Case Study: Opening the DOOR to more donors

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:

DOOR International is a unique ministry doing a needed work among the deaf population around the world. Read on to find out how this small ministry is harnessing the power of the web to build a growing constituent base, and learn the anatomy of their redesign below. It could help you get results too!

Strategy

"Begin with the end in mind." This is one of Stephen Covey's principles of Highly Effective People. Not only does that apply to people, but also to building effective websites. The first thing is to work through a fund-raising and overall website strategy for your website. Often we will do an on-site visit to develop a strategy. In DOOR's case, we were able to use questionnaires and phone calls to put together a solid website strategy. The highlights of their strategy were:

Detailed user-involvement paths--what are the paths through the website that we expect the user to take
Detailed list of creative hooks to draw people into DOOR and its mission
Recommendations for building traffic
Recommendations on increasing DOOR's mailing list via the website
Recommendations on the overall e-mail list strategy
Detailed list of recommended donation development via the website
Numerous misc recommendations

Site Map and Wireframes

Once we had the strategy in place, the next phase was to create a comprehensive Site Map and Wireframe document. Think of your sitemap as your "blueprint" for creating a site. A builder would not consider building a house without a solid set of blueprints. Yet, many in the web design world attempt to build their website without a solid set of blueprints. The goal of the sitemap and wireframe is to remove as many surprises as possible before you begin to build your site.

The sitemap should attempt to include every page on the website.
The sitemap should identify potential usability, design and technical hurdles that will need to be addressed when building the site.
Don't be afraid to spend time hammering out your site map BEFORE you write a single lick of code or do any design work. You will save HOURS of time, frustration and confusion during the implementation process.

Graphic Design

Once the sitemap and wireframe was approved by the client, we were ready for the creation process. We now had a blueprint that our designers could review to help them know what information should be presented, what the outcomes were and the preferences of the client. With this particular design, we went through six variations, a few of which can be seen in the following graphic.

DOOR design versions

The design process can be very challenging. Much information flows back and forth between the client and us. How a site looks, feels, and communicates is vital. But most importantly, the site should be effective with the agreed upon outcomes, regardless of look and feel. Throughout the design process, 5Q strives to keep this in mind and dialogues with the client if suggestions or requirements begin to encroach on effective communications. Some key elements we always keep in mind are:

Usability
Standard practices and layout
Color compatability
Layout and communication
Intended outcomes
Uniqueness of client and site

Implementation

Taking DOOR's photoshop files, we then created XHTML and CSS templates and placed them in our content management system of choice, MODx. MODx gives us the flexibility to write completely compatible HTML and CSS, and gives us the flexibility to add unique things that the client needs--such as audio, video, photo gallery and other nifty features.

The end result was a website that allows the DOOR staff to easily update content and pictures without impacting the overall design templates. DOOR has the option to edit content from the front-end with a more simplistic interface, or use a robust back-end manager that has many more options (below).

Content

The content of the site is another place where the sitemap is invaluable. With the sitemap, the DOOR staff had a very clear picture of every page of the website that needed content. Using that as a baseline, they sent us content for every page of the website. We then added the content with nice styling to the content management system

Training

Once the site was launched, we created some simple training videos to show them how to update various parts of the their website. This gives them the tools to teach as many people as possible how to update different parts of the website.

Summary

While it is too early to tell whether the strategies employed to help grow donations will be effective, DOOR now has a solid website that they can update on their own and use to raise funds or add more features as the need arises.

Case Study: Opening the DOOR to more donors