Website Development Best Practices

Tricks to deploying a new CMS

There are tricks to quickly deploying a CMS that make the business side of organizations very thankful because the new site is up and running quickly and efficiently - and make the IT side of the business happy because it doesn't involve changing the architecture, a lot of extra resources, downtime or troubleshooting.  Here are a few tips and tricks I have learned and implemented over the years:

• Create high content turnover pages in your new CMS. In one organization I worked for we separated the homepage from the rest of the website. With its custom CMS on the homepage and first few pages, we were able to upload and change high volume content rapidly without interfering with the java application that ran the rest of the site.

• Business Benefits: Resulted in a win-win for the business side that could rapidly and easily change content at any time. Technical side win-win with a readily deployed CMS.

• Insert your new CMS site into the existing corporate site. When your site is created in the new CMS, simply insert it into the existing corporate website or intranet by relinking.  Usually a new site built in a CMS consists of a few layers: homepage, Level 1, 2 and 3 webpages. These pages can be inserted within the existing corporate site or intranet then linked to other pages within the existing corporate website or intranet.

• Business Benefits: Branding and layout for the new CMS is set up to look the same as the corporate site or intranet, so for the client or user it is a seamless experience. This trick saves months and sometimes years of development effort.

Mobile Channel Strategy

5 things to keep in mind when developing a Mobile Channel Strategy:

1. MOBILE GOAL: Your over-arching mobile goal for your users should be to deliver: "Urgent information at your fingertips wherever you may be"

2: MOBILE TARGET AUDIENCES: What audiences are you developing mobile platforms for: 

• Determine your mobile priority audiences by identifying users with the most urgent needs. For example, within an organization, a priority audience would be salespeople who are meeting with potential clients at the client location. Determine your most important internal and external mobile priority audiences.

3. MOBILE CONTENT

• After determining mobile audiences next determine the most urgent content that should be simply and elegantly served up to them and enabled through mobile devices. For the example above, the sales person onsite trying to make a sales to a potential client would need a sales presentation customized to the potential client is a given sector, contract and licensing information, access to client databases, access to sales forms, electronic signature functionality.

4. MOBILE PRIORITIZATION: Prioritize mobile development based on: (a) complexity of implementation, (b) urgency of content need, (c) timeframe for development, and (d) mobile app budget.

a) Complexity of implementation: Determine the ease of acquiring or developing the mobile app based on an assessment of Simple, Medium, Difficult implementation.

• For example, a simple implementation would be to purchase and/or customize by rebranding a downloadable native applications from iTunes that can be focused on immediate sales productivity gains.
• An example of mobile strategy implementation with medium complexity would be enabling something like Citrix Receiver to your web and mobile channels in order to access existing enterprise databases and CRM tools. Native connectivity applications like a Citrix Receiver can be purchased and enabled on iPads and smart phones, for users to securely access enterprise databases "on the go"
• An example of a more difficult implementation is the need to create a custom developed application for each device: iPad, Smart phone versions, iPhone.

b) Urgency of need. For each of the target audiences and content needs you've identified in Points 2 and 3 above, then you need to assess "Urgency in relation to priority". Are the content needs by priority audiences: High need, Medium need, Low need.

c) Timeframe for development: Then establish short, medium or long term requirements for each of the needs, as some may be high needs but long term given the complexity of development.

d) Budget for mobile strategy and application: All of the above will have to be assessed and re-assessed based on budget availability. There are lots of mobile productivity apps that can be downloaded for a minimal expenses or customized by the developer for minimal investment.

Examples of complexity, need, timeframe and budget:

• Simple implementation, Urgent need requirement, Short term solution: Segment of employees provided with a mobile pilot and small budget ($50.00) to purchase and download native applications focused on immediate productivity needs.
• Medium complexity, Medium need requirement, Medium term solution: 1) Design a mobile website; 2) Develop using responsive web design and templates for display on ALL mobile sites and devices
• Medium complexity, Medium need requirement, Long term solution: Review urgent content needs and develop a custom app designed for each mobile device

Most Important Intranet Qualities

Intranets are an important part of an organization's knowledge assets to inform employees and to harness knowledge from employees. Intranets should engage, enlighten, inform and entertain. Often though Intranets are neglected or redeveloped as the final part of a web channel strategy - well after the corporate site, mobile sites, collaboration sites and search strategy.

The following findings from a survey of 20,000 intranet users from 67 organizations summarizes the benefits, usefulness and the sad, sorry state of finding information on many of today's intranets.

Source: 50 Ways to a Better Intranet

Website Evaluation and Diagnostic

For a client recently I conducted a website evaluation, diagnostic and usability assessment. The first diagnostic was a 275-point assessment scorecard report providing an overall score, and comprehensive assessment and scores of content, technology, accessibility and marketing. Each of the main points of assessment is further broken down in specific recommendations.

Because automated diagnostics can only do so much, I also provided an expert usability review. This looked at every in the automated diagnostic and went much further - another 200-point assessment measuring and providing a scorecard and recommendations on each point for: Search, Content, Writing Quality and Communications, User Tasks, Usability, Metadata, Shopping, Navigation, Information Architecture, Page Layout and Visual Design, Trust and Credibility, and Help and Feedback functionality.

I'm offering this as a free service because websites in general need a lot of improvement and I feel an obligation to help world wide web communications and in particular to help small business owners make their dreams come true through harnessing and enhancing the power of their websites.

If I can be of help and provide a complimentary, no-obligation website diagnostic and expert usability evaluation, please send an email with your website address/URL to: sanderson@e-cocreate.com