Restructuring of our website
You probably know it from your own experience: You have a question about the university, but instead of searching for the information on our website, you ask Google. It's simply faster. You type in your question - bing - answer found - and you're done.
We would like to change that in the coming years!
Our website is like a 10 year old closet that has never been sorted out: With every trend, every season, every vacation and event, new pieces have been added - some are timeless basics, some have gone out of style, others simply don't fit anymore and that pretty outfit you saw in the Allee Center window recently is still missing. So a lot of information has accumulated on our website that we need to re-sort. Others are missing and need to be added. And we also have to rearrange the drawers and shelves in some places.
Therefore, we are now starting the project "Restructuring of the website" together!
So we want to rebuild our website closet, tidy it up and add missing parts. The closet itself will not be replaced: The CMS system egotech and the Corporate Design will stay the same. We will improve the structure of the site's menus and the content and make visual modifications where necessary.
What do we want to achieve?
#Topic 1: Improve finding information
To do this, we will re-sort the content and modify the navigation structure. In collaboration with the departments, we'll take a close look at what information which target group needs and how we need to make it available to them. In the process, we focus the website on external target groups. Of course, the internal information will not be lost - you will find it here in our employee portal.
#Topic 2: Increase the time spent on the website
By aligning the content with the questions and needs of the target groups, they find exactly the information that helps them solve their problem. As a result, they feel well advised and in good hands and stay longer on our website.
#Topic 3: Interested parties become students, employees or cooperation partners
The path from "I'm finding out about the University of Magdeburg" to "I'm studying / working at the University of Magdeburg" is peppered with many questions, uncertainties, possibilities and even more questions. The more a decision changes one's life, the more we have to be convinced that this decision is the right one - that the investment is worthwhile, the course of study is the right one, the colleagues quite magical. The easier it is for our target groups to get in touch with us and feel well advised and informed, the easier it will be for them to decide in our favor. That's why we're going to improve our website on so-called "conversion" to turn interested parties into students, employees, cooperation partners.
#Topic 4: Being found and understood
Nevertheless, we still can't survive without Google. For interested parties to become aware of us, they have to find us via Google. And to do that, our site has to be optimized for search engines. To this end, we are developing a strategy, editorial guidelines and training courses. But we also will improve the barrier-free accessibility and translation of our content, because the best content is useless if it can't be understood or used.
So who are we, actually?
The organization, editorial and technical management of the project is carried out by the University Computer Center and the Media, Communication and Marketing department. If you have any questions, tips, suggestions regarding the project, please feel free to get in touch with the contact persons.
Project management
- Ina Götze
web editor / media, communication & marketing
project management in terms of organization & editing - Werner Liebscher
Services and Support Department / University Computer Center
technical project management
Of course, such a major project with such important changes cannot be implemented by just two people. At a kickoff, several working groups will be formed, consisting of the experts for the different target groups. They will be involved in the process of drawing up the target group descriptions and content as well as the situation analysis. We will announce here afterwards which persons have come together in which working group.
We are also being supported in the project by the digital agency 3pc, which has already worked with the Helmholtz Association, the Charité, the BMBF, the TU Berlin and the University of Konstanz, among others. In collaboration with this agency, the existing site is analyzed and a target group, content and structure concept will be created.
One request
The restructuring of our website is a big and important project, which we plan, think through and communicate as well as possible. But of course there may be delays for various reasons that we can't foresee. Or maybe we'll be super fast and finish much sooner. In any case, we all need a lot of patience and perseverance as well as understanding for each other and trust among ourselves. Therefore the request: If there is something on your mind about the project, or if you think we have not considered or communicated something, please get in touch with us from colleague to colleague!