Well, a good team is a good start…
My list of things involved in looking after an institution’s website.
- Feedback form – every page has a link which captures URL and user info and sends via a form.
- Issues tracker – I think that email should be kept clear of day-to-day site issues and update requests. So, a web-based issue tracker which automatically receives the feedback and other system notifications (such as additions to database-generated pages) would be a good idea.
- Project management software – web based tasks etc. Sharepoint was good for this. A basic but easy to use system that allows lightwieght project management.
- Weekly Work-in-Progress meetings.
- Structure page – very useful for internal people to see the departmental structure.
- PageBuilder – this is a (bespoke) utility that builds pages – fast template rollout and prototyping is crucial
- Menu system – standardise by giving the webauthors an easy to use system that makes their job easier
- Web stats – got to be able to see what’s happening
- SEO stats – WebCEO is good idea, but seems flaky in execution.
- Tools: All the usuals (macromedia/adobe suites, even Frontpage!) and Xenu link checker. Firefox plus extensions.
- Hardware: Colour laser printer, blutack, whiteboards, two screens.
- Test bench – old PCs and macs with appropriate browsers
…more to come I’m sure.
What about a good web systems team that knows their stuff and can be easy to work with?
A fair, and very important comment. I should also amend the first line of my post to read “Well, a good team is a good start…”
😉