourDXP, our data models follow a mixture of structured content for the categorization logic, and GraphQL Union Types for custom sorting.

Page Content Model DXP.png

Step 4: Design the Portal

Good design brings cohesion and helps provide a pleasurable user experience. Design can also include giving users more context on your brand and its values. This can be particularly helpful for intranet portals.

Build your DXP UI.png

Step 5: Build the Frontend

Using a flexible GraphQL backend means that teams have the power to build a performant frontend that matches their needs. Popular frontend frameworks like NextJS help teams optimize their performance on the frontend and find a good balance of short project timelines without compromising functionality. Using a GraphQL client, teams can query data from the GraphQL backend for the frontend framework.

Step 6: Deploy your Web Portal

Pushing a web portal live is one of the final steps to creating a web portal that is ready for consumption by users. To deploy your portal quickly and easily, teams can use services like Vercel or Netlify to handle all of the deployments and hosting.

Build Your DXP.png

Building a web portal with a flexible GraphQL backend makes it easy to quickly build a web portal that suits your needs. Teams use Hygraph to build web portals in production for a wide range of circumstances from internal knowledge portals to external knowledge portals.

Blog Author

Emily Nielsen

Emily Nielsen

Emily manages content and SEO at Hygraph. In her free time, she's a restaurant lover and oat milk skeptic.

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