A site redesign means looking at content, audience needs, company needs, and room for growth
Redesigning how a site works
The Attendance on Demand website design hadn’t changed much in 5 years. New content was making sections bloated, and new software meant quick redesigns of menus. The company itself was growing and changing, so it was time to look at making the site a better reflection of them.
INITIAL PLANS
For our first web team meeting, the Director of Marketing and I proposed basic visitor types, visitor goals, and paths they might take. During the team meeting we used a white board and many sticky notes and initially looked at the 3 main buckets the software serves: HR, Labor Management, and Business Management. While each has unique software features, many overlap. Instead we identified a task-basked approach which would help the audience quickly get to the information they want. The site is primarily for potential buyers looking for a solution to a specific problem, so sections on Scheduling and Leave Management, Tools for Managers and Employees, and Calculating Time Correctly seemed more obvious.
The meeting gave me enough info to set up a basic content plan, pulling info from the current site and from printed materials. I presented these notes so we could discuss content holes, specific types of content needed, and questions about details like appropriate aside items. By pulling in content from the current site we could account for each item, and could update or weed out items as we went. This process helped us clarify the purpose of each section, a single focus message, and specific content needs for the different topics. The sections became clearer too: Workforce Management, Tracking Time, and Making the Work Day Easier.
From there I set up a project in GatherContent. Here, it’s easy to set up templates for sections and pages. Because the project would be accessed and worked on by several content providers, it’s important the fields be very clear so notes and examples—even character limits—ensure the content is standardized. Each template has field for a few sentences on who the audience is for that page, and what their concerns are. We filled those sections out before sending to the writers so they knew exactly what we were looking for.
For this client, I already knew what the company stood for and what was important, and had data on who their ideal customers are and what they want. This was the planning phase, making sure appropriate content is accounted for in as much detail as possible. Knowing what each screen had to display, the next step would be design of the web elements and layout. Even though this project was put on hold before that step, I’m proud of how much advanced planning we did over the course of a month while also working on other projects.