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10 questions to ask about your website

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Top takeaway

Your website is a window onto your school, setting or trust. It needs to do a lot of work! Can parents easily find term dates? What impression does it give a job candidate? Will an Ofsted inspector find what they need? Does it convey your mission to stakeholders?

Use these 10 questions to consider your website from different points of view: strategy, ease of use, compliance and accessibility.

Changes don’t have to involve costly redesign. Simply ensuring that content is clear, easy to find and up-to-date will take you a long way.

10 questions

Who uses your website? What are they looking for? Think about your typical users (e.g. pupils, staff, parents, Ofsted inspectors, potential recruits) and what they want to know or see when they visit your website. Do you have data on what people are searching for? Use this to prioritise your key content.
What will I learn about your school, trust or setting from the homepage? What’s the main message users will come away with?
Is your website easy to navigate? How many items do you have in your main menu? Aim for no more than 6–8 items in your top-level menu. Make sure one of them is contact details!
Do you look at your website on different devices? How does it appear on a smartphone as opposed to a desktop, for example? When creating different types of content, test how it appears on a variety of devices.
Does your website meet the DfE requirements for what should be published online? See the guidance for maintained schools and for academies. For trusts, check references to websites within the academy trust handbook.
If an Ofsted inspector was reviewing your website, would they easily be able to locate safeguarding information? An outline of the curriculum? Would your ethos, values and aims come across clearly?
Are policies up to date? Do they contain current contact information? Is it the latest version of the policy? Are they clear and easy to understand?
If you’ve got a News or Blog section, is it up to date? A ‘News’ section which was last updated six months ago isn’t going to give a great impression. If you’ve got social media accounts linked, are they being updated regularly?
Do you have a website review schedule? What do you do with old pages? Do you archive, unpublish or delete content which is out-of-date? Try to update existing pages rather than adding new ones.
Have you reviewed your website from an accessibility point of view? For example, do images have alt text – alternative text for screen readers? Do videos have transcripts available? Are links logically labelled (and no ‘click here’!)? Do you check the visibility of colour contrasts? Is most content on page – and therefore searchable – or hidden in downloads?

10-questions-to-ask-about-your-website.pdf

Website audit

Want a fresh pair of eyes on your website?

Our three-part website audit includes:

Review of content, structure and messaging
Report and recommendations
Follow up meeting.

Get in touch for details and pricing.

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