Women's Health In The North

The situation

Women’s Health In the North (WHIN) recongnised that their website was no longer doing the organisation justice. The original goal of the website was to inform and educate visitors while attracting new members. Unfortunately it was doing neither and needed some serious TLC.

The existing website had become dated, was not very intuitive and difficult for WHIN staff to update. The website had been developed piecemeal and a number of sections were either out of date or not accessible. The membership message was not strong and the content needed to be reviewed and rewritten to work effectively for the web.

The solution

In conjunction with Hootville Communications, the first step in the process was to plan out exactly what was needed to get the website back on the right track, informing visitors and attracting and retaining new members.

Here are a few of the features KSO IT Consulting included to help WHIN reach their website goals:

• One of the key of goals was to simplify the member registration and management process. Up until this point, the membership process was managed by hand using a desktop database. We introduced Wild Apricot, an online membership management system and included a website form to automate the registration process. Now WHIN uses a single online system to add new members, manage their details and automatically send renewal emails.
• There is nothing like a good email newsletter to get visitors coming back for more. Included in the WHIN website is an eNews subscription form that allows visitors to sign up to and receive email newsletters created using the Vision 6 system.
• WHIN had a number of videos that had to be ordered and delivered via CD. The videos were converted so they could be run from the website and now take pride of place on the front page.
• Using Google My Maps we created a membership map of WHIN member locations. It’s a great way of visualising the distribution of members and recognising where services are required.
• The existing website host was not up to the task of providing a suitable environment for Joomla! KSO IT Consulting took over the hosting role, efficiently relocating the website.
• KSO IT Consulting trained 3 staff members over 2 x 3 hour face-to-face sessions. Now WHIN has the confidence and skills necessary to maintain their own website.

The result

To date there has been a significant increase in visitor numbers and membership is growing steadily. Together, WHIN, Hootville and KSO IT Consulting were able to reach the goals that were set at the beginning of the project and deliver it right on time; a website that WHIN can be proud of and will grow with them into the future.