maltpress

The East of England Development Agency is one of nine regional development agencies set up by the government in 1999 to improve the region’s economic performance.

For three years I was responsible for electronic communications for EEDA, re-launching their website twice (once following a major re-organisation) as well as advising on a wide range of websites including Landmark East, running the gauntlet, and Space for Ideas. I was also responsible for electronic communications strategy, writing for the EEDA site, and writing monthly electronic briefings for partners and regional businesses.

Relaunching EEDA.org.uk

The relaunch of the EEDA site consisted of the following steps:

• Research and planning: approaching the site from both end-user goals and content management and growth. How can visitors find what they need? How can the site grow with the organisation? What is the best content management solution?
• Procurement, hosting and set-up: while the content management system was being procured, design work was carried out by Pixelwork. Copy was written, edited and approved, and the site moved to a new dedicated server.
• Site build: when the content management system - RedDot - was up and running, I built the site from flat HTML pages provided by Pixelwork. Further functionality was added by other agencies and I built these into the system.
• Follow-up: to follow up, staff were trained in the use of RedDot in order to take control of the sections of the site they owned. For example, the HR team add jobs to the site. In addition, the site was launched internally with postcards sent to all staff members highlighting the new features of the site. Feedback was used to further refine the site.

The site has over quarter of a million visitors per year; visitor numbers continue to grow, as do subscribers to EEDA’s electronic bulletins. Awareness of the organisation has never been higher and customer satisfaction surveys reveal stakeholders benefit greatly from the website.