When I went to the Director of Convention Center Marketing (my boss) and the Executive Director of the Boston Convention Marketing Center (my boss’s boss) and pitched them the idea of letting me design and implement the digital media portion of our company, I knew it would be a tough row to hoe. First of all I had to get them (and by “them”, I really meant the Executive Director. Yes, you Milt. My boss and I were already on the same page.) to get behind a complete overhaul and redesign of the website.
Our company website. Was designed. In 2004.
TWO THOUSAND FOUR.
And, other than a few text updates. And the addition of a couple of flash videos. HAS NOT BEEN UPDATED SINCE.
That’s like 4 billion years in Internet world.
Seriously.
Our website may as well be a Geocities page. (No, honestly? A few months ago I found some plugin that “Geocities-ified” your webpage. IT DID NOTHING TO MY COMPANY WEBSITE. THAT’S HOW BAD IT IS.)
It’s impossible to navigate (there are not one but TWO navigation bars …. with flyouts and drop downs and ….. ugh. I’m breaking out in hives just thinking about it.), it’s not built for monitors made in this decade, it is the most uninviting, useless piece of marketing collateral out there.
This isn’t news. To me or my boss. And in the end I got my wish: a total revamp of the website.
I’ve never designed a website for anything bigger than a small business or a personal site. I typically get hired for more a la carte pieces. So taking on the dinosaur that is AdvantageBOSTON.com was not in the cards for me.
(Seriously – click that link. I dare you. But don’t blame me for your inexplicable and sudden onset of vertigo.)
So after an insanely detailed and intricate RFP/review process (I had at least two 1-2 hour meetings with 6 different web marketing firms … over a two week period. In other words, this process TOOK OVER MY LIFE.), we’ve finally settled on a firm. Even though they’ve been notified, the contracts haven’t been officially signed, so I’m reluctant to talk about who they are – YET. I will pimp them out as soon as we sing here, initial there, agree to name my first born after the owner … you know how it goes.
Anyway, I am obviously excited for the site overhaul – but I am MOST excited for building out MY baby: the community section. This will include a number of things – most notably our blog. (YES. I GOT THEM TO AGREE TO A BLOG. This seems like it should be a GIVEN, right? Come to my office for a meeting. You’ll “get it” then.)
Anyway – I’m looking for topics. I know so many of you out there are Social Media nuts (like me) and in the meetings/conventions business (like me) and some of you are even Bostonians (like me).
What kind of questions do you have about meeting planning? Convention attending? Conventions/meetings in Boston? Tradeshows? Exhibits? What’s going on at the Hynes? What’s going on at the BCEC? What’s all this T5 talk?
Please feel free to comment here, email me at work (jfrazier@advantageboston.com), or @/DM us on Twitter. Over the next several months I’ll be working on developing as much useful content as I can. I’m answering your questions and getting some top industry people involved as well, so ask away!
And while you’re at it, get connected with us!
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I know you’ll address this in your re-design, but both the advantage and T5 website say to me: CALL US DONT LOOK HERE FOR INFO. For anyone my age + younger, that = im not even going to use this place for my event (right?).
So that has nothing to do with your questions, but I think you rule. Good luck with your re-design, I know it’ll be phat when you’re done. ;-)
I absolutely agree with you that the site doesn’t do it’s job – but I actually disagree with your ‘call vs info’ take on it. I don’t think the site is saying “Call us”. The calls to action are abysmal. And it’s has TOO MUCH information (that you have to drill way down to even get/find – if you CAN get/find it at all). I think the combo of those things is saying “Ew.” hahahaha.
Oh I meant that the phone number is the biggest, boldest, ONLY thing that stands out on both pages. Who uses the telephone these days? ;-) You is SO RIGHT about there being WAY too much info. “ew” was EXACTLY what I thought.
btw, I love that your blog comments saved my bspears email & wesbsite info. lol ;=)