A New Site is Coming – Should I Change My Old Pages?

August 18, 2011

With the new website under construction, what type of energy should you be putting into your existing chapman.edu pages? Should you change your old site?

The short answer is “no…” with a “but.”

NO: We don’t want to re-design sites, change the look or feel of pages, or make other extensive alterations at this point. You can understand with the new site only months away that it makes more sense to hold off on making changes that are not critical. Our limited resources are really focused on bringing that new site to life; if you can postpone changes now, we can direct that energy toward the new web design.

BUT: We do want people to continue to update dates, links, copy, and so on as it is important to our site visitors that they continue to have up-to-date information. We appreciate all the hard work that web authors will be doing in preparation for the new site, and in keeping the current site accurate.

Where is the line drawn?

Here are a few questions that will help you determine if the changes you are considering are ‘critical’ or not:

Can my changes be made within the CMS (Active Campus)?

If yes, this is an indicator that your change is probably fine.
If no, consider if this change is a critical one.

Are my changes related to text?

If your goal is to change dates, deadlines, typo’s, or ‘copy’ then it can be done through the CMS (Active campus) and is a good thing to keep up to date.

Are my changes related to pictures?

If your goal is to change pictures, this can probably be done through the CMS (Active campus) and if so, is fine.
If you can’t change it in the CMS, you may need to ask yourself if the changes can be incorporated into the new site.

Are my changes related to design?

Generally speaking, spending time on design this close to a new site is what we want to avoid. We’d greatly appreciate that this type of energy be would be put towards the new site.

What is “critical?”