Web Content: build and engage your audience
Madeleine Sugden
Content Manager
www.knowhownonprofit.org
What is web content for?
Culture and heritage:
• Proof of existence – ‘about us / visit us’
• 24/7 learning resource
• Added-value – find out more / interact / shop / support us
5 questions
Five things to think about to help you make the most out of your web content….
1. Audience
• Will they get beyond your homepage?
• Who are you talking to?
• Are you using the right language?
• Are you current?
• How do you know what the audience wants?
Eg1 Museum of Witchcraft
• Clearly says who they are and what they are about
• But it doesn’t engage
• Navigation is cluttered – where do you start?
• Who is this site for?
Eg2 Walsall Art Gallery
• Too much text
• Broken pictures
• This page should be a shop window for the gallery inviting me in not telling me all their stories at once
Eg3 Tyne and Wear Museums
• Very warm, engaging and welcoming
• Is current – what’s on, podcasts
• Invites the reader in…
Eg4 Porthcurno Museum
• Clearly separates information for different audiences
Eg5 Museum of Brands
• Who is this information for?
Eg6 Visit Britain
• Written for the audience + other pages do the same
• Giving the audience what they want
Eg7 Working with Men
• Online questionnaire to find out what users think about the site
• Shows that they value the views of the audience
Eg8 Friends of the Earth
• Sharing the results of a previous survey
• Keeping audience informed of views and changes that will be made
• Really good content – clearly in touch with audience (eg Pub Ammo)
2. Presentation
• Are you helping skim reading?
• Are you writing for the web?
• Is information easy to find?
• How much information are you giving?
• How are you using images?
• Is your site accessible?
Eg9 London Canal Museum
• Too much text written in big blocks
• Not easy to skim read
Eg10 Samuel Johnson
• Text is well broken up into one idea per paragraph
• Only basic information given here – where do I go if I want more?
Eg11 Shakespeare’s Birthplace
• Good use of headings to break up text but still quite hard to read.
• Sentences are long (ideally should be 10-20 words on the web)
Eg12 British Heart Foundation
• Content well written for the web
• Good, clear headings
• Short bulleted lists
• Images to bring to life
• Written for the audience
Eg13 Porthcurno Museum
• Lots of information, hard to skim read
• Navigation links on left are hard to read as they are printed over a detailed image
• Don’t make people work to find information
Eg14 St Albans Museum
• Links at bottom not presented well• ‘Click here to find out more information
about …’ is a lot to process before getting to the important words.
• Simple, meaningful links work best• ‘Click here’ is inelegant and on its own
not accessible
Eg15 Whitby
• Well presented content
• They’ve thought what else the audience might want – local weather, places to stay, events
• They’ve made it easy to find everything out about this venue
Eg16 Lives of Buildings event
• Readers are having to work to find information – need to read whole thing
Eg17 Royal Armouries
• Inspiring events
• Great pictures
• Clearly labelled
• Easy to see what’s on
3. Medium
• Content isn’t just printed words
• Are you using the best format to bring the content to life?
• Are you using audio / video?
• Is it interesting / fun / useful?
Eg18 John’s story
• Great story – his own words
• We know what he looks like
• But we can’t hear his voice…
Eg19 Equipment at sea
• Background, photo, voice
• Good practice – file format and length specified
• Accessibility – text equivalent
• Find out more – other audio to listen to
Eg20 – Liverpool Museums
• Well integrated audio – audio not just in its own bit on the site ‘while you listen’
• Transcript available
Eg21 Great Fire of London
• Game / learning site from Museum of London
• Great way of giving content and atmosphere – bringing it to life with voices and sounds
Eg22 Your day out in Yorkshire
• Interactive day-planner
• Fun and useful
• Accessibility?
Eg23 Hackney Museum
• Virtual tour round the museum
• There is no one there – doesn’t make me want to visit
• No explanation of what I am seeing
• Could have been so much better
4. Marketing
• Help people find your site
• Search engines
• Use all channels available
• Integrate on and offline activities
Eg24 Google search
• How do people get to your website?• They will search for you by name or by
topic• What words do people use – are these
finding your website? Check yourself• ‘Victorian homes’ doesn’t find Geffrye or
Black Country Museum
Eg25 Colossus BBC tour
• Great content on BBC
• How are Bletchley taking advantage of this?
Eg26 Bletchley Park
• They’re not….
Eg27 Jorvik Viking Centre
• One of their characters has friends on Facebook
• Good way of keeping like-minded people in touch with what’s new
Eg28 National Media Museum
• Keeping followers up-to-date on Twitter
• Is Twitter mentioned on their site?
Eg29 Eureka
• Upload pictures of your visit to Flickr
• Helping to build the community of visitors
Eg30 Medical London walks
• Online extension to book / pack they sell
• Video of walk curator on the walk talking about the subject
• Great added-value
Eg32 IWMN Big Picture
• Amazing in-person experience at the museum
• Write-up not inspiring
5. Interact
• From passive readers to active users
• Help your visitors to spread the word
• Make it easy to interact / get involved
• Take advantage of influence windows
Eg33/34 Museum of Wales
• ‘I’ve been here, it was great’ – use eCards and virtual love spoons to spread the word
Eg35 Barley Hall
• Involve local people
Eg26 Kent Police Museum
• Invitation to donate something but full information about how to do this not given
• User will have to search for contact details for curator as they are not presented on the page
Eg27 Sponsor a value
• Interactive opportunity that is appropriate to the audience
• Fun and engaging
Eg28 History of Lego
• Wasted opportunity to let people share their memories of childhood toys – send your comments / join a discussion / send us your pictures
Eg29 eNewsletter sign=up
• Sign-up confirmed but what else can I do?
• Give me other ways I can get involved – events, become a friend etc
• Take advantage of the engagement someone is already giving you
Eg30 Plane Stupid
• People want to engage – don’t apologise for it!
Eg31 Oxfam
• Add a donation included in shop
• More likely to add donation at this point
• Oxfam are making it easy
5 questions - PAMMI
Presentation
Audience
Medium
Marketing
Interact
Madeleine SugdenContent ManagerKnowHow NonProfitwww.knowhownonprofit.org