UW websites are undergoing a transition to a new content management system (CMS) to help address common issues that site authors have faced with the current system.
“The University of Wyoming website has operated under the current CMS (Cascade by Hannon Hill) for several years. While this platform originally met the needs of the university, we have been limited by certain functions and development opportunities,” Associate Director of Digital and Content Strategy Mindy Peep said.
A CMS, according to Oracle, helps companies, organizations, and institutions, manage digital content. It acts as a single place to store content and allows those with permissions can create, edit, and publish content.
“As various strategic needs of the university have shifted, as have our needs within a CMS to support UW’s goals and initiatives. As part of a long-term approach to website improvement, this migration was necessary to provide site authors and our CMS administrators with a more user-friendly experience while maintaining the website.”
Modern Campus, a company experienced in not only web management but also higher education, will replace the current CMS.
Modern Campus utilizes Omni CMS, a system that caters to higher education through easy-to-use page editing, extensive reporting, and fail safe tools, according to their website.
“Based on the information we received in the Modern Campus proposal, who is the provider of Omni CMS, we anticipate site authors will have an enhanced experience when it comes to page editing and management,” Peep said.
“For instance, Modern Campus touts Omni’s ability to provide content checks at the time of publishing including robust spellcheck, hyperlink check and even certain accessibility checks. While accurate, detail-oriented content is still required from our site authors, these types of tools will aid in the overall accuracy of published website content.”
This transition from UW’s current CMS to Omni CMS will allow UW to maintain the current domain, www.uwyo.edu, and the layout of pages will remain similar. However, creating and editing content will be improved for those responsible for working on UW’s online content.
“One of our primary focuses for web strategy at the university is creating a more cohesive experience for our public-facing audiences,” Peep said. “As a critical student recruiting and retention tool, it is important that our website resonates with UW’s brand identity which has been invested in through significant resources and time.”
“In this sense, our long-term goal is to provide more templates and design elements that are consistent with the university’s visual system that can be tailored to meet the unique content needs of our units.”
The shift in CMS is the first of many changes in improving UW websites.
“The CMS migration is the first of many future website improvements, including incremental and longer-term design enhancements. As it stands today, Cascade CMS has reached its limit for us to have an effective web development strategy so our decision to transition to a new CMS is essentially a catalyst to bring forth those pursuits,” Peep said.
While Institutional Marketing and IT, along with other campus units, have been preparing for the migration, there has not been a set date for the system to go live.
According to Institutional Marketing, due to the size of the migration, the process can take several months for preparation, while the actual transfer of content happens in a short amount of time.
For those currently responsible for UW websites, Institutional Marketing will reach out to site authors with instructions to prepare them for the migration. Such preparations will include training and the removal of extraneous web content.
“We do not have an exact timeframe of training and the length it will take to get site authors up to speed in the new system,” Peep said.
“Our top priority in the training phase of the migration is that site authors feel confident in maintaining their web pages in Omni CMS. On top of Modern Campus’ robust knowledge base for site editors, we are working on tactics and ideas to ensure everyone who will be editing the site in the new CMS is fully trained.”
