Blog
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SEO What? Learn How to Use Search Engine Optimization to Get Your Website Seen
When it comes to your website, what is most important? That it’s engaging? That it represents your school’s mission? That it looks good? All of these are great, but they are useless if your website isn’t getting seen. How do you ensure that your website doesn’t get lost in the countless number of results that pop up on search engines like Google? Enter: Search Engine Optimization.
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From Launch to Pre-Op: Tips to Maintain Your Website's Health
Like kids, a pet, or even you, websites need consistent care to keep running and operating efficiently. At OUTC16, Jennie Salamoun, User Experience Architect at NewCity, walked us through the wellness and preventive care measures needed for a healthy website. Get her insight and best practices to keep your website in top shape.
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Making User Experience a Top Priority
We’ve all been on websites that have left us confused or frustrated. Perhaps you just needed contact information but it was nowhere to be found. Maybe the pages were overly complicated or poorly organized. Ugh! These are all examples of problems that can add up to a negative user experience, which can lead to a negative impression that reflects not only on your website, but on your college or university.
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Usability, Technology & Development
Get an In-Depth Look at Your Website's Health with OU Insights
When you only have a matter of seconds to shape the first impression of your website visitors, maximizing your website’s appeal becomes paramount. If your website has spelling errors or broken links, that poor first impression will reflect on your institution’s reputation. Worse yet, what if your website isn’t even seen because weak SEO tactics reduce visibility in search engine results? And even worse, what if you run into legal ramifications for not complying with accessibility guidelines?
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Transforming Your Website: From Content Management to Experience Management
Any time a visitor is on your site, he is having some sort of user experience. The critical question is what kind of experience is it? Great! Ordinary. Terrible! Most institutions using OU Campus have made excellent headway in mastering the basics. Content works well on all devices and platforms, text is scannable, and pages are consistent. Is that good enough? Learn about six key areas to focus on in order to elevate your website experience.
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Website Redesign: How to Give Site Visitors What They Need
At OUTC16, Sylvia Nicosia, Director of Web Programming and Development at Farmingdale State College, gave a detailed presentation on her institution’s most recent website redesign. Using analytics and qualitative data, Nicosia and her team developed a simple, yet powerful design where information architecture meets the expectations of their site visitors. Learn about their journey to a successful website redesign.
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How to Improve Your Website's Usability and Make a Good Impression
When starting a new book, the reader might give it a few pages or maybe even a couple of chapters to let it catch her interest. When it comes to your website, you’ve got a matter of seconds to capture her attention. Usability is understanding what your audience wants from your website and providing it in a way that is efficient and intuitive for them. Learn about five important areas to focus on when evaluating your sites’ usability strengths and weaknesses.
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Using Information Architecture to Streamline Website Navigation
Have you ever been on a website that was so badly organized you couldn't find information you knew was on the site? This is the effect of poor information architecture (IA). Good IA enables users to navigate intuitively so that they find what they're looking for in the shortest time and with the least effort possible, all while being engaged with your site. When IA is done well, the user doesn’t even notice the structure of information.
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The Halo Effect and Your Website
In social psychology, the Halo Effect is classified as a cognitive bias where an individual transfers his feelings about one aspect of something and extrapolates it into an overall opinion about it. So what does the Halo Effect have to do with your website? Actually, everything. The Halo Effect is not fair, but it is a definite reality.
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Accessibility Matters: Is Your Website Up to Code?
When building a website, the focus tends to be on how content is designed and managed, but we may be forgetting an important element that can cut down visibility when left unaddressed: content accessibility to people with disabilities. As part of #OUTC16, Justin Gatewood, Webmaster at Victor Valley College, showed us how to S.I.F.T. through a website’s content for accessibility.
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