Purpose and goals for your site
Your answers to the questions below will help you put together a site that meets the needs and desires of your audience, and your needs for dissemination and promotion.
"What" and "why" come before "how"
Determine the audience, purpose and content for your Web site.
Who is the audience for your site? [UW-Stout's audiences]
What do they want?
What do you have to offer or say to them?
Based on those answers:
What needs to be front and center on your site?
How can you organize your content within the templates so the audience can find what they want?
Do you have information that they might not realize they will need?
Do you need to lay out a process, or sequence of steps?
Try to do this from the perspective of your audience, rather than from your own organizational structure, reporting needs, or processes.
Consulting with the Web coordinator during this process could eliminate confusion about the purpose of your Web site. The Web coordinator can help you make sure your content is presented appropriately within the context of the entire university, is not misconstrued, or is not present elsewhere on the Web site in a slightly different form.
This process prevents the publication of duplicate sets of official UW-Stout information from different offices or perspectives.
Review and update your site on a schedule
Over time, your links and content will need to change. Prepare a schedule for maintaining links and updating content. CommonSpot allows you to both schedule and expire content, and to set "freshness reminders" for yourself to review and update your site. Use these features for time-bound content, or material that comes and goes on your site.
Get approval
Work through your normal reporting channels for approval to produce a Web site for your class, program, department or unit.