We commonly associate web analytics (including Google Analytics) with web governance and measurement, using it to evaluate content performance and user interaction post website launch. But web analytics can do more than report progress: it can inform process. A lot of content work happens before we have a governance plan in place, including content research and discovery. We need to understand business objectives and website goals, who our users … [Read more...]
The Future of Content Strategy In Five Minutes
September 12, 2011 by
Last week I attended and had the pleasure of speaking at the Content Strategy Forum in London. It was an amazing conference chock-full of web content professionals helping to move the industry forward. One of my favorite moments of the event was a series of "lightning talks"—by Shelly Wilson, Matthew Grocki, Nicole Jones, and Sara Wachter-Boettcher—discussing the future of content strategy. Each of them crammed tons of … [Read more...]
A Content Strategy Approach to Online Crisis Communications (Part One)
August 24, 2011 by
The most important communications plans at our universities are the ones we hope we never have to use. These are our plans for crisis communications, to be activated when a threat is posed to the health and safety of our campus community. Nowadays, these plans revolve heavily around electronic communications. Many universities shifted their crisis communications planning into high gear following the fatal shootings at Virginia Tech in 2007. … [Read more...]
Content Strategy Aid for Financial Aid
August 23, 2011 by
For students and their families, financial aid is potentially one of the biggest sources of stress and concern. If we can make any aspect of this complex process easier, we should -- and that includes the web experience. At this year's eduWeb conference, J. Todd Bennett and Adam Forrand of decimal152 broke down the process they went through to overhaul the Ithaca College Student Financial Services Website. They took the website down to the … [Read more...]
What .edu Can Learn From .gov
August 19, 2011 by
In the web world, higher ed is often compared to government, and the comparison is not always flattering -- crippling bureaucracy, committee hell, lack of funds and resources, the list goes on. So it is heartening to learn that smart content strategy can be achieved in the .gov domain. Erin Scime of HUGE recently detailed her work on the redesign of the Department of Energy's website, Energy.gov. The project sports many parallels to the ones … [Read more...]