Planning a Website Redesign : Week 1

1. Planning a Website Redesign: Week 1 Laura Solomon @laurasolomon www.meanlaura.com laura@designforthelittleguy.com

2. 1 Planning Why? Who? Goals, platforms and metrics 2 Design Series Agenda Fonts, colors, logos, working with a designer, and more 3 Content Content audits, inventories and writing 4 Usability, Testing and More Usability, accessibility, and more

3. WEEK 1 Planning a Redesign

4. Consider… “The most common user action on a Web site is to flee.” Edward Tufte, Information Design professional

5. Should we redesign?

6. When? Some clues ! ! ! ! Lost users Outgrown Missing functions Causes problems

7. https://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/32307/15-Things-People-Absolutely-Hate-About-Your-Website.aspxhttps://blog.hubspot.com/blog/tabid/6307/bid/32307/15-Things-People-Absolutely-Hate-About-Your-Website.aspx

8.  Why redesign? Improve usability Go forth into a new era Update the brand

9. People value consistency  Time investment  Possible degradation  Redesigns are major

10. Next question… How MUCH change?

11. BIG or small?

12. Small?

14. Big?

15. WHO is going to be in charge?

16. http://boagworld.com/business-strategy/10-harsh-truths-about-corporate-websites/http://boagworld.com/business-strategy/10-harsh-truths-about-corporate-websites/

17. https://oplin.ohio.gov/easier Ditch “design by committee.” As tempting as it is to have a team of some sort, in our experience, this almost always leads to either delays and/or disasters. You can never make everyone happy! Feel free to gather your staff’s input prior to your first phone call with Laura, but we strongly recommend that only 1-2 (MAYBE 3) people from your library should be involved in the actual phone conference. Because it is difficult to please everyone, typical Web Kit projects that are managed by committees tend not to only run longer, but can be more expensive because of constant revisions. To save your library time and money, designate 1-2 people to be in charge of the process and who can step in to make a decision as needed.

18. Don’t put the pie up forgrabs

19. Have to have GOALS

20. Potential goal areas      USABILITY ACCESSIBILITY DESIGN CONTENT SEO

21. What does a good goal look like? WRONG: “Our new website will make things easier for people to find. “ RIGHT: “Our new website will more effectively target our audience, the online patron, by making the tasks they come to the site to do most often easier to find and complete. (followed by a list of these tasks) “

23. What goes in it? • Proposed site architecture • Design preferences • Features • Preferred CMS • Specific hardware/server configuration • Goals • Think about phases

24. More questions to ask When was the last time I updated my website? What’s wrong with the current website? How much do I hope to accomplish? What do I like about other websites? Do those things fit our current goals? https://www.biznessapps.com/blog/8-questions-to-ask-before-redesigning-your-website/

25. Metrics are your FRIEND

31. WHAT should we use on the back end??

32. What are the options? CMS Website Builders Homegrown

33. https://www.neteasy.us/technology/content-management-systemts-cmshttps://www.neteasy.us/technology/content-management-systemts-cms

34. “Let’s do some math… Wix.com currently has over 90 million users. On their website, they mention that they have about 500 customizable templates. If we do some simple math… 90,000,000 users / 500 templates = 180,000. That means that if you use Wix, you are probably using the same template as 180,000 other people.” https://www.tytonmedia.com/blog/16-reasons-shouldnt-use-website-builder/

35. What about HOMEGROWN?

36. WEEK 1 The Big Take-Aways

37. Know WHY, WHO, HOW MUCH Consult your METRICS Understand your PLATFORM

38. Next week: DESIGN Laura Solomon @laurasolomon www.meanlaura.com laura@designforthelittleguy.com