EB202 – Assessment 2

University of Gloucestershire Business School Alumni:

Developing and designing a website

and supporting e-marketing techniques

Assessment Task 2:

Group assignment – consisting of two parts

• Formal presentation                     (40% of total module grade)

• Report and portfolio submission    (40% of total module grade)
   

(See pages 4-10 of your module guide for further details on the requirements and instructions for managing this aspect of your assessment.)

Context:

Your task is to design and develop a ‘mock-up’ of the website for The Gloucestershire County Association for the Blind (current site http://www.glos-blind.co.uk) and provide suggestions for supporting e-marketing tools that could be used to support the website. 

Marcus Green (Director of the charity) and the implementation and design manager for the website (David Bennoson, charity Secretary) are the project clients. Your group’s role is to act as an e-marketing design and development consultancy. In essence, your group will be creating a ‘pitch’ and will be competing with the other consultancy groups to ensure that the clients select your ideas. Just as in real life, the clients have the final say in which group’s design will be selected and indeed if they will use any design.

In developing your ideas you will need to consider options, make choices and apply good e-marketing practice. To make such decisions you must have a good knowledge of e-marketing and the relevant issues related to website design and development. You must also understand these issues on both a theoretical and practical level. This means understanding the literature, your clients’ needs and their objectives and also developing an appreciation of the needs of the ‘consumers’ of your product – the visual impaired people (VIPs) of Gloucestershire, those wishing to volunteer or make a donation and also those interacting with VIPs. It also means being able to apply knowledge and understanding, analyze competing ideas and develop an argument to support your choices. It is these elements that will, in large part, be assessed by the module team in your presentation and particularly in your report. In fact, the elements that are being assessed form the basis of the GBS UMS Grade descriptors for Levels II and III.

Your website and evaluation of your design and development ideas will be viewed through three mechanisms –the presentation, the accompanying report and the supporting portfolio. (Specific instructions follow, but to help you make sense of the task, additional briefing information is outlined below. 

Who are The Gloucestershire County Association for the Blind?

The submission of your first assignment should have enabled you to consider the nature of a charity working with the visual impaired. The Gloucestershire County Association for the Blind is an independent charity providing services for visually impaired people in Gloucestershire. It offers practical assistance and information to help people to cope with their sight problem on a daily basis. The charity has a large number of items of equipment designed especially to help the visual impaired.

What is the purpose of the GCAB website?

The website is the main source of information on a wide range of issues that can be related to both the visual impaired. It also provides information for those wishing to support the charity, either through donations or by volunteering.  It is also one of the key mechanisms through which interaction with the charity can be encouraged. The website also serves as a conduit through which communication issues are managed.

This means that the GCAB website has a number of objectives:

•   Disseminate information to key target groups

•   To stimulate interest

•   Raise the profile of the charity

•   To foster a long-term relationship with the charity

These objectives also relate to some of the broader objectives that the charity holds

Key target audiences

•   VIPs

•   Friends and Family

•   Potential Donors

•   Potential Volunteers

What your group needs to address…

•      Develop a home page for GCAB

•      Develop a structure for the site (provide example pages from your structure)

•      Create a navigation structure for the site

•      Create a design for the site to that you feel would help meet the objectives

•      Propose appropriate e-marketing techniques that can be used to GCAB’s website

You must address these issues in your presentation and report. Think about the choices that you make and consider how academic and industry information support or shape your thinking – you can indicate through the portfolio sources of inspiration, design issues considered and the e-marketing techniques that you have thought about.

Remember:

•   Nothing too ‘flash’

•   Consider connectivity, communication, content and community

•   Parts of the site could at different targets, but not all the targets will have the same needs and requirements – this presents a number of marketing and design challenges

•   Easy access to key information is vital

•   This site says something about the charity and its goals and mission

•   This is a live project

•   Treat it as a ‘client pitch’ to sell your ideas.

This task presents a real opportunity to develop something for your CVs.

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