Our Work - Website Consulting - Washington University in St. Louis

Internet Consulting

Washington University in St. Louis (WUSTL) is a university counted among the world's leaders in teaching and research, and draws students and faculty to St. Louis from all 50 states and more than 90 other nations. Bon Appétit, a private corporation, provides dining services for Washington University in St. Louis. WUSTL contracted WebConnection to redesign the dining services portion of the University's web site which would, in part, highlight the individual dining facilities located throughout the campus.

The previous WUSTL dining services web site was designed and built internally by faculty and students. As a result, it did not have the functionality or the design that most of the visitors to this site were expecting. WUSTL wanted the dining services web site to be a resource for students, faculty and staff; a place where they would return on a daily basis to learn what the individual facilities had to offer. WebConnection first provided Internet Consulting to key WUSTL personnel and identified the weaknesses in their original web site. The most obvious weakness was in the aesthetics. They had a brand bible that dictated the design of all printed materials but the internally designed site did not follow these rules. We created a Web Interface Design that followed the branding guidelines and strengthened the relationship of printed materials to the online destination.

The other aspect that needed improvement was the architecture and functionality of the website. In order to become a resource for the web visitors, we needed to empower the web site administrator with tools that would allow them to update content regularly. We added functionality such as news, events, dining facility menus and other destination areas that would entice a student, faculty or staff member to return on a regular basis. We designed a clear navigation system that improved and simplified the accessing of important information. Finally we integrated all of these content rich areas with back end Database Integration tools that allowed WUSTL to author this content whenever they needed to.

The final web site became a valuable tool, creating a destination that provided updated content in a clear and aesthetically pleasing manner. As a result their target audience began to visit the site more often and gain additional information into what the school's dining facilities had to offer.

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