3 Tips for Keeping Academic Program Webpages Up-to-Date
For those of us who’ve ever managed or been a part of a university website redesign (or refresh), it’s a huge relief when a project of that scale is finished. And while it’s worth celebrating, the truth is that the work of refreshing and maintaining a website is never actually over.
The end is really a starting point since there will always be content that needs to be adjusted, added, or removed. And while this is the case for many areas of your website, it’s especially true for your academic program pages.
Academic content can be far more fluid than one would assume. From updating the course curriculum to keeping the list of faculty current, certain program details can change throughout the semester. And then there are always new alumni stories for programs you want to highlight for prospective students.
While keeping content up-to-date is a challenge across the entire university website, it can be especially challenging when it comes to your program pages, which often need more specialized attention. Unlike certain other areas of your website, these pages are actually some of the most important ones since they draw the attention of prospective students.
The good news is that there are some simple things you can do to keep academic program webpages up-to-date, compelling, and fresh. Whether you’re right off the heels of a website redesign or haven’t done one in years, here are three tips to keep your academic pages current.
Develop a Reminder Process
A reminder process can be something you create in Google Docs, Google Calendar, or some other platform, to set notifications for updating content. You can also share this with other stakeholders on campus, like those responsible for updating certain academic areas.
Here’s an example:
At the end of every academic year, it’s likely that you’ll have some change in faculty. You probably have an area on your program webpages (at the very least your department pages) that features your faculty, including relevant background info.
Use your scheduling system to remind your office to inquire about entering and departing faculty at the end of each semester or year. When prompted, reach out to stakeholders in relevant areas (department chairs, deans, office administrators, etc.) for this updated info. You can follow this same approach with all types of content: course info, student testimonial quotes, alumni spotlights, application due dates, and so on.
This system works even if you have separate content creators on campus responsible for their academic areas. By reminding them to update content with some kind of process, you can keep them on track.
Schedule Regular Meetings with Stakeholders
Another strategy is to schedule regular meetings with stakeholders so you can keep up with changes in their respective academic areas. Remember, you don’t need to meet with stakeholders every time there is a small change that needs to be implemented. That’s what email is for. Still, it’s important to schedule a time, maybe only once or twice a year, to check in and address several things at once.
During these in-person meetings, find out if there is new content or information that they want to share on the website. Here are some examples:
New monthly events for the department
An updated collection of successful alumni stories
Awards or recognitions
An innovative video project
This is all content that, whether they know or it not, would be great to add to your academic program webpages.
Meeting regularly with departments in person also establishes better working relationships with faculty and staff. It pulls them into marketing conversations and helps them realize the importance of their academic program webpages for the success of the university. You can share with them how prospective students are behaving on the website and additional questions students would like to have answered online.
The more stakeholders understand the importance of academic program webpages in student recruitment—and the more they feel included in marketing efforts—the more willing they will be to help keep them up to date.
When it comes time to make a large change, such as a website redesign, having these relationships in place will make it much easier to gather updates and implement changes. This is because you will already have strong working ties with stakeholders and an established bridge of communication and trust.
Share Your Results and Expertise
In group meetings or by email, communicate successes (and shortfalls) with stakeholders from relevant academic program webpages. This is an important part of empowering collaborators and sharing responsibility.
Doing this means being prepared to explain why you are advising certain changes to academic program pages. It also means emphasizing the importance of their role (their willingness to make the changes themselves, provide certain content to your office, etc.). Even if you handle the web updating in one centralized area, you still must rely on stakeholders across campus to provide information.
If you can help contributors understand the “why” behind what you’re asking them to do, the more likely they will be to help. Therefore, it’s important to share certain best-practices, feedback from current prospective students, or even key analytics to highlight why these pages are so important. And why their help is so critical!
For instance, you could share analytics that reveal how prospective students engage more with faculty profiles with personal bios compared to only CVs. This might be more convincing than merely asking them to update their pages. (Remember, anything you ask them to do requires more of their time and effort!)
Beyond regular meetings and email updates, hold a training session once or twice a year. Offer technical assistance for content creators (if applicable), best-practices about communicating to prospective students, and more. Again, by being more communicative and taking time to pull them into the conversation, they’ll likely be more willing to keep these pages up to date.
With these basic steps, keeping a current website may be easier than you think.
Is it time for an audit of your academic program pages?
The team at 5° Branding can review your current site and explore new possibilities for making your website shine for prospective students.
