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So, you want to build a Web site? Great! Getting your message out to the millions of people that use the World-Wide-Web is an excellent idea. This article will hopefully start you off on the right foot.
ENTECH has been developing Web sites under its SNAP program for the past few months and we've learned a few lessons over the course of creating 10 Web sites for 10 nonprofits in Greater Milwaukee. In this section, we'll share our experiences while helping nonprofits plan their Web site projects.
Planning your Web site
The more information your organization can prepare before the Web-development process begins directly impacts how long and expensive the process will be.
We developed this page with the Web-developer's needs in mind, in terms of gathering information from nonprofits before Web development began. This information gathering also included a meeting where we asked the following questions:
- Who do you see as your current and desired target audiences?
- Name the three most important objectives for this web development project.
- What specific functions would you like the Web-site to perform? (For more on functional sites, check out the Data & Databases chapter)
- Are there any forms you would like created? e.g. registration forms, membership forms or contact forms?
- Will any portions of the Web site contain or ask for personally-identifiable information about your constituency? (For more on secure sites, check out the Security & Privacy chapter)
- Who will be responsible for performing regular updates to the site?
After we gathered this information we coached the organization through filling out the last few steps in the planning phase. This is where the real work begins. Read on.
Information Architecture
Entire volumes of text have been written on this subject. Information Architecture refers to the hierarchical taxonomy and organization of information on your Web site. These are not easy to create. Well, to be more accurate they are difficult to decide upon. When creating an information architecure, the first thing is to establish the "Top Level". ENTECH's Top Level is as follows:
About ENTECH
Services
Knowledge
Web.Dots
Community
Graphically, it looks like: (The last two headings are cut off for clarity)
We surmise that we can pigeon-hole anything related to ENTECH into one of these categories. These eventually become navigation buttons on our Web site. (See the top of the screen for the buttons)
If we have content that does not fit into one of these categories it may never be found, since someone may not know what Top-Level to begin with.
A technical but important note: If you read The Nuts & Bolts you will realize that Top-Level categories are part of the template. Therefore, if changes are made to the Top Level, you may be stuck re-engaging your expensive developer to make the changes.
When you are creating your Top-Level categories remember the following:
- Don't use organizational jargon (Web.dots is not a good one)
- Use uncomplicated language
- Try to stick to single words (helps your design and designer)
- Include an About Us or Contact Us
- Limit your Top-Level categories to 5 or 6
Take it to the Next Level
After you've completed and documented your Top-Level categories, now its time to move on to sub-categories. Not every site will need these, depending on how much content you have. Sub-categories go, as the name suggests, under your Top-Level categories. These categories can be a bit wordier and also might contain organizational jargon. Let's take ENTECH's "About Entech" Top-level as an example.
This one is pretty self-explanatory. I like to include a "catch-all" for things I can't quite put into other subcategories. In this case, About Us has links to much of the other information within this heading, as well as describing various important aspects of Entech's organizational structure.
The Content
So, what will people see when they click on Services->Assessments? They will see the content of the Assessments section. Each subcategory will link directly to a single content piece. These may also have indices of their own, like the Knowledge->First 50 Assessments page.
We'll get more into content in later sections of this Knowledge Guide Chapter. Read on to find out more!
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