For many nonprofits, the very point out of a web site redesign challenge is sufficient to ship folks operating for the hills. In spite of everything, most advertising professionals have conflict tales from previous web site tasks which have gone awry.
It goes one thing like this:
From the beginning, the launch deadline — possible formidable and in addition arbitrary — looms giant on the whole group. It’s seen as an immovable and fast-approaching object.
As issues progress, everybody concerned locations unreasonable stress on themselves and one another to launch a 100% good web site on day No. 1. Due to this, rounds of evaluations pile up, resolution paralysis takes maintain, delays mount and the environment turns into tense.
As soon as the web site lastly launches, everyone seems to be so exhausted that they by no means wish to have a look at it once more. The web site then stays the identical for the following three to 5 years, slowly falling right into a state of disrepair earlier than the whole course of begins once more.
Evidently, this isn’t a recipe for fulfillment.
Progress Over Perfection
Framing the objective for a web site as perfection, or something near it, is a recipe for catastrophe. How can nonprofits even know what a “good web site” is when guests haven’t interacted with it but?
I prioritize progress over perfection. It is a elementary shift in the right way to strategy web site tasks. It includes setting lifelike objectives for the launch of your new web site and serious about it at least viable product (MVP) as an alternative of the be-all and end-all. It’s just like how app builders strategy cell functions: you don’t launch model No. 1 and name it a day. It’s simply the beginning of a unending journey to enhance the product based mostly in your deliberate roadmap and person suggestions. If you strategy a web site like this, you create a more healthy dynamic the place your construct stays maintained and improved as an alternative of uncared for and scapegoated.
I like to make use of the analogy that you simply wouldn’t purchase a brand new automobile and determine to not change the oil. Why deal with your web site—considered one of your most costly investments as a corporation—this fashion?
Person-Centric Design
The emphasis of your nonprofit’s web site ought to be user-centricity. The audiences that go to your web site at the moment and people you want to appeal to to your new web site have to be given a outstanding seat on the desk.
To collect necessities, interview key organizational stakeholders, in addition to guests — from e mail subscribers to donors and volunteers — representing every group to which you hope to enchantment. Resist the temptation to develop a inflexible set of questions. As a substitute, give them house to specific their wants and needs in their very own phrases. Use instruments, like generative AI, to document every interview and remodel their responses into structured information with exact categorization.
What your guests need out of your web site is probably going very totally different from what you, as a corporation, wish to specific. That’s a wholesome pressure that have to be acknowledged and handled through the web site growth course of. Watch out to not design your web site’s sitemap round your inner division construction. As a substitute, base it on the data customers search and essentially the most logical paths to get them there. This would possibly imply placing your pursuits apart so your web site is as user-friendly as potential.
Attempt to assume intentionally about every web page you intend so as to add and be ruthless about eradicating bloat. Whereas it sounds counterintuitive, your web site isn’t about you as a corporation; it’s concerning the issues you might be working to handle and the individuals who want to again your work.
Constructing user-centric web sites additionally requires gathering and analyzing person expertise information. This includes implementing instruments, like web site warmth maps and analytical instruments (Google Analytics 4, for instance), early in your discovery course of in your present web site to establish frequent paths folks take and clear sources of friction. Your purpose is to create websites that aren’t solely a pleasure to navigate but additionally regularly optimized based mostly on key metrics and testing.
One indication that your homepage isn’t working is that a big portion of your guests instantly head to your “About Us” web page within the hopes of determining what you really do. Should you haven’t seen it, McSweeney’s bemoaned this of their piece, “We Dare You to Determine Out What Our Nonprofit Does.” (You already know your business is in bother when the notion is so frequent that you simply get roasted like this.)
Technological Empowerment
Web sites might be intimidating for nonprofit staffers. Oftentimes, they put on many hats, with “web site supervisor” being simply considered one of them. Add to that the truth that many nonprofit web sites are so dated that they really feel like they could collapse if a stiff wind hits them.
A part of any high-quality web site challenge is constructing in such a approach that the nonprofit workers feels snug and assured making updates to the positioning by itself. Whereas there’s an excellent argument for bringing in consultants to take care of your web site, you shouldn’t really feel beholden to an company or webshop to make easy updates to your web site. This results in a poor dynamic the place your workers doesn’t really feel in charge of their very own web site and should wait nonetheless lengthy till their vendor makes every change.
Nonprofits shouldn’t merely outsource the event of their web site and wash their arms of it. As a substitute, they need to select a companion who can clarify the work they’re doing in layman’s phrases, supply sturdy coaching and usually get their workers excited concerning the prospects as an alternative of dreading the method. This represents the very best of each worlds: the advantages of working with internet growth consultants to considerably enhance your web site with out the drawbacks of feeling they’re the one ones who can work on it.
Your group ought to all the time really feel prefer it has the keys to its kingdom.
You’re not alone when you and your group are embarking on a web site redesign however have collective trauma over previous redesigns. However you additionally don’t must repeat the identical course of. You’ll be able to select a greater, extra pragmatic strategy that values iteration and steady enchancment over undue stress and frustration.
This isn’t to say {that a} new web site ought to come simply. It’s a must to put within the work — however it must be the fitting work. Exhausting selections and debates ought to be needed to scale back bloat, introduce the right performance and resist the urge to talk extra about your self than to your guests. But it surely doesn’t must really feel like an uphill battle in opposition to avoidable stressors. Spend the whole time feeling such as you’re paddling upstream, losing effort on avoidable stressors, and also you’ll find yourself with out time for the very actual and very important work.
Decide to constructing your subsequent web site in a wholesome approach, rooted in person insights and undertaken pragmatically. By selecting an strategy that values steady enchancment, nonprofits can keep away from previous pitfalls and work towards success collectively.
The previous submit was offered by a person unaffiliated with NonProfit PRO. The views expressed inside don’t immediately replicate the ideas or opinions of NonProfit PRO.
