Sunday 21 October 2007
Thursday 18 October 2007
How can the ICAS website be improved?
The Internet is essential in today's business world and it is therefore important for any large organisation to have an easy to use and informative website. A company's website may be the first point of contact for any new clients so this website must portray the organisation's image and provide the information looked for by the browser. ICAS (Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland) is one of the world's leading professional body of accountants and its website is a prime example of one that could be redesigned to improve its effectiveness.
When first entering the ICAS homepage the first you get impression is an overload of information. This information is all relevant but as there is so much of it browsers may find it hard to locate the information that is relevant to them. Navigating the site is not straight forward as the twelve links on the left hand side open up with more various subsections when clicked on. This again makes life difficult for the browser when trying to find a particular article. A way of solving this problem would be to split the website up for different users such as members, students etc. This would allow the various groups to go straight to their area of interest. When a visitor clicks on their group the website can then be tailored towards the browsers needs allowing ICAS to communicate more effectively. A great example of this is on the homepage of ACCA before you fully enter the site you are required to pick what group you are form which enables you the get the information you seek quicker. The usability of a website is the most important feature, therefore by splitting the website up and helping the browsers navigate the ICAS website would be greatly improved.
Another problem I noticed right away was that the ICAS website seemed to run very slow compared to other sites. This was highlighted even more so when trying to perform a search on the site, just a basic search took over thirty seconds. This situation should definitely be investigated to find out the underlying problem of this slow connection speed. Perhaps ICAS host network is not up to running such a busy and complicated website. It could even be a by-product of the extensive information shown on the pages. The slow speed is a poor representation of the organisation and may result in browsers leaving the website before they have found out what they are looking for.
The addition of a blog service would improve the communication between browsers and ICAS. Having a blog would mean visitors would be able to make comments on new articles which would give ICAS feedback to the relevance of their posts. The blog could also be used by browsers who are having trouble with the site as the blog could be used as a direct means of communication to ICAS representatives. ICAS trainees or students could use the blog as somewhere to go for help and exchange ideas as information could be shared.
In conclusion the ICAS website could be improved by first increasing the running time of the website. Then the usability should be looked at as the website holds a large amount of relevant information but it can prove hard to locate specific articles. Therefore making the site easier to navigate would help in this area. Finally the addition of a blog as a form of online communication would improve the ICAS website.
References:
http://www.icas.org.uk/
http://www.axxiem.com/effective-website.php
http://www.acca.co.uk/
http://www.hypercyde.com/effective-website.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format)
http://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/feed101
When first entering the ICAS homepage the first you get impression is an overload of information. This information is all relevant but as there is so much of it browsers may find it hard to locate the information that is relevant to them. Navigating the site is not straight forward as the twelve links on the left hand side open up with more various subsections when clicked on. This again makes life difficult for the browser when trying to find a particular article. A way of solving this problem would be to split the website up for different users such as members, students etc. This would allow the various groups to go straight to their area of interest. When a visitor clicks on their group the website can then be tailored towards the browsers needs allowing ICAS to communicate more effectively. A great example of this is on the homepage of ACCA before you fully enter the site you are required to pick what group you are form which enables you the get the information you seek quicker. The usability of a website is the most important feature, therefore by splitting the website up and helping the browsers navigate the ICAS website would be greatly improved.
Another problem I noticed right away was that the ICAS website seemed to run very slow compared to other sites. This was highlighted even more so when trying to perform a search on the site, just a basic search took over thirty seconds. This situation should definitely be investigated to find out the underlying problem of this slow connection speed. Perhaps ICAS host network is not up to running such a busy and complicated website. It could even be a by-product of the extensive information shown on the pages. The slow speed is a poor representation of the organisation and may result in browsers leaving the website before they have found out what they are looking for.
The addition of a blog service would improve the communication between browsers and ICAS. Having a blog would mean visitors would be able to make comments on new articles which would give ICAS feedback to the relevance of their posts. The blog could also be used by browsers who are having trouble with the site as the blog could be used as a direct means of communication to ICAS representatives. ICAS trainees or students could use the blog as somewhere to go for help and exchange ideas as information could be shared.
In conclusion the ICAS website could be improved by first increasing the running time of the website. Then the usability should be looked at as the website holds a large amount of relevant information but it can prove hard to locate specific articles. Therefore making the site easier to navigate would help in this area. Finally the addition of a blog as a form of online communication would improve the ICAS website.
References:
http://www.icas.org.uk/
http://www.axxiem.com/effective-website.php
http://www.acca.co.uk/
http://www.hypercyde.com/effective-website.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format)
http://www.feedburner.com/fb/a/feed101
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