{"id":4488,"date":"2013-07-24T09:11:24","date_gmt":"2013-07-24T13:11:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meetcontent.com\/?p=4488"},"modified":"2017-04-20T00:24:32","modified_gmt":"2017-04-20T04:24:32","slug":"portal-websites-the-great-content-divide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meetcontent.com\/blog\/portal-websites-the-great-content-divide\/","title":{"rendered":"Portal Websites: The Great Content Divide"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Time
Do you know where your portal website will take you?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In the Star Trek universe, a "portal" is a doorway to another dimension, connecting two points in space-time. In higher ed, a portal is just as fantastic \u2014 an internal website intended to better target users, remove content clutter and improve content governance. Voila! Well, maybe.<\/p>\n

Portal websites aim to meet these goals by dividing content directed at external audiences (such as prospective students, parents and media) and internal audiences (such as current students, faculty, and alumni). Unfortunately, portal websites often cause more problems than they solve. <\/p>\n

Portal websites can be effective, but we must tread carefully. <\/p>\n

Without a holistic content plan for how your external public website and internal portal website work together, you’re taking a risk not unlike stepping through a Star Trek portal, blindly hoping you end up where you want to go.<\/p>\n

Why We Love Portal Websites<\/h2>\n

To some, the idea of using a portal to divide your website by audience type may seem unthinkable, while to others, portal websites are synonymous with content management. Indeed, web professionals often use portal websites to tackle their big content problems that have loomed unsolved.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at a few reasons why portal websites are such an attractive content solution. While some of the benefits I discuss below are practical benefits, others are perceived benefits that end up creating a whole new set of problems. (We\u2019ll get to these problems in a little bit.)<\/p>\n

1. We want to clearly target our primary audiences.<\/h3>\n

Often, a big complaint by marketing and admissions folks is that their website contains too much irrelevant content that doesn’t speak to their primary audience: prospective students. If your website is primarily a marketing tool, then including content for internal audiences hinders communication and confuses external audiences. Portal websites help address this problem. <\/p>\n

2. We want to improve web usability and findability. <\/h3>\n

A commmon problem I hear in higher ed is, "Our website has too much content \u2014 people can’t find anything, and everything is out of date." To solve this problem, web professionals aim to reduce the amount of content on their public website, thus improving content usability and findability. (Indeed, I’m a huge fan of cutting content<\/a>.) Portal websites act as a repository for content clutter. Out of sight, out of mind.<\/p>\n

3. We want to reduce the demand on content maintenance. <\/h3>\n

A huge perceived benefit of using a portal website is reducing the demand on content maintenance: Less content means less maintenance. General marketing content is easier to maintain than detailed internal academic content and student services content. (Of course, as we\u2019ll see, using a portal website doesn\u2019t remove content from your website; it just relocates it.) <\/p>\n

4. We want the right people to own the right content.<\/h3>\n

Content is political, we all know. Competing content priorities and messages hinder communication and content quality. A portal website allows marketing and communications professionals to manage the public-facing content and academic and student services professionals to manage the internal content. This division of content can clarify content governance and reduce political turmoil, but that\u2019s not the whole story.<\/p>\n

Why Portal Websites Fail<\/h2>\n

Those are some good reasons to love portal websites. So, what’s the problem? Well, while a portal website may address these content problems, it doesn’t actually solve<\/em> them. In fact, it causes more and different content problems. <\/p>\n

Let’s flip the page and look at some of the ways portal websites fail.<\/p>\n

1. There is a fine line between internal and external content.<\/h3>\n

Conceptually, dividing content between prospective students and current students (or other external and internal audiences) seems like a clear task. It’s just a matter of separating marketing and admissions content from academic and student services content, right? <\/p>\n

The reality is that the lines are not clearly drawn. Admissions content can’t stand alone \u2014 it relies on academic content to describe programs and degrees, on student life content to help tell your institution’s story and on student services content to help describe resources and advising options. The reality is that no content stands alone \u2014 your website is indeed a web of information, relating relevant information to help audiences find, discover and use valuable content. <\/p>\n

By creating an artificial divide, you hinder your audience’s ability to learn and discover your institution. Segmenting content for external audiences may improve usability and simplify communication, but it also hinders findability and limits content value.<\/p>\n

2. Segmenting content fosters redundancy and hinders findability.<\/h3>\n

When you segment content without providing easy access to related content, you force the creation of duplicate content to fill information gaps. For example, essential internal content like academic program descriptions and career services information is needed to support admissions content and must be re-created on the public website. <\/p>\n

This causes several findability and maintenance problems:<\/p>\n