1. Planning Your Web Project
Christin Boyd, Trainer
Kate Witt, Project Manager

2. NPower Northwest
• Vision
A thriving community with high performing
nonprofits.
• Mission
To strengthen the nonprofit sector by catalyzing
innovation and driving adoption of technology
solutions.

3. Future Brown Bags & Webcasts
For more information regarding upcoming
brown bags and trainings please visit our
website and blog
http://www.NPowerNW.org
or Like us on Facebook

4. Plan your website project
Define the web features you want
that achieve your goals
within your budget.

5. Contents
• State the problem
– From the audience perspective
– From the employee perspective
• Shiny Object Syndrome
– Carefully choose the most cost effective
technologies rather than the latest gadget.
• Tips to save time and money with your
consultant
– Define your priorities and budget.
– Save money by avoiding needless redesign

6. Web Site Goals
• Your organization has a mission statement and a set of
goals
• Clear goals will help your team
– scope your work
– guide your priorities
– clarify communications with constituents.
• Example goals:
– Increase online donations by 10%
– Increase volunteer hours by 5%
– Increase number of children in our programs
– Increase program participation in the Latino community
– Never show incorrect event details on the web calendar

7. State the Problem
• Problems for the audience:
– Downloading articles takes too many clicks, steps.
– Hard to find
• list things that are currently hard to find, actual complaints, real scenarios
• Personal features such as classes I registered for, my volunteer schedule
• Seniors find it hard to find resources
– Mobile phone users unable to read calendar because of formatting
– Low percent of registrants actually attend events
• Perhaps they need reminders, calendar downloads, directions?
• Problems for staff:
– Hard for staff to update the calendar
– Staff can’t put important announcements on the front page without
going through tech person.
– Staff can’t archive without breaking links.
– Unable to get page statistics (Google analytics) for some pages

8. State the problem
• Who is going to do what and how often?
• Who = what group of audience members, e.g. donors,
volunteers, parents, educators.
• What actions will they take on your web site.
– E.g. donate money, buy something, download a brochure,
sign up for a class.
• How often will people take this action?
• Why do we ask how often?
– Common tasks should be easy
– Infrequent tasks are a lower priority
– Some widgets charge you per transaction cost.
– Some widgets charge you a one time fee at setup time.
– Some widgets charge you a subscription/monthly fee.

9. Shiny Object Syndrome
• Tempting to look at other web sites and say
“I want that on my web page!”
• Is it cost effective?
• Does it serve a specific purpose which results
in achieving our organization’s goals?
• Can your constituents even use the new
technology?
– Does the new technology work on older
computers (school & library computers)?
– or on new mobile web browsers?

10. Value of new technology
• Total cost = Initial price + subscription fees
+ transaction fees
+ hours to implement
+ training staff to use it
+ fees to store large files (e.g. videos)
• Value = Total cost ÷ frequency of use

11. Example: Donation system
Monthly transactions 10 175
Average donation $20.00 $20.00
Total donation $200 $3,500
Expected monthly fee
PayPal standard $7.40 $129.50
DonateNow* $64.48 $160.48
DonateNow Lite $10.00 $175.00
GoogleCheckout** $8.80 $154.00
PayPal Standard + Wufoo Forms $37.35 $159.45
* Includes initial setup fee $199, amortized over 3 years
** Google Checkout prices for under $3500 in donations per month

12. Tips to Save Time & Money with Consultant
• What costs money?
– Working with a consultant just to define what you
want this project to accomplish.
– Redesign
– Redesign again
• Clear SOW
– Clear problem statement
– Clear priorities
– Clear direction on budget to solve problems
– Where compromises can be made between wants
and budget

13. Design Costs
• Graphic Design is different from User Interface Design or User
Experience Design
• Not all design elements will plug in and work with a given web
software system.
• If the designer did not define parameters with the web
developer, then the design will need to be modified to work
with the specific features of your web software.
– Example from recent NPower engagement: Even a great Photoshop Design
will probably 30 hours to convert into a web template/theme that works with
your web software.

14. Save money on design work
• The Designer and Developer need to talk to each other
– Once before they start implementing
– A second meeting when the designer delivers a draft design.
• You will pay for these planning hours, but it will save you the
cost of redesign.
• Agenda for these Designer & Developer meetings:
– Agree on structure of the site, the navigation elements.
– Agree on which technologies they will use (CMS, any graphical plug-ins like
QuickTime, Silverlight, or Flash)
– Version control (Source code control)
– Design impacts of a “members only” area of the site.
– How will the new design look
– how will staff members update the graphical content
– how will the audience interact with any graphical elements

15. Summary
• State the problem or goal
– From the audience perspective
– From the employee perspective
• Shiny Object Syndrome
– Explain how the new thing achieves your goal
– Calculate the cost effectiveness of new features
• Tips to save money with your consultant
– Define your priorities and budget
– Communicate with designer and developers

16. Thank You
Christin Boyd, training@npowernw.org
NPower Northwest
Website: www.npowernw.org
Facebook: www.facebook.com/npowernw
Twitter: @npowernw