I very much so agree with the comic. The majority of students who use the website are searching for something, whether it be class schedules, department questions, faculty phone numbers and emails or calendars just like the comic listed. I feel like most universities gear their websites towards incoming students, so they make the site attractive to promote the school in a specific light. But most students who are attending the school are probably using the website more even though it may not be the completely intended audience.
I compared this comic with the University of Washington website. As sorry as I am to say this, I feel like their website is a lot easier to navigate than WSU's. That is at first glance, their search bar could be worse than ours. For the most part the site follows the comic's descriptions. The homepage has news articles and research developments relating to the school. There is a lot of information, I would agree that it is almost too much to take in without a substantial amount of time to examine the site. I think that the audience is still expected to be future students, however I do think that there are more links that could go to the most popular pages. When rolling over the links on the top of the page, there are many more options to choose from than those on the WSU website. I think these differences do change the target audience in some ways. Since students are the ones who probably use the site the most, it should be geared more towards them. But recruiting future students is also important, since each student is only at the school for a limited amount of time. UW does a good job of finding a balance between appealing to future students and reaching the needs of current students. I many links on the site will make it easier to navigate, instead of spending more time searching for something that may or may not come up on the search bar.
In my blog post, I also said that I agree with the comic. It makes sense that universities design their sites to promote the school to incoming students. I completely agree with that idea. After I read what you wrote about the University of Washington website, I went and looked at the site to see if I agree with you. I think that you are right that the site is in many ways better than the Washington State University website. I agree that the UW site does a more successful job of gearing its website information and layout toward current and future students than WSU does.
ReplyDeleteI went and looked at the UW website and I can see where you're coming from. Just by appearance alone I can tell it's more friendly in terms of the needs of the current students. But I think in terms of the design, it's a little sloppy. The awkward slideshow thing of news articles in the middle is kind of out of place in comparison to the rest of the design. If you were a high school senior looking for a college, solely based on their website, would you pick WSU or UW? Even with my Cougar bias I still think I would pick WSU... I think the website is a whole lot more pleasing to the eye and contains a lot more relevant and interesting information right up front.
ReplyDelete"As sorry as I am to say this, I feel like their website is a lot easier to navigate than WSU's". Ha :) You do a nice job describing how purpose and audience play a role here. Doing a bit more to integrate some of the terms from the reading would've helped, but overall a smart analysis.
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