WWC Website Linking Policy

The links in the drop-down menus that appear in the header of each page are open to discussion but will not be changed or added to lightly. If your page is intended primarily for on-campus use, keep in mind that the college community makes up less than 5% of website usage. Any items intended primarily for consumption by the WWC community should be included on the inside page, which can be easily accessed from both on and off-campus. If your page is for off-campus consumption, please keep the following points in mind:

The more links in those menus, the harder they are to use.
It's not about status.
As few items as possible are chosen from most-accessed pages.
Placing your link on a second-tier page will give you more hits.

The more links in those menus, the harder they are to use. Older versions of the navigation, which sometimes had more than ten items in one menu, made it much more difficult for users to find the information they were looking for. For a prospective student considering more than one school, whether they find what they are looking for quickly may make the difference in their decision. The average website visit lasts less than one minute. When it takes that long just to read over the initial menu options, then there is a usability crisis occurring.

It's not about status. Just because your link does not appear within the header drop-down menus does not mean it is not important! It does not mean that your department or office is not integral to the college! Keep in mind that almost all of the departments and offices on campus are important and integral, and each staff member feels that her or his department is important. You'd be surprised how many people ask for links. We can't link them all. Being forced to prioritize, we have chosen the most objective method available.

As few items as possible are chosen from most-accessed pages. Most of the items there have been included after studying user behavior--these items are the most requested overall. The items that appear there now receive the lion's share of website users' attention. Popular items can receive tens of thousands of visitors per month, whereas many departmental sites receive less than one hundred. Other items, such as ADA Accommodations and Institutional Planning, have to be prominently displayed for legal reasons or to aid our continued accreditation.

Placing your link on a second-tier page will give you more hits. Your link will not become more popular linked from the drop-down menus. Once users have used the primary drop-down navigation to find the "neighborhood" of pages that they want to view, they tend to ignore the drop-downs. Users spend more time exploring these second-tier "neighborhoods" via the green "Explore" boxes that appear on those pages. By placing your link within its appropriate neighborhood, and by helping users find that neighborhood quickly and efficiently, it will receive more traffic. There is also a site map and powerful Google-powered site search to help users find what they are looking for if it is more obscure.

Explore

Web Applications

Reference

Former Crews

WWC Website Linking Policy