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Company: Waterstons Limited
Project: New College Durham Website

http://www.newcollegedurham.ac.uk

Dates: Apr 2007 to Nov 2007

How did the project start?

As one of the leading further and higher education colleges in the North East, New College Durham recognised that their website had the potential to become an effective marketing tool.

The college’s objective was to come up with a modern, fresh and most importantly, user friendly website that was easy to update and appealed to potential and existing staff and students.

What options did you consider?

From the start, the college had a clear vision of how the new website should look and feel. They felt that functionality and structure was just as important as design, because it would be pointless to end up with a visually pleasing website that was confusing in terms of navigation and structure. They wanted an out-the-box, rather than bespoke content management system (CMS) which would be reliable and well supported. The nature of the college means that content on the website is constantly changing and evolving, and they required a CMS that could be used effectively by a number of departments across the college.

Waterstons was one of five companies approached to develop the website, and only one of two who proposed a solution centering around an out-of-the-box CMS, extending it with bespoke development where required. We felt that in addition to satisfying one of the college’s requirements, an out-of-the-box solution was well-suited to the project, rather than reinventing the wheel. After considering various options, we proposed Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS) 2007 as the platform of choice due to its close fit to the college’s business requirements and its capability to be used as a web content management system.

What help and expertise did you receive?

The College decided on the fairly unique route of combining the design of the website by an award-winning design agency (NE6 Design), with the implementation and development of the website by an award-winning business and IT consultancy (Waterstons). This combination proved an unequivocal success, with the two companies working in close partnership and each company using their particular expertise to good effect.

Did you face any challenges or learn any lessons?

MOSS 2007 combines two of Microsoft's existing products, SharePoint Portal Server 2003 and Content Management Server 2002, into one highly flexible and customisable product that can be used both for document management and collaboration in an intranet or extranet scenario, as well as web content management for a public-facing website. The New College Durham website is one of only a few content-managed websites built on this platform, and demonstrates to good effect what can be achieved with this powerful product.

At the time of development, using MOSS 2007 as a content management system was relatively unproven due to it being brand new technology, and as such there were some technical challenges we needed to overcome. Generally speaking with new technology, there is a period of time between the product being released and the production of books and thorough documentation, during which it can be difficult to find answers to challenges posed. Waterstons have a Gold Partnership status with Microsoft which enables us to be on the forefront of cutting edge technology and as such we are practiced at stepping up to such challenges. We were therefore able to address and overcome these issues and the project proved a big success.

What are the outcomes and how has it improved your business?

Despite limitations due to accessibility restrictions, the new website has a modern look designed around the College’s existing brand. It comes top of the Google search listings, is easy to navigate and search, and the new online enquiry system is well-used and easy to administer. The College used to receive 3-4 online enquiries per week from their old website, and the number has now risen to 30-40.

The content management system has allowed departments within the college to take ownership of content, providing an easy way for non-technical users to update the website quickly and efficiently and empowering staff to look after their own data and make timely updates.

Beth Etherington, New College Durham’s Marketing Manager, said "As a College we needed a content management system (CMS) designed to suit the needs of our business. From a marketing perspective we needed a CMS that enabled us to tailor content to individual market sectors and this was achieved through the use of different portals from our home page. SharePoint 2007 has provided a fantastic user friendly system that will enable other staff to take ownership of their area and update content as required, all through a quality controlled process.”

“From the outset Waterstons have been professional and most importantly to us, customer focused. They took time to understand our product and our business. I have complete confidence in Waterstons and would highly recommend them to any business looking to develop a bespoke website based around their customers’ needs. When selecting a developer it is important to consider their technical ability to complete the project, their customer service and their management capabilities. Waterstons excel in all areas and the end result is a website that we are proud of."

What are your plans for the future?

The website went live at the start of November with just the Marketing team responsible for content management. In the months since the launch, staff in other departments have been internally trained to maintain their own content, allowing the College to expand both the depth and breadth of the website content. Feedback has been extremely positive, and the website enjoys new and returning visitors now that relevant information is easy to find.

The next step will be to harness the website as a powerful marketing tool during recruitment campaigns. Additionally, there is potential for a follow-on project which will display the website’s course finder on touch screen kiosks in the College foyer, allowing prospective and existing students to access the most up-to-date course information easily.