Home page designs posted
The committee and working subcommittees have met at least once a month since beginning the project in April. In addition, the committee has had meetings with many campus constituents (some multiple times) as well as focus groups with each of the target audiences, including current students, faculty and staff, prospective students and alumni. A survey of nearly 1,800 users was also conducted early in the process as well.
As a reminder, this project entails the re-design of the www.ncsu.edu homepage as well as the creation of ~ 100 top-level "core" pages. It does not include the re-design of college, unit or department sites though some guidelines and templates will be created and shared.
Primary goals for the re-designed homepage:
- Embody the NC State brand and convey critical marketing messages
- Create a simplified structure and improved user-centric navigation to improve usability
- Enhance the visual design
- Focus on prospective students
- Create a sense of community and collaboration
To make yourself familiar with the page elements review this earlier post. Please note, these are just flat images and not programmed HTML pages at this point. All designs will be reviewed for compliance with regulatory requirements under ADA and section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act.
We encourage you to provide feedback on the visual design, sharing your thoughts and input on your favorites, things you like, dislike, or would like to see included (or omitted) as well as any other thoughts you may have. As mentioned above, the content on these concepts is not final yet. Please use the comments field at the bottom of this post.
Click on each thumbnail image to see a larger version of the design concepts.
Concept 1 - Action:
This design features a large, dynamic image in the main promotional area. The image and related story/content are intended to show the kind of action and activity that happen every day on NC State's campus.
The large image would load randomly (i.e., on one visit you may get a research-related image while the next time you may get a campus life image) but you can also select your interest area by scrolling through the tabs and arrows below. If you selected one of the other areas the whole top area would change to that featured image/headline. For example, you can see that the research "tab" has been selected in this version. It is envisioned that the image/story for each of the categories (academics, research, outreach, campus life, diversity and international) would change every 3-6 weeks.
Other page elements include a news/events area (you can tab between the two) as well as a secondary story, quick facts and campus slide show.
This design features a large, dynamic image in the main promotional area. The image and related story/content are intended to show the kind of action and activity that happen every day on NC State's campus.
The large image would load randomly (i.e., on one visit you may get a research-related image while the next time you may get a campus life image) but you can also select your interest area by scrolling through the tabs and arrows below. If you selected one of the other areas the whole top area would change to that featured image/headline. For example, you can see that the research "tab" has been selected in this version. It is envisioned that the image/story for each of the categories (academics, research, outreach, campus life, diversity and international) would change every 3-6 weeks.
Other page elements include a news/events area (you can tab between the two) as well as a secondary story, quick facts and campus slide show.
Concept 2 - Utility
This design has the same page elements as the "action" concept but is much more utilitarian and content-heavy. Similar to many of the news and information sites visited regularly on the Web (CNN, MSNBC, etc.), this design has a main story/image and related content and links (in the gray box). You may notice that we are showing that the main area could be video in addition to being a static image. The same is true for concept 1. Don't worry, we've heard that if we use video it should not auto-play on page load.
The colored text tabs at the top (by the "Get Involved") would function similar to the tabs in the first design and change the main feature area to related content. Different from the other concepts, the search and quicklinks fields are in the left column with the other navigation in this design.
Concept 3 - Your Story. Your NC State.
Though it looks different from the two previous designs, the elements of this concept are the same as the other two designs. All navigation is the same and the same content is featured (except for the campus slideshow).
The big difference here is in the obvious treatment of the main feature area. Rather than focusing on one primary story and cycling through other themes, here those stories are featured through individual stories and profiles from throughout campus. This could be a feature on a student's unique experience (perhaps a community service effort), faculty research or an accomplished alum among countless others. We are envisioning new stories and content being added regularly and this is indicated through some of the images that have the "new" tag. Similarly, older stories are faded back.
As you'll see in the second of the two jpgs, as you roll over the different images you'll see what the content is related to (research, outreach, campus life, etc.) and you can click on each image to get the full story. That content could be a video (as is shown here) or another page with image/story, link to another site or some form of other media.
We have also built in a method for site visitors to share their own stories and viewpoint (see "Share Your Story"). This idea needs to be further defined but think of a mechanism for users to add to the homepage content or share stories that may be of interest to others.
Other page elements (news/events, secondary story, quick facts) are on the second half of the page.
Please share your thoughts and feedback in the comments area.
