Website Content Worksheet
Website Content Worksheet
Website Content Worksheet
1. Decide purpose of site. Do you want to provide information for clients and
customers, or sell products directly (Do you need a Shopping Cart, Merchant
Account?)
3. Do you need hosting? High quality hosting at very reasonable prices is available
with Site-Maker, or you may choose another company to host your website.
4. Plan out the number of pages and their titles. The name of your homepage
might be your company name and whatever product you are offering. Titles/links to
other pages might be "About Company", "Products", "Services", "Contact", "FAQ",
"Guestbook", "Order Form", etc.
6. Decide specifically what graphics/photos you would like on your site and
which pages your want them on. Label them by name and where they will be located
on your site. Send the photos for scanning or send digitized images on a diskette or
CD-Rom.
7. Compose and format text to be on each page of site. All text and information is
to be provided by the client and provided via floppy disk or CD Rom, or sent to Site-
Maker by e-mail on Microsoft Word. Otherwise, there will be a small charge for
typing.
8. Decide if you want any additional options for your site: Shopping Cart, Site-
Map, Guestbook, Links to Related Sites, Sound or Music, Animation, Additional Forms,
Java Scollers & Effects, Autoresponders, Password Protection, Bulletin Boards,
Database
Preamble
• An informal process may be as simple as distilling ideas and suggestions into a brief
statement which is then given formal approval.
Neither method is intrinsically better than the other. However, the size
of the project, pending deadlines, and available resources may
influence the decision to opt for one process over another.
Suggestions for articulating website goals
• What role is the website meant to play in the public image of your organization?
The responses, refined as you wish, form the basis of your website
goals statement.
Example: The General Council Offices website has a four-point goals statement.
• Deliver the resources that leaders need for their ministry when they need them.
• Promote relationships and collaboration between ministries across the country and around
the world.
• Help people connect with churches and movements beyond their communities, particularly
with global partners.
• Provide information about the denomination to those with an interest or need to know.
As with the site goals exercise in Step 1, identify who will be involved
at this stage, and the available time.
• Identify possible user "experiences" you will offer on your website. Samples include:
o An information retrieval experience where users come for information such
as a worship schedule or list of upcoming events.
o A participative experience where users join an on-line discussion forum.
o A transaction experience where users order worship planning materials or
reserve a meeting room for the local scout troop.
This exercise helps stakeholders visualize the site and potential audiences for the
various features and/or content packages. The audience/content issue is very
important:
o A site for children and youth may opt for information delivery through a lush
interactive experience, while
o A site for their parents may deliver similar information in a traditional
manner, one more commonly seen in static print documents.
• Rank the importance of each audience group.
• Identify the special needs or requirements, if any, for each audience group. For
example, people with disabilities may be unable to access your website, or do so only with
great difficulty.
Link: To ensure your website is accessible, we highly recommend the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) List of
Checkpoints for Web Content Accessibility.*
The outcome of this exercise is a collection of user experiences that
match the site goals.
• As a general rule, they are impatient; that is they are reluctant to wait beyond a
reasonable time for content to display;
• Look for user support resources such as a site map, contact information, content
revision notices, etc.
• How long does it take for pages download? Consider the time required for pages to
display on a dial-up connection. What percentage of your audience access the Internet via
dial-up?
• Does the site use JavaScript and other specialized programming? Are these
embellishments useful or just "eye candy"?
• Does the site have ads? If so, how are they used and where are they placed on the
page templates?
A Note about Browsers: Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) may be the dominant browser, however there are
many versions of IE and other browser brands in use. It is helpful to look at websites, including your own, using a
variety of browsers. Depending on the features supported by each browser version, the content layout and
presentation can vary dramatically. We support and highly recommend the standards proposed by the W3C* as a
way to design around browser eccentricities.*
• Have stakeholders identify the content they want on the site. Sort these requests
into a manageable number of groups. This initial sort provides a logical starting point for the
creation of a site organization plan.
• Will the site offer content currently available in other formats? If yes, does this
content need to be "re-purposed" for a different medium?
How will you present your website content given your audience and
preferred user experiences? We offer the following as a way to begin
your discussion. Consider first, some format options:
• Content may be static, usually as a unique collection of HTML pages. This is the
most common and the easiest way to produce Web content.
• Content may be dynamic, that is pages are generated from a database and
displayed in templates as users click through the links on your site. Remember, the design,
production and testing cycles for dynamic content will be different, and may be much more
complicated than those used for static page development.
• Content may be interactive, that is users exchange information with the site, usually
for a specific purpose such as a commercial transaction, subscribing to an e-newsletter,
participating in an online forum, etc. The technical expertise and resources required to
develop interactive and dynamic content may require further discussions.
o List all functional requirements and technical components.
o Rank the importance and scope each technical component.
o Determine the feasibility of each technical component.
o Do you have the time, technology, skills and money to build the
technical infrastructure for your functional requirements?
o If you plan to lease or subscribe to such services, how will you
evaluate the various available packages?
Links: HTML: For more information on HTML markup see Dave Raggett's Getting started with HTML.* Style
Sheets: We highly recommend the use of Cascading Style Sheets to control content layout and presentation
throughout your whole site. For more information, see the W3C's Cascading Style Sheet's page.*
• When you agree on the group elements, name each group as descriptively, yet
briefly as possible. Two common labels include:
o An 'About Your Organization' label. This section includes general information
about the organization, its history, mission, news, contact information, street
location, etc.
o A 'Site Map/Index' label. This section is especially useful with ambiguous
organizational schemes (see below) that are not supported by a site search
function.
1. Viewers would rather be watching TV. For this group the Web is about eye
candy and other visual jolts. They use text only as directions to further visual
stimulus.
2. Seekers want information they can apply to their own work. They move
quickly through a site, rarely pausing to scroll down or across. If what they want
is not immediately visible they move on.
3. Readers are rare birds of the Web. They will scroll through and read long
documents, download and print PDFs, as they would any print document.
• Trim or distill long documents. Write "long", if you must, but be prepared to trim
your copy to keep it tightly focused.
o Present the most important material at the beginning and then add detail.
o Write short paragraphs, ideally, with only idea per paragraph.
o Use sub-headings to separate blocks of paragraphs.
• Even Readers will appreciate a summary and/or Table of Contents at the beginning
of long documents.
• Lists and other design elements help break the flow of uniform text blocks. Lists are
especially good for presenting categorical information (see next item).
• Sort information into categories where applicable, e.g., "Sermon Starters," "2003
News Releases," etc. When visitors can jump from chunk to chunk, they get to their
information destinations quickly.
This step takes your labeled content groups and builds a model
structure for your site. To help stimulate discussion consider how the
following models may or may not work for your site.
• An exact organization model sorts content into well defined and often mutually
exclusive sections. Common applications of this model include:
o An alphabetical sort used for a staff directory on a contact page, or
o A chronological sort used to present a collection of news releases.
Exact organization schemes are:
o Easy to design and maintain.
o Require users to know exactly what they're looking for.
• An ambiguous organization model sorts information into categories that rely on
language and/or visual symbols to convey the category content. Common applications of
ambiguous organization schemes include:
o A topical sort such as "Worship Resources", or "Justice Issues."
o An audience-specific sort such as a "For Children" or "For Prospective
Students."
Ambiguous organization schemes are:
o More effective than exact organization models because most users don't
know precisely for what they are looking.
o Difficult to conceptualize and design.
• A hybrid model, applies the exact scheme for some content and an ambiguous
scheme for the remainder. A common hybrid model is a hierarchical scheme where content
is organized as a collection of pages beneath a Home Page. We use this model on united-
church.ca. Not surprisingly, we recommend this model because:
o It is an easy metaphor to understand, and
o It works well with both simple and complex collections of information.
Acknowledgement: Much of the above has been adapted from an excellent book, "Information Architecture for
the World Wide Web" by Louis Rosenfeld and Peter Morville. O'Reilly & Associates, 1998, pp. 26-36.
Now that you have identified the major content sections, fill them in
from the content inventory. Once the content is labeled and sorted,
you need a navigation system to help users travel throughout your site
in such a way that they don't get lost.
• Where am I? Users will never create a mental image of your site plan unless they
know where they are at all times.
• Where can I go from here? This is answered by visible navigation options and other
links on the page.
The General Council Offices site navigation scheme uses tabs arranged
horizontally across the screen to label the main content areas. Within a
content area a menu in the left margin to sub-divides the content into
logical sub-categories. As users click towards specific documents a full
range of navigation options remains available. The horizontal tabs offer
direct links to every major content category on the site. The left-side
menu offers links to every major sub-category within the chosen
category.
For more information: For a much more comprehensive discussion of website navigation and usability issues,
we highly recommend "Designing Web Usability" by Jakob Nielsen, New Riders Publishing, 2000.
Now is the time to take the site plan and build a visual design around
it. This step is often the most satisfying aspect of a website project.
Remember: Settle the intellectual property issues early on. Determine who owns what aspects (HTML code,
graphics, scripts, etc.) of your website. For more information on copyright issues, see below. Understand the
benefits of using proprietary resources and the costs (time, money, inconvenience) of opting out.
Consider the following points as you begin to the visual design phase:
• Consider a distinct colour palate. Use colour to generate a visual vocabulary** which
supports your site content.
• The colour theme should use browser-safe colours which reproduce consistently
across platforms and browsers.
• Remember, the eye tends to see the pictures first. Consider how visual images can
reinforce the text.
** Visual vocabulary is a set of symbols used to describe a system, structure, or process. Web designers use
the vocabulary to describe, at a high level, the structure and/or flow of the user experience of a website.
Browser-Safe Colours: For a "Microsoft-centric", but still informative, perspective on the colour-safe Web
palette, see Robert Hess'The Safety Palette.*
Layout grids
Layout grids are the foundation of your visual design. Grids and design
sketches lead to page mock-ups. The goal, as you begin, is to have
pages similar in form across all major sections of the site. Consider the
following points as you begin:
Consider the following points as you begin your design sketches and
page-mock-ups.
• Sketches establish the site's look and feel. They may been done concurrently (and
approved!) during earlier steps in this process.
Some users and their automated spiders and web bots scour the
Internet constantly looking for vulnerable information to exploit in
telemarketing campaigns, junk mail, mass e-mail campaigns. A good
way to avoid a flood of unwanted e-mail is to to hide or mask the e-
mail addresses on your website. We use a tiny script to mask e-mail
addresses on the General Council Offices website. This script is
available for download [RTF 2 pp. / 12 KB].
Final Thoughts
• Designing a website is a team effort. Anyone who insists they can do the job on their
own is not someone you wish to have planning and building your website.
• Remember, your site should revolve around its content. If you build your site before
you have your content you've done things backwards.
• Understand and approve the costs and fees before you begin. We dislike being so
suspicious, but be wary of a price that seems too good to be true. It often is.
• Every site will require regular maintenance. Information has to be updated and the
site design has to be kept fresh. Ensure maintenance costs and responsibilities are
understood and agreed upon as you begin developing your website.
• What makes a good website? Common Sense! If nothing else, build your website so
that it makes sense to your users.
Don't forget! Once your site is up and running, plan for a formal and regular evaluation of the site. Suggestions
for points of discussion include:
• Has the site met the its goals?
• Are you getting adequate feedback to evaluate the site?
• How would current stakeholders evaluate the site?
• Have new stakeholders come forward since the site was launched?
1. Purpose
Give the most important purpose a "1", next most important a "2". Leave those blank
which do not interest you at all.
__ To gain a favorable impression of the company or organization.
__ To develop a qualified list of prospects
__ To sell products directly taking credit card information over the Internet
__ To encourage potential customers to contact us by phone or mail to
consummate a sale.
__ To make available product information and price lists to distributors.
__ To make available product information and price lists to customers.
__ To strengthen brand identification.
__ Other _______________________________________________________
2. Site Organization
Please label pages you desire and cross out the rest.
Total number of pages decided upon ________________
Domain Name It must be registered through your web hosting service and approved
by a domain registration service before you can use it. You may check the availability
of your domain name at Network Solutions (http://www.networksolutions.com)
4. Masthead Graphic
6. Navigation System
The navigation system of all our Standard Website Packages includes:
• Links from the front page and sectional pages to every page in the system to
enable Web search engines to "spider" and index content on every page.
• Colored bar "Image Map" with a brief word or two indicating each page --
or, in larger sites -- each section of the website. This appears at the bottom of
every page. In some sites we put this both top and bottom. You are limited to
a maximum of about eight (8) selections on this image map. We use server
side image maps to make it easy to expand the site at a later time without
having to change the coding on each page of the site. For this reason, and to
keep costs down, we do not include separate "buttons" on our standard sites.
Included in sites of 6 pages or more.
• Left-Side Menus with text links are especially useful on larger sites. Included
in sites of 6 pages or more. They can allow more detail than an 8-item bottom
image map, and can enable visitors to see from any page how to get to any
other. These may be white or light-colored over a dark left-side color or
pattern, or black or dark over a light left-side color or pattern.
Do you have any trademarks or service marks? If so, please list them here and
indicate which are registered trademarks.
9. Response Forms
What is the purpose of your response form?
Note: We do not set up sites that use the response form as an order form, since
these require secure servers, and secure order pick-up. For one or two products we
recommend using ShopSite Lite with a secure server. We charge extra to set up the
ordering system.
Phone: _____________________________
• Advertising your Website to Web search engines that index the Web
• Giving customers a good reason to come by offering them something
• Finding industry-wide linking pages and negotiating reciprocal links to and
from their webpages.
• Purchasing Web advertising
• Becoming active in several of the thousands of Internet news groups and
mailing lists
• Developing a "signature" mini-ad attached to all your e-mail messages
• Making your website part of one or more of the many "malls."
• Including your e-mail and Web addresses on all your company's print
literature, stationery, and display advertising
• E-mail newsletters
We submit your information to Web search engines to "register" your website after
final payment is received. Before doing this we work with you to get 50 to 100
keywords and a carefully constructed 25-word sentence contain the most important
keywords.
12. Maintenance
Target Date____________________
Package prices include minor updating over the first six months of the contract. This
covers minor price changes, product changes, etc. It does not include major changes,
such as changing newsletter content (which essentially involves constructing a new
webpage), which is billed at our hourly rate.
Target Date for final payment to be made and your Web Site to be advertised:
_____________
On behalf of my organization I approve the above plan which I have developed with
Wilson Internet Services to construct a website, and I authorize Wilson Internet
Services to use this Website Planning Worksheet as the basis of the project.
These are the items that will make up the package you'll be sending to us:
In our Standard Web Site Packages we include everything the average small business
needs for Web pages. But be sure to see the limits of what is included in our
packages; we charge extra for services required beyond our standard packages.
Text
• You must set up a separate Word processor file for each Web page. Use
this worksheet to indicate which file names correspond to which Web pages.
• We prefer Microsoft Word, though we can convert a wide variety of file
types.
• Please do not send us a draft of your text. Send us your final version. While
we expect to make minor changes here and there after the Web pages are
prepared, we charge extra to format and insert brand new text. Most word
processors allow you to count the approximate number of words. Web pages
which contain more than 1,200 words may be subject to additonal charges,
especially if they require a good deal of formatting.
Graphics
• The quality appearance of your Web site has a lot to do based on the photos
or graphics you choose for your Web pages. Clipart can be used, but tends to
make the pages look amateurish. Photos are probably best.
• You may send graphics to us in either digitized form or hard copy
photos which we will scan.
• Prepare captions for each photo. You may affix a PostIt Note to the photo
to indicate its caption and which Web page it goes on.
• If you need us to prepare specialized graphic elements in addition to our
custom site graphics package, please explain clearly, and perhaps include a
sketch. We charge for such items on an hourly basis.
• You may select stock photos from your pages from PhotoDisc or Corel, and
give us the photograph number. We will purchase and download the
appropriate photo, place it on the Web page indicated, and bill you for the
photo cost. If you want us to find and select photos, we charge our hourly
rate.
• Our Standard Web Site Packages include an average of 1.3 photos or
graphics per page. Beyond that we charge an additional fee for placing
photos.
Please include this Web Page Content Worksheet with the materials you send to
Wilson Internet Services. Feel free to use your own form if that is more convenient.
Photos or
Approx
Content File Name Graphics
# of
Description for Text If none
words
state "None"
Home . . .
About the
. . .
Company
Order/Response
. . .
Form
Services/Product
. . .
s
. . . .
. . . .
. . . .
. . . .
FAQ . . .
Newsletter . . .
. . . .
. . . .