Archive for April, 2007
April 18, 2007
Things to Think about Before a Web Site Redesign
Mike is getting ready to refresh the design of his organization’s web site. He asks:
In my present job, I’ve inherited a website that is, to put it kindly, dated. It needs a top-to-bottom redesign and I’m finally getting that underway. The questions I’m struggling with — how do the members use the website, if at all? — what functionality do they want and need? — what really works for us?
These are important questions but I like to start at a bit of a higher level before delving into them. The process I use with my clients usually follows this pattern:
What are your overall goals as an organization?
What does your company or NPO hope to achieve in the next year? Two years? Five? You need to clearly understand what you are trying to achieve overall before you even think about your web site, even if it is a key element in achieving the goal!
How do you want to go about achieving those goals?
Otherwise known as: strategy. I picked up a definition of strategy from Alan Weiss, that goes something like this: strategy governs how you make everyday business decisions. It influences your tactics. It defines how you want to go about achieving your goals. Now you can get specific to the Web, placing various strategies into the context of how well they will serve your goals. You should also be looking at which audiences for your site are the most relevant to your goals and develop strategies for serving them.
How should your site specifically support those goals and your strategy for achieving them?
Now you get down to the details. What features and content best support your strategy? What imagery is best aligned with the above? How should it be organized to appeal to your target audiences? And so on.
Ideally, you should spend as much time and effort as needed to answer these questions before investing a penny in a redesign. Otherwise, you put your investment and overall success at unnecessary risk.
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April 4, 2007
Survivor Meets Ecotourism Meets Web 2.0 Job
Here is an interesting job if you are up on your web 2.0 development skills and fancy an adventure in Fiji: Wanted: 2.0 web chief to manage and develop Tribewanted.com from Fiji. Looks like the company provides an ecotourism experience in Fiji and is trying to build a global community around itself. Interesting!
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April 2, 2007
Notcasting: What Not to Do on Your Podcast
Paul Bissex has posted a great list of things not to do on your podcast:
- I Must Apologize for the Terrible Sound Quality of the Last Podcast
- I Must Apologize for the Terrible Sound Quality of the Present Podcast
- I Must Apologize for Not Making a Podcast in Several Days/Weeks/Months
- Thank You for All Your Emails Telling Me What I’m Doing Wrong
- I Need to Speak Very Quietly, My (Mom|Dad|Girlfriend|Ferret) is Sleeping
- There Is a Very Exciting Thing Coming at the End of This Podcast But I Won’t Tell You What It Is
- We Only Have One Microphone for the Three of Us
- We Are Laughing About This Thing, Ha Ha, You Kind of Had to Be There
- I Had Big Plans for This Episode But They Just Didn’t Work Out
- Please Listen to My Next Podcast, It Will Be Better Than This One I Promise
No one cares about any of that! Just do your best and be interesting. This is important because it is functionally impossible to skim a podcast as you can with text.
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