college background old website project research new website development implementation lessons...
TRANSCRIPT
Designing a New User-Centric College Public Website –
Lessons Learned
Khouloud HawasliActing Manager, Electronic Communication services
George SackettWeb Content Supervisor
College BackgroundOld website Project ResearchNew website Development ImplementationLessons learned
Outline
Largest community college system in Missouri serving an area of about 700 square miles; created by area voters in 1962
Four campuses, three education centers Transfer, career and developmental programs Non-credit continuing education courses Various workforce development initiatives A “League for Innovation” institution
About STLCC
25,000 credit students each semester 40,000 non-credit each year 31,000 workforce development students 130 credit programs 57 workforce development programs 1,800 faculty (420 FT) 3,500 employees
Numbers
College Websites Public Website Users Website
(faculty, student organizations, classes and staff)
Intranet (three sites: key resources menu, static content pages, and a SPS2001 document center)
Why Create a New Site?
“One College”, … but not a well defined identity on the web site
Issues and problems with old site
Developing a new brand identity for the institution
Site is difficult to navigate – and to find content – 16,000 pages with no standard navigation!
Internal use content mixed in with other content
Pages did not follow best practices for web design
Most pages did not comply with our loosely defined college standards
Issues and Problems
Common to have over 2,000 broken links Non-compliance with ADA requirements Out-of-date content No unified appearance – brand identity was
fragmented at best to almost non-existent No workflow, review or style editing process
Issues and Problems (cont)
Taking content from the existing 16,000 pages to distill the items of need to audiences
Taking multiple sub-sites (i.e., programs and departments) and integrating them together
Content Challenges
Meetings at each campus to introduce project and seek cooperation and support
2005 – Audience research conducted by contracted firm◦ Current and prospective students – focus groups
and online surveys◦ Continuing Education and high school guidance
counselors – focus groups
◦ Key administrators and faculty influencers – phone interviews
◦ Larger sample of faculty and staff – random, online survey
Discovery – Audiences
Registration Hub for student news and communications Access to all programs and classes Class availability, times/room numbers,
changes, grades Do everything online:
◦ Pay for classes◦ Get parking passes◦ Get books◦ “Not have to go to the campus”
Student Web Expectations
Ervin Marketing Report, May 2006
73% - accurate and timely information 70% - easy registration process 66% - ease of navigation 61% - descriptions of programs 55% - easy payment
Most Important Student Website Expectations
Ervin Marketing Report, May 2006
84.7% - Registration 82.4% - Student Resources 81.8% - Class Schedules 77.9% - Blackboard 60.3% - College Catalog
29.9% - can’t find what they are looking for
Reasons Students Say They Access the Public Website
Ervin Marketing Report, May 2006
Studied site’s navigation and search capabilities
92 charts provided a snapshot of the site’s technological structure, showing the:◦ Types of pages (html, asp, etc.)◦ Graphics used (jpg, gif, swf, etc.)◦ Links (html, CSS, mailto, scripted)◦ Server side (SSI) and client scripting◦ Other document types (pdf, doc, xls, ppt, etc.)
Discovery – Technical
One-on-one interviews with:◦ Senior administrators◦ Technology executives◦ Student services staff◦ Web coordinators◦ and others
These employees were directly related to the web site’s operation, administration, updates and/or maintenance
Discovery – Web Operations
Objectives for the New Site
Strategic
Technical
User-centric
The existing public website will be replaced in its entirety
The new website will focus on the needs of our external constituents and will incorporate the College’s new marketing, branding and image campaign
Project Scope
Intended to increase enrollment at the College
Align with the college strategic mission Simplify the experience for students Management, faculty, staff and
administrators given the ability to develop and update content to web-site
Project Intentions
The contents of the new website will be developed by the outside vendor
The new web site will utilize the Serena Collage web content management system to simplify the publishing process and enable a workflow driven web authoring environment
The Game Plan
OverallTechnicalUser-Centric
Objectives
Rebrand the site to project STLCC as one college
Build a site that allows visitors to select a path based on personal needs
Create a new web content delivery system:◦ Easy to update◦ Reinforces web standards◦ Provides a consistent user experience◦ Flexible to respond to changing needs◦ Embeds review, tracking and accountability
Overall Objectives
Acquire and deploy technology that expedites and streamlines the ongoing content development and maintenance of the site
Continually evaluate the site’s effectiveness by reviewing traffic metrics, click paths, on site searches, and user studies
Use the fault-tolerant design of the existing site
Create an agile technical environment for future web-based functionalities
Technical Objectives
Understand the current user experience (qualitative research) and issues
Determine features and functionalities desired by users
Reorganize and rewrite the content to fit the needs of our target audiences
Integrate the site into the ongoing, daily processes of the college
User-Centric Objectives
College• Leadership Team• Ad Hoc Web Advisory Committee• Management Team• Technical Team• Developer Team• Content Team
Non-College (Vendors)◦ Millennium Communications◦ Tower 29
Project Team
Project Milestones
www.stlcc.edu Architecture
Huge change in the culture of the way the website was maintained
Shifting responsibility for campus Community Relations and web coordinators
Web Authoring as a distributed responsibility
Identify person(s) responsible for web authorship
Project Change Issues
Role of the Ad Hoc Web Advisory Committee – taxonomy (navigation, structure, organization)
Frequently accessed content on home page Content management system to assure fresh,
reviewed content Must be timely, accurate and consistent
Navigation and Content Design
Provides structure to unstructured content
Organizes together content from multiple sources
Some users never search; and in many cases search isn’t as effective as structure
Allows users to find the content they need in a way that makes sense to them
Taxonomy Creates Navigation
Intent to use an outside firm on contract
◦ Encountered difficulties as they did not understand the intricacies of the college
More effective was the work of district community relations personnel
Reviews and edits were done internally– a very slow process
Final editing and last checks for AP style by vendor
Content Development
User Evaluation and Discussion
Home Page
Newsroom
About the College
Campus Page
‣ Automate consistency and standards through templates and required elements
‣ Rich text editing eliminates the need for HTML or web editor experience
‣ Manage workflows with the combination of task management and a review/approval system
Web Content Management System
‣ Allow authorized users to easily add or update content “anytime, anywhere” through a browser
‣ Roll pages back to a previous version as needed
‣ Schedule content replacement or removal
Web Content Management System
Calendar System
SungardHE Banner (ERP) Self-Service BlackBoard LMS Home-grown applications
◦ Course Schedule◦ Schedule of Late-Starting Courses◦ Employee Directory◦ Continuing Education Registration◦ Student Application◦ Sexual Harassment, FERPA, and Diversity Tutorials
New system – Windows Live student e-mail
Integration With Existing Systems
Banner Self-Service Portal
Course Schedule
Employee Directory
‣ New website went live March 9:http://www.stlcc.edu
‣ In order to have a go-live date, a “line” had to be drawn somewhere on what content would be part of the initial deployment
We used the Ad Hoc Web Committee to develop basic guidelines for what was to be included for Phase 1
There are some who feel their content was left out when it is too important to not be included
Phase I Completed
Focus can get redirected based upon urgency of communications
Underestimating timeline for content and technical specifications development
Working with several different vendors
Vendor reshuffle
Deploying new WCMS in conjunction with new site
Challenges Along the Way
New positions, new employees◦ no blueprint for their jobs◦ in a large, complex organization
Internal audiences – time it takes to communicate – delays caused by summer schedules
Managing expectations of new site – 1,600 vs. 16,000 pages
◦ Where is my information???
Challenges Along the Way
“Phase 2” begins - Corrections and updates WCMS contributor training New content based on feedback and metrics
analysis Development of interactive, more dynamic
content Development of department and unit’s pages
“Phase 2+” - Student credentials and my.stlcc.edu student portal
Future
Implementation of Enrollment management◦ CRM◦ Variable web content/print
Addition of content that was not included in the first phase
Blogs/Social networking Continued focus on Brand Management
Future plans
The overall goal of project of creating a user-centric website was achieved
The new website contributed to the goal of increase in enrollment
Phase I rolled out on time The use of an outside evaluation
◦ Provided confirmation and justification for taking on this huge project
◦ Justified funding for project◦ Identified the need for dedicated positions
National Council for Marketing and Public Relations – Silver Award
Things That Went Well
Active involvement of the faculty and staff Use of outside vendors
◦ Discovery◦ Web development
Good internal cooperation between technical and content
Smooth transition to new site
Things That Went Well
Integration of home grown apps successful WCMS – edit, review and deploy functions
going smoothly Implementation of AP style Setting a deadline and trying to stick to it -
forced us to make some tough decisions to meet that deadline.
Things That Went Well
Outside vendor◦ Web development team needed a lot of effort to
get up to speed with WCMS◦ Vendor used for writing of content never really hit
the mark – ended up using in house resources
Things That Could Have Gone Better
WCMS◦ Issues integrating applications vendor never got a
handle on this◦ User interface – edit function not as “friendly” as
desirable – Many support calls from occasional user
◦ Task management is cumbersome◦ Uncertain future of vendor support◦ Required desktop settings not necessarily
compatible with campus settings
Things That Could Have Gone Better
In house team undermanned – made meeting deadlines very challenging
Content still needs to be re-written in a more “user friendly” style – easier to read
Better information dissemination – communication/feedback process with faculty and staff during development – prior to implementation
Faster implementation of additional/missing content ◦ Departments◦ Dynamic content
Things That Could Have Gone Better
Hard coding of static information – outside vendor not familiar with internal resources for dynamic content
We had more hardware than was necessary – ASP & ASP.NET integration WCMS not realized until after learning more about WCMS capability
Internal technical staff would have benefitted from earlier training
Identifying and training more content contributors earlier
Things That Could Have Gone Better
Contact Us
Khouloud HawasliActing Manager, Electronic Communication Services
[email protected] [email protected]
George SackettWeb Content Supervisor
[email protected] [email protected]
Presentation is available online at:http://www.stlcc.edu/presentations/