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I. Introduction:
Once upon a time there was an association that lived barely across the border from
Washington, DC. Very nice people worked there. The members were also very nice
people. Both the members and the staff were well informed and took their jobs very
seriously. Everyone wanted to see the association grow and thrive. They produced lots
of good products and were the number one source for both their members and the
public about the profession.
But, something really bad happened to this nice group of people. It happened slowly
over time. They didnt mean for it to happen it just did. They became very frustrated
and ashamed of this thing that happened. From the outside everything looked great but
if you looked more closely well you could start to see there were problems.
It was things like:
Broken URLs
No easy path back to the homepage
A search field that didnt search
Ugly URLs
Inconsistent navigation
Outdated content
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3. How to develop a WORKABLE strategy to keep content clean and fresh going
forward
But, first we would like to introduce ourselves (we should think of a way to make our
introductions more interesting by adding to our background something like last book we
read or favorite tv show):
Laura Armstrong
Anne Marie Munson
Kerri McGovern
Diane McMahon
Dean Millard
About ACA
About designDATA
II. How did the website get this way?
1. Out of date technology
For years money that should have gone to technology upgrades went to other
association projects.
We were no longer on an upgrade path with our association management
system.
Our association management system and our content management system
were not compatible with each other.
Our content management system was even out of business
The leadership du jour would have ideas for the website and staff would make
it happen without it being part of an overall strategy.
Special favor to a colleagues business made our credit card processing
incompatible with our association management system thus aiding us in
falling behind.
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Website took up enormous staff time as it was not easy to update a page
Often had to turn too expensive outside help just to make small changes to
the website.
3. Understand the scope of your project before you start so you dont have to
go back and ask for more money
a. Do you need a new AMS and CMS?
b. Do you need them to be on the same platform or does your
association have the bandwidth to navigate separate systems
c. Know your budget, resources and timeline
IV.
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2.
3.
4.
5.
Go mobile or go home
Long-tail URLs are here to stay for a L-o-o-o-o-n-g time
Social Sites Matter
Optimize for ALL search engines
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When designing a new website for your members you must understand
their needs. You can conduct focus groups, do surveys, conduct usability
testing (this page or that page) or you can do what we did design
personas of your members.
We already knew a lot about our membership, as we have been surveying
and observing them for a long time.
Personas are a best practice approach to communicating with designer
and developers about your intended audience.
Dont develop personas around your membership categories but around
the groups of people that you serve. Even if you are a trade association
you are servicing people.
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New Practitioner
Emerging Professional
Developing Professional
Established Professional
Nonmembers
Leadership
Public
Home page
Join
Career Center
Social Media
ACA News
Practice Management
New Grad Toolkit
New practice guide
Engagement
Community
Continuing Education
Professional Development
Corporate Members/ Discounts
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Member login
Staff contacts
Find a doc
Certification
Research-evidence based practice information
ACA News Articles
How to become a speaker?
GR/ Payment Policy issues
Practice Resource Center
CEUs
Specialty Councils
PAC
How to become a delegate?
Mentorship opportunities
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1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Engages the whole association in the process thus creating buy-in to the change
Enables people to externalize their thoughts and ideas
Helps a group to focus on one thing at a time
Allows groups to visualize patterns
Know who are the owners, contributors and decision makers are
Set a style sheet and of acceptable fonts, colors, graphic resolutions, etc and
make sure it is always followed
Have page templates and define when to use what template
Use the tools provided by your CMS to set approvals
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Have a cycle for auditing content and removing old information or pages with no
visitors
Involve everybody but have a strong core team to make ultimate decisions