March 2007

Member Experiences - Website Building
Don't be left behind because your club or federation does not have a web site!

   Web Site Building Experiences of Stephanie Roesner
   Virginia Federation of Republican Women Webmaster
    www.vfrw.org

Dear Bettye,

I read with great interest your article in the Spring 2006 edition of The Republican Women titled, “Building a Web Site is Essential … and Easy” and I downloaded the complete version from the NFRW website.

In September 2006 I was appointed as the new webmaster for the VFRW (Virginia Federation of Republican Women at www.vfrw.org). Since revamping our state website I have had many questions from our members about creating websites for their clubs. There has been so much interest that I am currently working on a new section for our website to provide information and resources to our members to help them do exactly that for their clubs. I was so impressed with your article that I would like your permission to include the .pdf version of it in this new section as a reference to supplement information I’ll be gathering from numerous other resources and from my own experiences

Below the editor’s note we were encouraged to share our experiences in web site building with you. Here’s mine …

About seven years ago I had the great fortune to be working for a company whose technology support group needed an intranet website created to help provide online information to the customers we supported. Because of my administrative assistant skills I was asked to take on this project –I agreed but told them there was only one problem, I knew a lot about spreadsheet and word processing software, a little about graphics and absolutely nothing about website design. The answer, LOTS of training. I spent six months going to HTML, FrontPage and Dreamweaver software training classes and followed that up with a Content Webmaster Certification course. It was that part of my training that put the icing on the cake and was the most helpful. In that course I learned a lot about web usability, including how to conduct usability testing. More than anything else I learned that you have to remember what the purpose of your website is, who is the audience and how can the information they are looking for be presented quickly and easily. One of the books has been a great reference for me is Don’t Make Me Think by Steve Krug. Mr. Krug also has a website http://www.sensible.com/. Hopefully I have used the training I received well and the VFRW website is a testimony to that. If not, I wish someone would tell me so I could make necessary changes and not embarrass our federation! J (An improvement I’m currently working on is SSL technology for a password protected member’s area. This is new territory for me but if other people can do it, I can learn!)

All of the website’s I have created have been done using FrontPage, and I think state federation websites should be robust, and this is an easy product to learn and use for that purpose.

Help for Small Clubs with limited "geek" resources.

For a small club with limited “geek” resources I recommend using Network Solutions Image Café online product. High speed internet access is a must (or else you’ll pull your hair out waiting for pictures to upload) but this product is affordable, easy to work with and most of all portable. (Currently they’re offering a starter site that includes 5 pages, 2 e-mailboxes and 1 year free domain name registration (http://www.networksolutions.com/create-a-website/index.jsp). I worked for Network Solutions at their headquarters in Herndon, VA for 2.5 years in their customer service division. I recommend their product because during my time there part of what we did was constantly rate our products and services against other big names in the industry like Go Daddy; and I find their product to be one of the easiest to use and their price and service competitive. Online website creation/authoring is a big plus for small clubs. Hard drive failures, sudden illness, a disgruntled member or personality clashes between ingoing and outgoing webmasters are all areas of concern and happen more frequently than we’d like. An online website product can be updated by anyone who has the login ID and password and on any computer that has high speed access to the internet. There can be co-webmasters so that if one person is ill or out of town the other can still keep the website updated and it provides a great opportunity to train other members to be webmasters. As much as I enjoy being the VFRW webmaster there will be a time when someone else will need to do this job and it will be harder to find a replacement because the VFRW website was created using FrontPage and requires more experience and expertise than one created using an online product like Image Café.

I hope that the sharing of my experience has been helpful and that you will allow me to use your article as a resource on the VFRW website.

Kind regards,

Stephanie Roesner
VFRW Webmaster

webmaster@vfrw.org or s_j_roesner@hotmail.com

Website Building Experiences of
Virginia Langen -- Diamondhead, MS

webmaster for www.gc-republican-women.org

Mississippi Gulf Coast Republican Women

RE: Why build web sites for Republican Women federations and clubs

Dear Bettye,

My daughter, Stephanie, forwarded her email to you and your response -- and I would like to get in on the conversation. The following is just my opinion and based on my own experience. I was quite impressed by your article. I will be investigating the sources you gave to see what we can do as our club re-develops. Web pages have become a critical tool for RW's and we all need to get on board with current technology and recognize what it can do for us. Your article is so timely as we go into yet another election cycle.

I live in Hancock County, Mississippi (the Mississippi Gulf Coast). Our county was the hardest hit by Hurricane Katrina (one of the little cities in our county, Waveland, had a population of more than 8,000 -- after Katrina there we only 35 habitable houses left standing). Our web page was critical in staying in touch with members who evacuated far and wide. We went from 63 members down to less than 30 and now are back up to 42. Our members, and other ladies I have talked to, think surviving Katrina might just be easier than developing a web page.

There is a back story to why Stephanie forwarded your communication to me. Through an interesting hap stance I had recommended Stephanie be contacted to give advice regarding the VFRW page. I did not think Stephanie wanted to be a webmaster but knew her experience could be helpful. The way it turned out, the VFRW page was brought down and 80 hours later came up much the way you see it now.

The only reason I became a webmaster is because the organization I was in knew I could get help. I did not want the job -- what I knew of web site development was way too advanced for me. That 5-page site no longer exists. I am the webmaster for www.gc-republican-women.org It costs $70. per year, has no bells and whistles but does have two email boxes. It is ideal for small clubs like ours. There are other web hosts but we use Network Solutions. We don't use any programs such as FrontPage because we want total portability. If something happens to me (like I'm suddenly in a coma in the hospital), the club president, or someone she directs, simply logs on with our username and password from any computer anywhere and does the updates. In the course of time I expect the club will opt to have 5 pages and even become interested in more options. For the time being, though, our needs are being met.

State web pages, such as VFRW, have far different requirements than a small club.

Our page is updated once a month whereas VFRW is updated weekly (and sometimes more often).
We don't need a password secured Members Only pages. Our club is so small we don't have to put names, and other member info on our page, state pages should. Due to the strange things people do, it is unwise to have personal info on a page that anyone or weirdo can access.
It might be nice for a small RW to have forms on the web page as well as members being able to make reservations for events online. It is imperative that a state page have that availability.
RWC presidents should go to the state page weekly. The state page needs to be very current with info the clubs may need or want. Small clubs like ours update less frequently and we still like using the phone to talk to our local members for instant feedback, et.
Bells and whistles as well as special features are imperative for a vibrant state RW. One thing that comes to mind is the feature that allows you to enter your zip code and instantly find clubs within a 50 mile radius. This feature is an absolute must on the NFRW page, very helpful on a state page, and not necessary for a small club.
A vibrant state web page needs to have a webmaster who uses a program such as FrontPage. A small club like ours cannot afford to purchase a program like that for their webmaster and the webmaster may not want or have the resources to purchase a program like that just to do the web page.
State web pages need web masters who are trained or have professional background. Small RW's present an ideal opportunity for on the job training and in time should produce state level webmasters.

As an aside, I know of several states that have what appears to be poor web pages. The truth is even worse. For whatever reason they have no contact with their webmaster and the page can only be accessed from that webmasters computer. There should always be a cross trained web master for a state page.

I think it would be helpful to have a workshop at convention entitled something like, "Web pages for cowards" as well as an advanced workshop that goes beyond the KISS (keep it simple system). This would focus development with hosts such as Network Solutions who offer as little as a single page, have all manner of templates, and is just a select and go process. A high speed connection is quite helpful and the ability to remember to use spell check is important too. Network Solutions does everything else for you except type your copy. Quite truthfully, the hardest thing I had to deal with when using Network Solutions was to decide what to name our page.

I really enjoyed reading the GFRW page. I went to school for several years in Atlanta and my mother lived there for a "zillion" years. It has been my pleasure to know a number of Georgia politicians so reading your page was almost like reading my home page. I do so wish we had a state page that was anything approaching yours.

Thank you -- not just for all your hard work -- but most of all -- THANK YOU for sharing your knowledge and experience.

Sincerely,

Virginia Langen

Diamondhead, MS
ginnylea18@aol.com

Please let us know about your website building experiences.

Page Assembled by Bettye Chambers, NFRW Website Assistance Coordinator bcnole@bellsouth.net.

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