GREAT WEBSITES
What Makes A Great Website?
As an award winning Webmaster (see Contact
Information) I have found that great websites have
many characteristics in common, including the following:
1) An easy to identify home page (the first page that
a person sees when viewing your site). It should have your name,
what kind of organization you are, your web address, the Webmaster
/ contact person, your affiliations, and date of your latest update
to the website.
2) The home page should be uncluttered. Some
websites try to put every bit of important information on their home
page. Instead of making information easy to find, a cluttered
home page makes finding information very difficult.
Try this experiment – visit the following NYSUT
location: http://www.nysut.org/cps/rde/xchg/nysut/hs.xsl/links_3348.htm. Click
on 10 – 15 of the individual union website links and peruse their
home pages. Determine for yourself which websites are more user friendly,
visually appealing, and are ones that you would like to explore.
3) A consistent navigation system. The navigation
system, either a series of buttons or links that you can click on,
should be the same on every single page. People are NOT going to stay
long on a site if they can’t figure out how to find the information
they are looking for.
4) An update time on each page. People visiting your
website want to know how time relevant your news is. If you don’t
update your site regularly you will lose your audience. No one will
spend much time on a website if the last time it was updated was in
2004!
5) Make the print easy to read. Although browsers
can adjust the size of the print, some users don’t know about
that feature. Don’t start out with too small (or large)
a print size that forces visitors to adjust his or her browser.
6) Don’t use too many different fonts. Don’t
use uncommon fonts. If you use a font that other people don’t
have, their browser will substitute another font – which may
radically change the look and feel of your entire site.
7) You need to be regularly adding new content to
your website. Your website is NEVER finished! A static, unchanging
site will only be visited once or twice before you lose your audience.
For union sites, updating your site with monthly cabinet meeting minutes
and your newsletter are both good ways to start. For business sites,
putting up some sale items usually brings in some new business.
8) Make your site appeal to the greatest number of
people possible. An education site isn’t going to draw in millions
of viewers – but there are things you can add to the site that
will increase traffic flow. For example, I have added a lot of photographs
of the district and the surrounding area to appeal to people that have
moved away from the area and to attract potential new staff to the
district. I have added a Kudos section to include as many staff
members in the site as possible. I have added annotated links to other
educational and parenting sites, a history of the union with photos,
and an E-mail Directory (listing of active and retired teachers, parents,
student teachers, administrators with their E-mail addresses) so that
people can keep in contact with one another – and so I can keep
in contact with them to let them know of new updates to the website. A
listing of union benefits and other ways to save money will also draw
readers.
9) Be careful of the photos and downloadable files
that you use. A 1.5-megabyte photo may take a couple of seconds to
download for someone with a cable Internet connection, but take 7 minutes
for a person with dial-up. Very few users will wait over 30 seconds
for a web page to load.
10) You should get your own domain name. A domain
name is a unique name that will basically be the Internet address to
your website. The WGTA website domain name is: wgta.net. Our
web address (called the URL) is http://www.wgta.net.
Getting your own domain name costs money, different companies charge
different amounts, the price also varies by the length of your contract.
You are basically “renting” the domain name on a yearly
basis.
You do not necessarily need a domain name. You can
also store your website on someone else’s host computer – using
their domain name as part of your Internet address. For example, NYSUT
allows you to place your website on their hosting computer. The advantage
to this is cost (you don’t have to “rent” a domain
name and sometimes the hosting is free!). The main disadvantage is
that you end up with a somewhat convoluted web address, like: http://www.nysut.org/wgta.
The name is longer and a bit harder for users to remember. Also,
if you change your host your website address will have to change.
I suggest that you get your own domain name right
from the beginning. Once you start advertising your website address
you will NOT want to change it. With your own domain name it also
doesn’t matter who your hosting computer is, your web address
always stays the same.
11) Another consideration is advertising your website.
You have to advertise your website address to your audience. I
put our web address in our newsletter, it's on our business cards and
we take out small periodic ads in local newspapers.
I also do an E-mail Directory where I have collected
over 100 names and E-mail addresses of teachers, retirees, parents
and administrators (people sign up to belong to the Directory). I password
protect the Directory and post it on the website. Only people with
the password (the Directory members) can access the addresses. Having
these addresses allows me to send out a message to over 100 people
telling them, for example, that the newsletter has been posted on the
website. This in turn generates a LOT of traffic to the site. Having
the address available to members of the Directory also allows people
(especially retirees) to keep in contact with each other.
Business owners should also try to accumulate E-mail
addresses of customers that frequent their business. Sending out E-mails
is a free method of advertising and is especially effective if you
send out ads to previously satisfied customers.
A Directory is a LOT OF WORK however (getting the
addresses, updating the many changes in addresses, putting together
ads, etc.). Once you decide to have a website constructed I suggest
that you start to gather E-mail addresses.
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This page was last updated on November
15, 2011
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