Chicago Wilderness Coalition Public and Extranet Web Sites

Web-based administrative tools provide cost-effective communications management for a nonprofit environmental coalition.

Need/Opportunity

• Provide nonprofit coalition with cost-effective education/communication tools
• Provide public with information about biodiversity and coalition mission and activities
• Provide information and services to coalition member organizations
• Enable coalition staff to use Web-based tools for site administration

The Chicago Wilderness coalition (CW) is an alliance of more than 180 public and private organizations working together to protect, restore, study, and manage natural ecosystems of the Chicago region. Coalition activities include informing and involving the public in the promotion of biodiversity in the Chicago region, as well as providing a range of services to coalition member organizations. Cost-effective management of communications initiatives is critical to a nonprofit organization such as CW. The coalition uses the Internet to provide information and services to the public and its member organizations. Chicago Wilderness chose Argonne National Laboratory's Environmental Science Division (EVS) to redesign and expand its existing public and member Web sites to enhance its online services.

Approach

• Conduct detailed audience and needs analysis
• Restructure navigation, expand content and services
• Develop interactive natural area site locator administered via Web
• Develop Web-based administrative tools for news, events, and e-mail announcements

Working closely with CW staff, EVS conducted a detailed design analysis to examine the needs of the coalition's public audience and member organizations. The existing CW Web site served both the public and member organizations, but was confusing, difficult to navigate, and lacked important content and services. The design analysis showed that development of separate public and member extranet sites would better serve user needs.

The new CW public Web site combines educational material about regional biodiversity with information about the coalition, its activities, opportunities to get involved, and current news and events. Visitors can subscribe to the coalition's e-mail news service or use the database-driven interactive Sitefinder service to locate sites they can visit. CW staff use a secure, Web-based administrative interface to add and edit news items, send e-mail announcements, and manage the Sitefinder service. Visitors can also order or download selected coalition publications online.

The CW members' extranet site provides members with useful information about CW activities and meetings and provides them with access to important CW publications. CW's bimonthly members' newsletter is available online, and members are notified of new issues by e-mail. Members can learn about current CW projects by searching the online projects database.

Results

• 400,000+ visitors
• 2 million+ pages viewed in 1 million+ sessions
• 1750+ subscribers to public e-mail list
• 630+ subscribers to members e-mail list
• 35,000+ documents downloaded

The CW Web sites have had more than 400,000 visitors since launch in February 2002, with more than 2 million pages viewed in approximately 1 million user sessions. Currently, there are approximately 1750 subscribers to the public e-mail list and 630 subscribers to the members e-mail list. In addition more than 35,000 documents have been downloaded from the two sites.

Benefits

• Expanded content and services
• Improved usability
• Reduced communications costs
• Reduced publishing costs
• Reduced Web site maintenance costs

The new CW public and member extranet sites offer expanded content and services while improving site usability. The public and member extranet Web sites have provided CW with a low-cost method for communicating with the public and the coalition's numerous member organizations. The sites provide the public and coalition member organizations access to important educational material and publications, and help raise awareness of the coalition's initiatives and activities. Electronic publishing of the coalition's newsletter and effective use of e-mail communications avoid substantial paper-based publishing and communication costs. The availability of Web-based administrative tools designed for use by non-technical persons puts control of the sites' content in the hands of CW staff while greatly reducing maintenance costs.