Cabinet Office
When initiating a website project there are some basic questions that need to be addressed, all of which will affect its usability. Technology that would be seen as suitable for one sector of the marketplace will not be ideal for another.
The language used within the document, the format of the document itself and the style of presentation will all have a direct effect on the users of your website.
1.5.1 Marketplace
It is vital to know who your target audiences are and how they will access your information. This information will determine how you design and prepare the electronic publication.
However, targeting information on a website is very different from the targeting of conventional publicity and information.
Conventional marketing is effective at getting the information to the intended audiences. Leaflets are sent only to mailing lists of the target audience, or displayed in places they are likely to visit. Advertising is placed in magazines or in TV programs that appeal to the target audience.
This leaves design and text in conventional publicity free to concentrate on the task of communication with particular kinds of people.Anyone with access to the Web can show up at your website, whether your information is for them or not. Websites have to do their own targeting by directing users to the information or services that are for them.
Some industry experts suggest that the different levels of a website should have different aims.
Information on the upper levels of a website will be targeted at a very broad general audience. The aim is to help users swiftly find what is relevant to them… or move on. Design should aim to be professional and sufficiently engaging for a broad audience. In this context Government sites should aim to:
Middle layers of the site can be for people with some interest in content or services. This level of the site should aim to:
Middle levels of the site can also be a good place for key messages aimed at the general public. Writing and design can in this case be more clearly targeted at the target audience.
Lower levels of the site will tend to provide the detailed information that government sites so often make available. Here the aim is to:
An exception to this approach is likely to be a website that works as part of a publicity campaign. As advertising is likely to be driving an interested audience to the site, there can be a greater degree of targeting.
The aim of the site should be to add value to the campaign by such means as:
An important aim of design will be to make it plain that the site ties in with the look and feel of the campaign. Users should be in no doubt they have come to the campaign’s site. The content and transactions on the site must reinforce the value of the brand.
Campaign sites should be revised as the campaign changes or be taken down once the campaign ends.
1.5.1.1 Who is the information for?
Departments and agencies should be aware of who the core and non-core audiences are for their sites. It is very likely that the audiences for different parts of the site, or for different sites within a single department’s web estate, will vary considerably.
You should be aware if parts of your sites are aimed at younger or older audiences, or if the information is pertinent to users whose first language is not English.
Do you have information written and designed for your audiences? It may be the case that you have policy documents available. Policy documents are not intended to communicate with the public. Does your site also provide information written for the public on those same subjects?
If you are targeting information at particular audiences, you should consider doing some market research or at least consultation with audiences. It might be helpful if the web team views sites alongside members of their core audience.
See section 2.4 Building in universal accessibility
1.5.1.2 Language
Writers for conventional media have an easier job than writers for the web.
In the first place conventional writers can assume that the leaflet or advertisement is being seen mostly by the target audience. They can use all their skill to deal with the concerns of that audience its own language.
In the second place, most people including professional audiences avoid reading onscreen. Instead they scan quickly for information relevant to them. If they don’t find it, they move on.
Research carried out by John Morkes and Jacob Nielsen has shown that the following practices dramatically increase comprehension by users.
Other recommendations include:
Visit the research report at:
http://www.useit.com/papers/webwriting/writing.html [External link]
1.5.1.3 Technical aspects of marketing
In general government sites aim at a broader audience than commercial sites. We must ensure that the disabled can use our online information. Our audiences also include as a matter of policy the socially excluded. Our audience includes people on especially secure systems (such as the rest of government and some businesses). We tend to have more professionals or policy experts interested in our information -- and so end up publishing far more long detailed documents than many commercial sites.
This means that the technical aspects of government sites will differ from the typical audience for many commercial websites. Government users may sit behind firewalls that strip out scripting. Corporate and business users probably work on networks whose system administrators do not allow them to download software… so there is no point offering them free downloads of plug-ins. Socially excluded users may be accessing on older equipment. Some of our audiences are international, and for them speed of access (as well as other content issues) may be a priority.
This means that to reach these audiences effectively, the technical aspects of the site must match the needs of our audiences. Mandatory compliance with the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative recommendations will help ensure this. Here are some other considerations.
Although the main part of any website will be constructed using HTML, the target audience for the website will help decide the format that should be chosen for storing subsidiary documents. There is no reason why several formats could not be employed at the same time to ensure maximum usability. In particular our professional or policy audiences may want documents provided primarily to be printed out.
See section 2.4 Building in universal accessibility
See section 2.5 Browser compatibility
See section 4.2 HTML pages
See section 4.3 Non-HTML file formats
1.5.2 Customer relationship management (CRM and eCRM)
At the simplest level, customer relationship management (CRM) means the attraction and retention of visitors by operating a user-focused strategy.
1.5.2.1 Audience attraction
Audience attraction involves offering the information and services on your website that your user base requires. To do that there must be an understanding of your audiences and their needs if you are to understand what information and services to offer. You will also need to decide if that offering will be identical for each audience segment or whether you will differentiate (making the right offering to the right customer segment).
See section 1.7 Getting users to your site
1.5.2.2 Audience retention
Audience retention involves acquiring and continuously updating knowledge about visitor needs, motivation and behaviour. Applying this knowledge through a process of learning from your successes and failures will ensure that your website is better managed around the user. The aim is to understand, anticipate and manage the needs of current and potential visitors in terms of what is offered and how it is offered.
Relationship management looks at a continuing series of transactions, rather than an individual transaction. This includes supporting your users online and offline, and satisfying them by responding to their requests for information and assistance as soon as possible.
The user-centric strategy allows the integration of people, processes, and technology systems to support the delivery of user requirements. The organisation’s whole team will need to be in the business of building customer relationships, both online and offline.
1.5.2.3 Electronic CRM
With the ‘all-electronic’ version of CRM, customer relationships become more dynamic and interactive. The creation of a channel and product strategy will define how your organisation delivers its products and services effectively, making sure the right message gets out at the right time and through the right channel. Relevant information can be collected more easily, uploaded automatically and used more effectively.
For example, your department might build a database about its users that described relationships in sufficient detail so that those providing the service can match user needs with products, remind them of the available services and information, and even know what other online and offline transactions a visitor had used. This would provide a web manager with the information necessary to know their users, understand their needs, and effectively build relationships with them.
However, web-based CRM can mean that huge volumes of user information are retrieved, stored, processed and delivered electronically. The IT platforms used must be flexible, adaptive, and scalable. They must also be completely dependable and secure to provide the credibility that will encourage the use of online transactions and resources.