702 Gazette - From magazine to screen
Gillian came to 45b with a copy of the 702 Gazette magazine and some notes. After some coffee (she declined the biscuits) we'd already come up with a load of great ideas to promote the magazine online, and ultimately, increase the revenue from advertisers. After an hour, the biscuits were gone, and the notepad was covered in scribbles, sketches, notes, and crumbs. That night, with pen and paper, the following plans were drawn up :
The next day, this was uploaded for Gillian to mull over. She liked it. We met again, and fine-tuned the ideas. These were formalised in a "functional specification" document, which basically means that the client knows exactly what they're getting, and we know exactly what we have to build. We'd decided on a bespoke content management system (CMS) which would allow Gillian to control the site from her home PC, and allow her to add articles to the website as they were written; create distinct pages for each advertiser, thus building a unique local business directory; maintain a local classifieds section to further generate local interest, as well as provide an online photo gallery. This should all link into her current card-processing account, in order to take payments online. Oh, and ideally, it would be nice to have it built in time for the magazine's first birthday party, three months down the line. So we set to work on the design. "it has made a difference to the magazine’s revenue as an increasing number of advertisers in the magazine came via the website" The initial design was pretty much spot-on from the start. Gillian suggested a different colour scheme, but the basic layout was all there. We amended the design, and provided a full set of layouts, showing each unique page of the site. Once approved, we could move onto the template build. XHTML & CSS templates were created for all the different page layouts. These were uploaded, so Gillian could see exactly how the site would appear. This also allowed us to test the pages in a variety of browsers: Internet Explorer 6 & 7 on the PC. And Firefox and Safari on the Mac. As well as Opera on the Wii. We even gave it a spin on the Blackberry. Once satisfied that everything worked. It was onto the site build. The programming was done in Microsoft's ASP.NET 2.0 using an MS SQL database. This is by far the most time-consuming, and most boring part of the process, so suffice to say it all worked beautifully. The classifieds section worked a treat, and required minimum maintenance, the online payments all integrated smoothly, and the CMS tied it all together nicely. All that was left to do now was some training. A help document was written up, then over a couple of hours, and more coffee, Gillian was shown how to add features and advertisers pages; control the classifieds section; upload new images to the gallery; add community notices and all the other fancy stuff the CMS allowed her to do. This went well, and we were just in time for the launch party. This took place at Bodacious in Morningside Road, and 45b was in attendance to rig up the laptop to the projector and wow the crowds with the new website. Some excellent food was scoffed. Especially the lasagne. And the salmon. And the strawberries in chocolate.
The website has now been running for a few months, and is growing nicely, as Gillian adds features and advertisers to it on a daily basis. The client's view"When I decided that the next stage for the 702Gazette was to have a website, Craig of 45b came highly recommended.I had only vague ideas of what I wanted and working with Craig was so easy – from the initial concept to completion, he listened, made suggestions (and coffee!) and came up with a final product which not only needed very little "tweaking" but has also made the 702Gazette brand more professional. I’m sure the site is complicated to design but its very easy for me to update (and I know Craig keeps his eye on it as he contacts me to let me know if I make a mistake on it!) and so simple for customers to navigate. Most importantly it has made a difference to the magazine’s revenue as an increasing number of advertisers in the magazine came via the website. I would have no hesitation in recommending Craig and 45b." Visit the site: http://www.702gazette.com/ If you'd like to discuss how 45b could help get your business online, please get in touch for a chat. We'll provide the coffee and biscuits. |
702 Gazette approached 45b to build the online presence for their excellent free magazine, distributed throughout South-West Edinburgh.
