November 5, 2003Leslie Gardner and Joe Chervenak

National Renewable Energy Laboratory

What Makes a Great Web R&D Web Site? Highlights of the www.nrel.gov Redesign

Outline

Where We Started Support – What We Needed/How We Got It Our Redesign Process Putting It All Together Lessons Learned Future Plans The Evolution of www.nrel.gov What Makes a Great R&D Web Site?

Where We Started

Where We Started

nrel.gov Y2K

Start from scratch!

Support – What We Needed

A major redesign would require– More resources– Management buy-in

Support – How We Got It

Applied for funding as an NREL-wide strategic initiative– Initiative benefits all centers, offices, and programs– Management buy-in is a critical success factor– Web site receives more than 130,000 unique

visitors every month (more than physical visitors to the lab)

– Users are getting more sophisticated– Web site redesign is aligned with management

priorities

Our Redesign Process

Analysis Information Architecture Design Implementation Project Timeline

Note: We validated with managers throughout process

Analysis Phase

Process – Analysis

Statistics and Search Logs Focus Groups Site Objectives Audience Formal Benchmarking Study Distilled to Four Big Ideas

Analysis – Statistics & Search Logs

Analyzed Web statistics and search logs to understand users needs

Findings:– Basic information on technologies is very popular– Users search on basic terms such as “solar

energy”– Renewable resource data, online photo library,

and publications are heavily used

Analysis – Focus Groups

Held internal focus groups to hear staff needs Results:

– They want researcher pages– They need help answering inquiries– They navigate the Web primarily by using Google

search– They improved our site objectives– They identified sites for us to benchmark

Analysis – Site Objectives

Advance the Lab’s mission – research and technology development of renewable energy and energy efficiency

Showcase and promote our expertise, capabilities, current research, user facilities, and publications

Share our unique data and software tools Provide nontechnical information for general

audiences Facilitate relationships with our stakeholders Enhance the Lab’s institutional viability and image

Analysis – Primary Audiences

NREL’s primary public Web audiences – Business and industry– R&D and business partners (other labs,

universities or private sector)– Public policy makers

Analysis – Secondary Audiences

NREL’s secondary public Web audiences– Consumers and general public– Educators and students– Media– Scientific and technical communities

Analysis – Tertiary Audiences

NREL’s tertiary public Web audiences– NREL staff– Investors

Analysis – Benchmarking Study

Initial review of over 200 Web sites– R&D organizations/labs– Universities– Think tanks & advocacy groups

Selected 44 sites for thorough study Developed criteria based on site objectives

– Example: How does the Web site showcase research projects, researchers, and accomplishments?

Analysis – Benchmarking Study

Benchmarking study:– Provided an abundant number of ideas– Gave us credibility with both management and

staff

Analysis – Four Big Ideas

1. Emphasize research and researchers Jefferson Lab

2. Focus home page on our R&D areas CREST

3. Include more information to address general inquiries/FAQs NOAA

4. Develop new templates to promote consistency and improve usability Brookhaven, INEEL

Information Architecture Phase

Process – Information Architecture

Pieces and parts

Process – Information Architecture

Information Architecture

Process – Information Architecture

1. Redesign goals based on analysis– Structure information by topics that users

understand– Emphasize research and technology

development– Consolidate all partnering information into one

area

2. User interests and tasks

Process – Information Architecture

3. Detailed content inventory

4. Defined initial bins and labels

Note: Primary navigation and terminology validated and refined throughout the process

Info Architecture – Approach

Info Architecture – Highlights

Clear goals and objectives greatly facilitated architecture process

Solved partnering with NREL by separating partnership information into R&D and applying technologies

IA team consulted on all iterations Recommended consistent navigation and

terminology on subsites

Design Phase

Process – Design

A need for design

Design – New Look and Feel

Corporate image and branding Leveraged knowledge from Energy Efficiency

and Renewable Energy template project

Design – Wireframes

Worked with wireframes to illustrate concepts and get early validation

Managers didn’t understand impact of their decisions until they saw full mockups

Design – Wireframe Example

Wireframes

Design – Wireframe Example

Design – Templates

Template for corporate pages (we own) Template for R&D subsites (others own)

– Developed common architecture based on site objectives

– We piloted one R&D site to begin working out issues

– Required lots of time to collaborate on new template that represents diverse research areas

Design – Templates

Round Two

Design – Templates

Round Three

Design – Templates

A good template model

Design – Templates

Subsites use the template

Implementation Phase

Process – Implementation

Content Coding Worked with individual centers, offices and

programs to redesign their sites into new template

Project Timeline

Putting It All Together

www.nrel.gov

Lessons Learned

Plan for the unexpected Trying to lump all the ways we want users to

partner and work with the Lab into one category was difficult

Staff is struggling with topic view Hard to keep everybody happy

– “Where’s my stuff?”

Lessons Learned

Where’s my stuff?

Lessons Learned

Management values benchmarking data from other credible organizations

Associate Director buy-in was critical Validation is tedious and costly, but buy-in is

priceless Hit ‘em high, hit ‘em low, and hit ‘em in the

middle Individual criticisms and input must be heard,

but decisions must be made from Lab-wide point of view

Future Phase

Future Plans

We now have a 3-year plan (not 1-year) We want to implement these ideas:

– Develop FAQs – Formulate NREL’s research history– Use more multimedia – Develop comprehensive Information on all user,

test, and analytic facilities– Expand technology basics information– Conduct usability testing

The Evolution of nrel.gov

Our New Site

nrel.gov 2003

Our New Site

www.nrel.gov

What Makes a Great R&D Web Site

No definitive formula yet, but all Web best practices apply to R&D sites

“Great” depends on the degree of how the site aligns with management and user needs

Formal benchmarking study is a good way to get ideas and identify current best practices for R&D Web information

Because we’re InterLab, how can we collectively use the Web to support R&D in our organizations?