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Content Analysis

Content of the current site is analyzed by combining results from other analysis methods. Results from scenario paths, competitor evaluation and the content audit are synthesized to help determine what content will be included in the redesign.

OVERALL
This document outlines the rationale for the information architecture changes we propose. The most important issues that motivate the changes are:

  • The current ATI site does not indicate association with the University of Texas. We decided to further indicate the affiliation with UT through incorporation of UT logos below-the-fold on the home page. This brings out the affiliation without distracting the user from ATI.
  • There is no information for investors. Since obtaining financing for companies is one of ATI’s main offerings, the site should have content that would attract investors whose main interest would be in learning about the benefits and risks involved in supporting ATI firms.
  • Grouping the content to logically fit how a user browses on a website rather than reflecting how the content currently exists in paper collateral.These reflections on design changes are based in the synthesis of our client interview, competitive analyses, user testing, and information architecture techniques we have learned.


HOME PAGE
The Home Page currently has too many links that are not logically organized—this causes issues for the user’s decision path on where they would like to explore. The “quick links” are currently off-site links and should be changed so that they open in a separate window. Another issue with the links is redundancy: the "ATI Only" button and "Login For Secure Services" link can be combined into one link and there are two home links on the top navigation bar.

Other issues with the home page are that audience specific information falls "beneath the fold." News and Graduate Company News are currently empty, making the site appear out of date and neglected. In terms of compliance to UT standards, there is no UT Privacy link on the page—which is a requirement of the UT System. Also, Logos and navigation images do not have alt tags. This does comply to the UT Accessibility Standard (which goes into effect January 1, 2003).

ABOUT US
Currently, the top About ATI page features a list of people involved with ATI. Instead, as is more usual in business websites, the top About ATI page should begin with a more detailed description of the organization (i.e., mission and history) rather than serve the (primary) purpose of listing organizational members. On the current site, information about ATI’s mission and history are contained on four different pages (with varying degrees of detail and with some repetition between pages) under the About ATI page. Two of the pages have somewhat cryptic names: “Fact sheet” and “Background.” The mission and history information can and should be consolidated and displayed on a single page to solve these issues.

The “people” information should be moved to a separate page under the main About ATI page. The current page lists ATI staff members at the bottom of the page below long lists of Advisory Board members and Success Committee members. ATI staff should be moved to the top of the people page. In addition, only one staff member has a separate bio and image. For consistency and to lend a human face and credibility to ATI, all ATI staff should have bios and images on the site.

ADMISSIONS/JOBS
Preliminary testing indicated that we needed to keep the jobs page on a top level. Current content of the page includes a link to submit your resume, lists of companies where one may look for a job with links to their main page and their job vacancies page. ATI indicated that they would like more contact with UT, possibly through internships, so we created a separate page for Internships. We also broke Submit Your Resume out on to its own page in order to create more actionable steps for the job seeker to take. We modified headings to be clearer and task oriented.

Current content of the Submit Your Resume page includes a bulleted list of information/directions for someone submitting their resume followed by links that either take you back to the jobs page, or open an email application to submit a resume. Content was re-organized to create a task flow as one moves down the page. Headings were modified to indicate steps to be taken in order to submit a resume. Language was edited to be more concise and task oriented.

COMPANIES
The content of the original Current Companies page is a list of ATI companies organized in alphabetical order. Each company’s name acts as a link to their web page. Each company also has a paragraph description associated with it. Companies are grouped as “Current ATI Companies”, “CEI Companies”, and “Non-profit Companies.”

The redesign maintains a ‘companies’ link on the index page so it will continue to live one level in. However, two new pages will be added: Graduates and Success Stories. These will be linked from the Companies page. The Graduates page was developed after running user scenarios. Success Stories was added after finding these in the competitor evaluations and seeing a possible need for this type of information in the User Scenarios.

The alphabetical listing of companies will be maintained as content with navigational links added in the main body of the page for the company subsets. Links to Graduates and Success Stories will be added to the local navigation.

We decided move the Graduates page under Companies after running user scenarios and conducting preliminary testing. The current content is an alphabetically organized bulleted list of names of ATI graduate companies with links to the companies’ web sites. There is some inconsistency of style within the page. We maintained the alphabetical listing, eliminated the bullets, and implemented a style consistent with the overall site.

CONTACT US
Current content is ATI’s address, a link to a location map, contact phone numbers and a form to be filled out and sent by anyone requesting more information. The design of this page reflects ATI’s request that specific contact persons information is not visible, but rather that online forms be used that are re-directed to the appropriate person internally.

SERVICES
When a user, such as an incubator company, enters the Services section they are confronted by a large and strongly colored graphic showing a flowchart of available services. This graphic suggests to the user that there is a certain order to when they can use the Services, which may not be reflective of the varying company needs. It is suggested that the page be designed so that there is more of a text introduction to the services offered and that the graphic be lowered so that more of it falls beneath the fold so that it is less distracting.

Based on competitor analysis and card sorting, it was found that the name of the “Infrastructure” sub-section was unclear. The term “Facilities” more accurately describes to the user the content on that page. Also, the sub-section called “Know How Network” also suffered similar confusion and should be renamed to a name like “Service Provider Directory” or “Consultant Directory”.

On the “Know How Network” page the first half the body content was devoted to the consultants and the bottom half of the page switched topics to available procurement discounts. This discount information is quite large and should be moved to its own sub-section called “Procurement Discounts” which will make it more accessible. With the actual consultant directory information the page should be designed to make the choices between joining the directory and searching the directory more immediately discernible.

The section called “On Site Organizations” should be removed from the Services since it does not fit into the large graphic on the main Services page and also its content listing of various affiliated organizations are not appropriate in this section.

Overall each of the sections within Services needs a layout that makes it easier for the user to see immediately what information is available due to the fact that most of these pages are long. One way of helping group and make this information easier to understand is to place the headings for the different pieces of content to the side of the text, in this way the user will be able to find what they are looking for at a glance.


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