The question is how do you edit, rewrite, redesign or even copy 49,000 webpages to our new site? One page at a time. Web Services has started the content phase of the redesign. During this time, we try to rework almost all of our existing web content in three phases.

Content Phases

Phase I (February 1 – May 22) – The Beginning

Top-level pages – We’ve started out by tackling some of the initial pages that will be available straight from the new homepage—routing pages for academics and admissions, a news and events page, spiritual life, about Bethel University, and more. This is high level content that helps visitors get a good first impression of the university as a whole. We’ll also begin working deeper into areas like admissions and academics that are most hit by prospective students.

Phase II (May 22 – August 20) – The Middle

Getting to specifics - After the first phase, we’ll start moving into content that’s more specific to a school, an audience, or office—unique school homepages, undergraduate student life, library, calendar, locations, athletics, and more. At this point in the process we’ll also have a schedule for when we’ll work with specific offices and departments to move their content over into the new design.

Phase III (August 20 – December 31) – More of the Middle

A wave of offices and departments – Phase three will look a lot like phase two, just with different offices, departments, and programs moving into the new site. We’ll be up to our elbows reworking webpages, and at the same time maintaining what’s changed since the fist pages launched. We also anticipate having lots of content work to do as we move through 2011—as we said from the start, “the redesign” is more of a process than a project.

And it’s a big process.

There are lots of messages, audiences, and priorities to juggle. We’ll be completely honest—at times it is daunting.

But we’re excited about what it means for the university and for the thousands of site visitors. We hope you’ll extend grace when there are unknowns or when we pile tasks on your plate. And we hope you’ll share in the excitement as we watch our web presence transform over the next year—buckle up folks, we’re in for a ride.