The Vendor is required to provide to design, develop, and implement a comprehensive website rebuild for the university.
- The new website must reflect the university's brand identity, highlight its academic programs, showcase student success stories, and efficiently guide visitors to relevant information.
- One (1) company to completely evaluate, redesign, and rebuild its website in an open-source CMS to create a modern, accessible, user-friendly digital experience that effectively communicates the university's value proposition and drives recruitment of prospective students; while serving the needs of current students, faculty, staff, alumni, donors, and community members.
- The project includes:
• Information architecture development and content strategy
• Visual design aligned with university brand guidelines and location in the county
• Responsive web development for all devices
• Content management system (CMS) implementation
• Migration of existing content and resources
• System integrations with university platforms
• Training and documentation
• Post-launch support and maintenance.
- Discovery and planning phase
• Conduct comprehensive interest-holder engagement sessions with:
1. Prospective students and parents/guardians
2. Current students (undergraduate and graduate; in-person and online)
3. University employee representation
4. Alumni and donor representatives
5. Community members and partners
• Develop user personas and journey maps
• Create information architecture and site map
• Establish project timeline with clear milestones
- Design phase
• Develop wireframes and prototypes
• Create responsive visual designs aligned with state’s brand identity
• Implement user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) best practices
• Design navigation structure optimized for key target audiences
- Development phase
• Implement content management system (CMS) with customized templates
• Develop responsive front-end code (html, css, JavaScript)
• Create custom functionality as needed
• Implement required integrations with university systems
- Content migration and creation
• Assist with migration of existing content
• Develop templates for new content creation
• Optimize content for search engines and accessibility (WCAG 2.2 or later)
- Testing and launch
• Conduct comprehensive testing across a wide range of devices and browsers
• Perform accessibility testing and remediation
• Execute performance optimization
• Implement security testing and vulnerability assessments
• Develop launch plan and execute website deployment
- Training and support
• Provide comprehensive CMS (the university currently uses WordPress) training for content administrators and university staff
• Create documentation for users and administrators for ongoing maintenance
• Deliver technical documentation for it staff
• Provide post-launch support and maintenance (integrations, technical strategy, CMS updates, security patches)
• Performance monitoring (ex. alleviating slow load times)
• Analytics tracking to make data-driven decisions about future website changes/developments
• 24/7 technical support to prevent or minimize technical issues or answer questions from university staff members.
- Content Management System (CMS)
• The website must be built on a modern, secure, and scalable content management system that:
• Provides intuitive content editing capabilities
• Supports granular user permissions
• Allows for distributed content management
• Features workflow approval processes
• Includes version control and content scheduling
• Supports content reuse across the site
• Offers built-in SEO tools
• Provides built-in analytics or easy integration with analytics platforms
• Supports multi-language capabilities (Spanish)
• Content scheduling features
- Design and user experience
• Fully responsive design that performs well on all devices with a mobile-friendly approach
• Adherence to state brand guidelines
• Intuitive navigation with clear pathways for different user types
○ Includes search functionality
• Strategic placement of calls-to-action
• Design elements that highlight the universities unique value propositions and place/location in the county
• Visual storytelling that showcases student success and campus life, including grizzly athletics
• Video integration that plays on demand without sacrificing/impacting SEO/speed requirements
- Functionality requirements
• Advanced search functionality with filtered results
• News/blog section with categorization
• Faculty/staff directory with search and filter options
○ Consider internal versus external directory options with potential for “contact me” form(s).
• Program finder with filtering by degree level, area of study, and delivery method
• Multi-language support capability (English/Spanish)
• Social media integration
• Preferred functionality:
○ “Splash page” capability for emergency notifications
○ Online forms with data collection capabilities
○ Events calendar with filtering options
○ Interactive campus map
○ Virtual tour capability
- System integrations
• The website should, if possible, integrate seamlessly with the following systems:
• Workday (HR, finance, student information system, and touch net)
• University calendaring system (the university currently utilizes live whale)
• Sidearm sports (athletics website platform)
• Blackboard (student learning management system)
• A potential CRM system for enrollment management (the university currently does not utilize a CRM for enrollment management)
• Single sign-on (SSO) authentication
• Social media platforms (ex. embedded feeds)
• Video hosting platforms
• Black baud raiser’s edge (alumni/foundation database)
• Omnilert/e2campus (emergency notification system)
• Virtual campus tour platforms (modern campus)
• Internal ticketing system - it helpdesk/facilities (the university currently utilizes request tracker, school dude, and planning pod)
• AccuLog (academic campus catalog)
• Hometown ticketing (campus ticketing software - theater, music, athletics)
• Mainstay webchat
• Other university software as applicable
- Hosting and security
• Recommendation for secure, reliable hosting solution
• SSL implementation
• Regular security updates and patches
• DDOS protection
• Web application firewall
• Automated backups
• Disaster recovery plan
• Ability to handle high-traffic periods
• Content delivery network (CDN) implementation
• Compliance with state it security policies.
- Contract Period/Term: 3 years
- Questions/Inquires Deadline: May, 19, 2025