{"id":272,"date":"2015-03-24T09:50:04","date_gmt":"2015-03-24T09:50:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/web\/?p=272"},"modified":"2015-11-16T13:28:39","modified_gmt":"2015-11-16T13:28:39","slug":"improving-user-journeys-on-the-postgraduate-website","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ncl.ac.uk\/web\/2015\/03\/24\/improving-user-journeys-on-the-postgraduate-website\/","title":{"rendered":"Improving User Journeys on the Postgraduate Website"},"content":{"rendered":"

The postgraduate (PG) website redevelopment initially began with a focus on improving<\/strong> the content<\/strong> and developing a strategy<\/strong> for content management.\u00a0Mostly, this was to enable a more coherent user journey through the website \u2013 to\u00a0improve the experience<\/b> as a whole and encourage applications.<\/p>\n

A consistent user experience<\/h2>\n

As the project got underway it became more and more obvious from our user research that we really needed the website to be optimised for\u00a0mobile too.<\/p>\n

To create a truly consistent experience<\/strong>, users of the website should be able to get the same experience and information\u00a0no matter what device they use<\/strong> to view the site.
\nWhile we were trying to work out how we were going to do that, there was still some debate in the web development world about if you should or could just offer a separate mobile site.\u00a0Immediately we decided that approach wasn\u2019t helpful at all.<\/p>\n

Project creep<\/h2>\n
\"The<\/a>

The Postgraduate website goes mobile<\/p><\/div>\n

Just imagine a user looking at the PG website on a desktop computer.\u00a0Later they decide to go back and check some information using their phone.<\/p>\n

What would their experience be like if we gave them a separate site? With a different structure and content?\u00a0That really wouldn\u2019t be helpful. Or coherent. Or easy to maintain.<\/p>\n

So the work grew<\/strong> from a massive project of improving all the PG content and creating a PG content strategy, to also incorporating<\/strong> the \u2018small\u2019 technical demand of a mobile responsive website!<\/strong><\/p>\n

In 2010 Ethan Marcotte coined the term responsive design<\/strong> to describe a flexible, grid-based layout for a website that behaves differently depending on the device used to view it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2026 It was a busy year.<\/p>\n

Inspiring results<\/h2>\n

Now we have a really great, mobile responsive website<\/strong> with much improved content<\/strong> that we’re not only proud of, but has inspired the University\u2019s Go Mobile project<\/a>. Just a quick look at how our users are responding already (we launched at the end of October) shows, for mobile users:<\/p>\n