This week, the Foundation Center’s column, The Sustainable Nonprofit featured this targeted article on Spending Your Web Site Dollars Wisely.  Major points:

• Delegating responsibility to the lowest level staff member or volunteer is foolhardy.  In a world where many will visit your web site as the first step in learning more about your organization, the web site must be professional and kept current.  It should not be primarily maintained by Information Technology, except for the back end responsibility of keeping it online
• When to use a content management system (CMS) – “the more content you have and the more you plan to change or update it, the more you’ll need (and want) such a system”
• Use professionals to create copy and images.  Hire a professional designer (if you don’t already have one on staff) so that your site is more about marketing than about information technology
• Design your site for the visitors’ perspective, not your organization’s
• Take the time to examine other web sites and to create a site map.  Think about what your constituents are most likely to look for and how can find it easily.

At my current organization, I’ve recently been instructed to review all of our web sites, and fix what’s wrong and make sure the information is correct.  Yes of course, but this should be the responsibility of everyone, not any one individual or department. (sigh!)

Wishing everyone a healthy and peaceful holiday season.