orders online. As these facilities are added the web site changes from an isolated system
to one that must be integrated with other technologies such as the customer database,
stock control and sales order processing systems. Given this integration with corporate
IS, the IT department (or the company to which IT has been outsourced) will need to be
involved in the development of the site and its strategy.As well as issues of integrating systems, there are detailed technical issues for which
the technical staff in the company need to be made responsible. These include:
availability and performance of web site server;
checking HTML for validity and correcting broken links;
managing different versions of web pages in the test and live environments and con-
tent management.RESPONSIBILITIES IN WEB SITE MAINTENANCETable 9.5Web site standards
Standard Details Applies to
Site structure Will specify the main areas of the site, for Content developers
example products, customer service, press
releases, how to place content and who is
responsible for each area.
Navigation May specify, for instance, that the main menu Web site designer/webmaster usually
must always be on the left of the screen with achieves these through site templates
nested (sub-) menus at the foot of the screen.
The home button should be accessible from
every screen at the top left corner of the
screen. See Lynch and Horton (1999) for
guidelines on navigation and site design.
Copy style and General guidelines, for example reminding Individual content developers
page structure those writing copy that web copy needs to be
briefer than its paper equivalent. Where detail
is required, perhaps with product
specifications, it should be broken up into
chunks that are digestible on-screen.
Copy and page structure should also be
written for search engine optimisation to
keyphrases (Chapter 8).
Testing standards Check site functions for: Web site designer/webmaster
different browser types and versions
plug-ins
invalid links
speed of download of graphics
spellcheck each page
See text for details.
Corporate branding Specifies the appearance of company logos Web site designer/webmaster
and graphic design and the colours and typefaces used to convey
the brand message.
Process The sequence of events for publishing a new All
web page or updating an existing page. Who
is responsible for reviewing and updating?
Performance Availability and download speed figures. Staff managing the server