CMS Help and Support

How should I design my website and web pages?

Design and Planning

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Use this as a checklist to develop your site, page or any part of your web presence

• Define the purpose - this is most important
  • Think about what you want the site/page to do and how to achieve it
• Define the audience
  • Increase promotion effectiveness - who is going to visit your site?
• Plan the content
  • Typography choices, video, pictures, not too much text, etc.
• Plan the navigation, 3 clicks or less
  • Create a clear, concise path to the information
• Plan the pages, what is needed and what is not
  • Don't be too text heavy, measure effectiveness through analytics and make adjustments
  • Users typically scan the page in an 'F' shape, going left to right across the top and down the left side
  • Most users will only scan for specific terms as they hunt around your content
• Plan the experience
  • Know your department's goals
  • Structure to increase overall ROI
  • Use appropriate templates to best represent information

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ADA Compliance Resources

• http://wave.webaim.org/
  • Type in your URL to the page you want to have checked by the webaim product
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• Here is a link to our ADA guidelines (PDF)

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TIP

• Always remember to use lower case and dashes, no spaces, when naming files and folders in your site.

Resources

• Photo Database
• CMS Help & Support Site
• Manuals, Training, Support, ADA guide
• Speed Test - Test the download speed of your website
• Check for Broken Links regularly