Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Death and taxes are not the only givens in life: Library website redesigns are just as unavoidable. Instead of focusing on how the front end looks, Degler introduces ways to improve how the back end works. Topics include simplifying design, creating reusable content, improving underlying technology, and evaluating silos. Samuel shares how Waring Historical Library’s four employees, with no formal web design training and varying degrees of experience, created and launched a more user-friendly and responsive site in just over 1 year. Using LibGuides CMS, Omeka, and Google Sheets, as well as heavily engaging their users, the staff designed a site that organizes and showcases the varied resources in the rare books and special collection. They also devised ways to connect more with their users through widgets and blog posts that synchronize with their social media accounts. The success of this project could not have occurred without proper project management, tools such as Google Sheets to organize our workflow, and each team member’s enthusiasm to learn something new. Learn from their experience!