Cutting edge features makes new College website stand out from the crowd

08/09/2010 14:02:00

A new website created for Hertford Regional College by Sagittarius Marketing has a number of innovative features which have generated an overwhelmingly positive feedback from students and other users.

The college awarded Sagittarius a contract to redevelop its three websites following a competitive tender. The Kent-based digital marketing agency, which already counts a host of colleges and educational providers among its extensive client base, was asked to transform Hertford’s’s online presence as part of a £63m redevelopment programme.

The college has two campuses in Broxbourne and Ware in Hertfordshire and offers top quality training and education with hundreds of full-time and part-time courses for learners and services for businesses.

The agency’s first task was to redevelop the college’s main website (www.hrc.ac.uk). “Not only has it transformed the look and feel of the college’s website but it has made the user journey easier and now allows prospective students to apply online,” said Kate Ailey of Hertford Regional College.

HRC’s Digital Team said: “The site has allowed us to easily manage content and update the site regularly using the CMS, as well as broadcasting e-newsletters to nearly 3,000 people who have signed up since April. Our bounce rate is down and average time on the site is up – overall the website has been a big hit so far with staff and students alike.”

Sagittarius Marketing Chief Executive Officer Paul Stephen said: “The college has very high aspirations for its digital services and is keen to expand its e-marketing activities. The new online course enrolment process has revolutionised the way the college interacts with its students, enabling people to choose and pay for their course online.

“We believe this digital shopping basket approach to course selection is very unusual in the further education sector and meets the client’s ambitions to ensure that its websites are at the cutting edge of innovation,” he added.

“The client recognised that from a technical and design perspective, the sites could reach their target audiences in a more effective way. The college’s brief identified a number of key deliverables, including making the course enquiry and enrolment process much easier for their main target markets of full-time, part-time, degree level students and employers.

“A key factor in winning the contract was our own Content Management System (CMS), which has been developed in-house by Sagittarius and can be integrated with their EBS course database, plus our design concepts and understanding of the educational sector.

“The brief emphasised that the website should incorporate an easy-to-use CMS that provides the ability for numerous users to edit content, based on restrictions allotted to access rights levels, and provides a workflow process for content approval across users. The system allows content to be published in a range of formats, such as video, blog, images etc,” added Paul Stephen.

Sagittarius is now creating two additional websites for the college, a Business Solutions training website targeting employers and the college’s outreach centres site, NextStep. Both are currently a microsite linked to the main Hertford Regional College website.

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Cutting edge features makes new College website stand out from the crowd

08/09/2010 14:02:00

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