MAKE 2018 THE YEAR YOU REALLY OWN YOUR SITE AND ENSURE THE CONTENT AND DESIGN REFLECT THE QUALITY OF YOUR INSTITUTION. In this webinar, we cover the six things you need to know to set up your redesign project for success. You’ll learn how to: 1. Use insights from data to justify a website redesign, and what to do while you’re waiting for budgetary approval. 2. Set your priorities by determining goals and success metrics around engagement, conversion, brand building, and internal efficiency and collaboration. 3. Identify blind spots. (Spoiler alert: We have a list of top 10 mistakes that institutions usually make, and how to avoid them.) 4. Create a strong RFP that great firms will want to respond to, and choose the best-fit partner for your needs. 5. Create realistic expectations internally around cost, process, and community engagement. 6. Move your website from a capital project to an ongoing process.

1. Redesign Done Right
Webinar
SIX THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW

2. Your Moderator Today:
Mallory
+ Director of Marketing
+ Executive Producer, Higher Ed Live
+ L.A. Transplant
@MalloryWillsea

3. Housekeeping:
A few starting details:
45-minute webinar + 15 minutes for questions and answers
Chat and ask questions through the Zoom Control Panel
Tweet during the webinar with #mStonerNow
Please fill out the post-webinar survey
Check your inbox on Friday for the webinar recording and slide deck

4. Your Presenter Today:
Voltaire
@vsantosmiran
+ Co-Founder of mStoner
+ Senior Web Strategist
+ Chicago Native

5. As We Get Started
My Goal
To provide you with useful and actionable information and ideas for
your upcoming redesign project.
To affirm what you think you know and to remind you of what you
might have forgotten.

6. Today’s
Topics
1. Justifying a Redesign
2. Setting Goals
3. Identifying Blind Spots
4. Crafting a Killer RFP
5. Managing Internal
Expectations
6. Moving From Project to
Process
Agenda

7. Poll
(We’re all friends here.)
What’s the biggest issue
you’re facing in redesigning
your website?

8. Justifying a Redesign

9. If you want something new,
you have to stop doing
something old.
Peter Drucker
“

10. Points from Our
Recent Research
4

11. What the Research Says: Mythbusting Websites 2016
The website is the
single most influential
resource …
… that a college or university provides that teens use throughout
the search and selection process.
Resources: mstnr.me/RedesignResources

13. What the Research Says: Mythbusting Websites 2016
Academic programs,
visiting, costs and aid,
and student life are the
big four …
… types of information that prospectives look for in the research
phase of their process.

14. What the Research Says: Mythbusting Websites 2016
Intuitive navigation and
the ability to easily find
information are
paramount.
Prospects ranked these two attributes most highly among
criteria for a great college website.

15. What the Research Says: Mythbusting Websites 2016
Pictures of campus are
as important as
program rankings.
Actually, prospects reported that pictures are slightly more
important than rankings in the early part of the process.

16. Key Reasons for a
Redesign
6

17. Key Reason #1 for a Redesign
Your application or yield
numbers need a boost.
Usability issues? Process issues? Content issues?
Visual interface issues? Possibly all of the above.

18. Historic
Freshman
Class
Enrolled in
2016

19. Key Reason #2 for a Redesign
Your academic program
page traffic is relatively low.
Low traffic indicates that you have significant opportunities to
showcase this vital information.

20. 2,000 new
admissions
inquiries in
the first
month after
launch

21. Key Reason #3 for a Redesign
It’s been five years or more
since your last relaunch.
Your visual interface may be showing its age. Your mobile design is likely
a retrofit. Your CMS may be a version (or two) behind the current.

22. Mobile-
optimized
navigation,
new IA,
new CMS

23. Key Reason #4 for a Redesign
It’s been three years or more
since your last content audit.
Organic sprawl. This is the term we use to describe
the result of a decentralized publishing environment without
proper governance.

24. Lean, clean
structure
focused on
prospects

25. Key Reason #5 for a Redesign
Your page load performance
times are poor.
• Performance impacts search engine optimization.
• Performance matters to site visitors, especially on mobile.

26. Page load
time
averages
three
seconds

27. Key Reason #6 for a Redesign
Your pages aren’t compliant
with accessibility standards.
Complaints and lawsuits surrounding accessibility on education
websites have risen steeply in the last year.

28. Shifting to a
Proactive
Accessibility
Approach

29. In the Meantime …
Four Worthy Efforts
+ Firsthand feedback
+ Small footprint
+ Actionable information
+ Broader view across
multiple facets
+ Immediate wins
+ Roadmap for larger
redesign
+ Identification of
specific issues
+ Foundation for training
+ Input for larger
redesign
+ Baseline
+ Meaningful metrics
dashboard
+ Beginning of data-
driven decision-making
Do a usability study. Conduct a site check-up. Perform an accessibility
audit.
Get your analytics in order.

30. Settings Goals

31. I don’t focus on what I’m
up against. I focus on my goals
and I try to ignore the rest.
Venus Williams
“

32. Areas of Focus
6

33. Key Goals
Engagement
Stickiness on
Key Pages
Use of Site Tools and
Functionality
Interactions with
Interactivity

34. Key Goals
Conversion
Request
More Information
Contact a
Counselor
Visit Our
Campus
Apply
Now
Talk with a Faculty
Member
Meet with a
Coach
Sign Up for
an Event
Register
for Class

35. Key Goals
Insight
Page Views of Key
Landing Pages
Unique Visitors Traffic Sources Devices
Locations Bounce Rate Exit Pages in a Multistep
Process

36. Key Goals
Efficiency
Reduction in
Repetitive Requests
Increase in High-Touch/
High-Value Interactions
Improvements
in Internal Process

37. Key Goals
Collaboration
Content
Collaboration
Content Sharing Authoritative Sources
of Information (ASIs)

38. Key Goals
Reach & Reputation
Brand Awareness Brand Perception

39. Identifying Blind Spots

40. Happy families are all alike;
every unhappy family is
unhappy in its own way.
Leo Tolstoy, Anna Karenina
“

41. Common Mistakes
10

42. #10
Treating the project as
primarily a technology effort.
Technology is a key component of a redesign, but technology
should not drive decisions or limit ideas.

43. #9
Viewing the project primarily
as a design endeavor.
beautiful design + usability + content + technology + governance = winning

44. #8
Taking an overly
aggressively approach to
the project timeline.
No Gantt chart has ever survived an encounter with reality.

45. #7
Having unrealistic budget
expectations.
Contrary to expectations, web projects have not gotten cheaper over the years.

46. #6
Not having the proper
leadership in place.
You need support from the president to make this a priority.
You also need a champion for this initiative that has
authority, visibility, credibility, and a high degree of trust in
you and your team.

47. #5
Neglecting analytics (again).
“We’re really flexing our data muscles and using insight from
unified analytics on a daily basis to drive our decision-making
and our priorities.”
Said almost no one ever.

48. #4
(Still) avoiding your
governance pain points.
Deciding who gets to decide is … ultimately easier than avoiding
the conversation altogether.

49. #3
Having fuzzy
personalization thoughts.
Personalization is a powerful tool. Now, how to use it well.

50. #2
Expecting photography to
come cheap and easy.
Painful reality: most of the photos in your DAM aren’t as usable for
your website project as you think they are.

51. #1
Disregarding the need for
content strategy up front.
Leaving the words for later is the best possible way
to ensure a hot mess.

52. Crafting a Killer RFP

53. Choose me. Pick me. Love me.
Meridith Grey, Season 2, Episode 5, Bring the Pain
“

54. True Story
Agencies hate RFPs.
RFPs that communicate
“vendor” instead of
“partner.”
RFPs that state a scope of
work that doesn’t match
the rest of details and
deliverables in the
document.
RFPs that don’t allow
conversation or provide
clarification.
Litigious Language Suspect Scope Zero Visibility
And many agencies are responding to fewer and fewer of them.
RFPs that stipulate
unnecessarily restrictive
requirements.
Implausible Requirements

55. Learning from History
Gettysburg Great
Engaging the campus
community before the
selection process began.
Workshops to align
expectations and map out
the committee’s vision for
the project.
Four pages.
Preliminary
Groundwork
Project Committee
Engagement
Clear, Concise
RFP
Each chosen for a specific
set of skills and
demonstrated success.
Limited Number of
Prospective Partners
Resources: mstnr.me/RedesignResources

56. Elements of a Great RFP
Clear scope of work
without being prescriptive
Indication of priorities
and flexibilities
Institution stakeholders:
RFP process contact
Specific evaluation
points in ranked order
Budget range and
timeline expectations
Third-party systems
requiring integration
Summary of
institutional landscape
Web properties not
included in the project
Required information/
proposal sections

57. Managing
Internal Expectations

58. Every single person you will ever meet
shares a common desire: ‘Do you see
me? Do you hear me? Does what I say
mean anything to you?
Oprah Winfrey, The Final Show
“

59. Avenues for Engagement
Discovery
sessions
Experience mapping
workshops
Strategy review
presentations
Card-sorting, labeling
studies, usability sessions
Town hall meetings for
project milestones
Pre-launch education
communications
Internal launch
feedback
Regular communications
about progress
Post-launch stakeholder
celebration

60. Moving from
Project to Process

61. We are the gardeners of a vast,
evolving ecosystem during a hot,
persistent summer, and our gardens
need tending to.
Ben Bilow, Three Things You Can Do In Between Redesigns
“

62. Paradigm Shift
Continuous Improvement
Establish a regular rhythm
of implementing changes
and enhancements to
your site.
Create and test variants of
key page elements.
Figure out the why behind
the what.
Base decisions what will
best engage and serve your
target audiences.
Ongoing Improvements Experiment-Based Fueled by Analytics User-Focused

63. Resources
Resources
Three Design Trends for 2018
Redesign Checklist Partner with mStoner
Dive Deeper Download Explore
Resources: mstnr.me/RedesignResources

64. Questions & Answers

65. Thank You!
MALLORY WILLSEA
802.457.9234
mallory.willsea@mstoner.com
VOLTAIRE SANTOS MIRAN
312.420.6778
voltaire.miran@mstoner.com