Richard,
It sounds like your managers are confusing design with information
architecture, and you may need to sort out what is most important to them
before proceeding.
We had exactly the same problem here at Cambridge - web team wanted to
address information architecture issues, management wanted a pretty home
page. We tried more than once to get one company to do all. In the end, we
did the information structuring bit in house and farmed the design out to
a company, along with a strict tech and content brief.
I think trying to sell information architecture for what it is (substance,
not looks) is a really difficult thing. Of course, design is important in
conveying information, but it's not the place to start.
For the record, we tried a contacted a couple of consulting firms about
the architecture side of things, but as we'll never use them, we'll never
know. We have also spoken to a company called Digitext about these kind of
issues - http://www.digitext.co.uk/ so you may want to check them out.
Nicola
Nicola Rogers Tel: 44 (0)1223 766809
WWW Editorial Officer WWW: http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/
University of Cambridge Email: [log in to unmask]
On Wed, 9 Oct 2002, Richard King wrote:
> I've been tasked with finding a firm of consultants who can advise us on
> how we might re-structure our website in order to make it 'easier to find
> things'.
>
> I have been given the name of a few companies, but am a little put-off by
> the fact that their own corporate websites are usually loaded with
> Shockwave Flash and Javascript bells, whistles and gizmos and show little
> sign of being either accessible or easy to navigate! (Even they sometimes
> admit that this is for 'management to management marketing'!)
>
> Am I on a 'fools errand' or is there anyone out there who might be worth
> talking to??
>
> I've already put forward to management some of the sites that I think are
> worth emulating (some of the best UK academic sites) but these are felt to
> look 'boring' or .... insufficiently 'expensive' or... something!
>
> TIA for any suggestions..
>
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