So your CEO wants your organization to re-vamp or build a website? Six months later, ten thousand dollars and hundreds of man hours later= A traditional web presence. But why do you have a website? What is it doing? It may be beautiful and trendy, but is it effective and contributing to your organizational goals?
Creating a web strategy can be an nebulous challenge. Organizations do not typically understand the rationale and purpose of a web strategy. Furthermore, because of the "enterprise" nature of this topic, it has been largely left untouched by the web community.** This post attempts to define web strategy, its importance, while offering critical lessons learned.**
What is a Web Strategy?
Simply put, a web strategy is an actionable plan devised to achieve measurable results and success on the web. Typically, a web strategy would communicatehow the organization will utilize the web to further its mission.Contributing Source: Viget Blogs
Why create a Web Strategy?
Typically, the need for a web strategy comes from the direct request for (or existing) the end product, a website, online application, etc. You if you have any type of web presence- a website, a myspace, a blog- you have a web strategy. But web strategy can also help clarify stakeholders, visions, principles, and goals for organizational web initiatives and provide the rationale behind future development, and more importantly.....funding.
So on that note, I wanted to offer some "tips" for creating effective web strategy.
10 Tips for Developing an Organizational Web Strategy:
-** Think big.** A web strategy isn't just a process for developing a website. A web strategy is basically a business plan- a way to achieve what your organization defines as success. The process, rational, time frame, etc are products of the strategy. This is also NOT a project management tool. Many web strategies get too far into the details of how, a web strategy is high level view of the time lines, potential costs, process, resources, etc. A web strategy should not define specific activities?
-** Be flexible and responsive.** Web strategy should always evolve- the web is iterative quickly evolving. Your process should be as well. Use- but beware of committee meetings, huge documents, process charts, and other traditional methods.
-** Proceed with caution.** Agile and iterative development are important concepts, but developing partnership, stakeholder buy-in, and organizational integration can often take some time. Don't rush the planning process! I have seen some web strategies that have taken multiple years to develop. However....
-** Don't get held up in bureaucracy.** Ofter websites are created, launched, and revised garnering business success WITHOUT a web strategy. Your web strategy does not have to be solid or finalized to begin production.
-** Start small. Be Concise.** You may not be Amazon.com. You may not need to create a 200 page document. Boil it down to the essence. Two pages perhaps.
-** Involve Leadership.** This is extremely important- inherently, a web strategy will affect the organization at many levels. An organization's website is a critical part of it success. Find a high level champion. This person can help gain senior level buy-in.
-** Integrate and consolidate.** Look for overlap and coordinate with other organizational strategies and processes (Communication/IT strategies often overlap). A successful web strategy takes into account, the entire organization- its mission, its vision, short & long term plans, staff, strengths, weaknesses, etc.
-** Consider your audience.** So you've developed a 200 page web strategy. Who is going to read it? Who needs to read this? Think about who you need to communicate your web strategy to and how to best do that. One document doesn't fit all. For a group of senior staff, maybe a presentation works best. For the CEO, maybe a one page brief. For a web conference, maybe different presentation.
-** Prioritize your goals.** Due to an inevitable lack of time and resources, choose the core core objectives, principles, requirements, etc that support your most important goals.
-** Don't over think it.** I can't over emphasis this point. At some point you have to just boil it down: Where are we going, and how are we getting there.
Next week, we will take a look at the typical web strategy elements.** Remember, there is not a formula for creating the perfect "Web Strategy" - we are discussing different methods, and then bringing it back down the the essentials. **
Feedback
Does your organization have a web strategy? Do you feel like you need one?** Do you think by nature of a "web strategy" - organizations tend to over think the process?** Do you have any tips or lessons learned dealing with web strategy?