Services Employed
Needs Analysis for a New Content Management System
Background
Clicks and Links were selected by the Assessment and Qualifications Alliance to undertake a needs analysis for a new content management system.
Brief
The AQA website team required assistance in undertaking an analysis of its CMS needs, as well as making recommendations of the available solutions. This led AQA to issuing a tender for Needs Analysis consultancy services. Clicks and Links responded to this tender and were selected to carry out the consultancy service.
In order to cater fully for AQA, Clicks and Links associate Graham Oakes, an expert in the field, provided along with our Technical Consultant, Olli Aro, a review service. Graham and Olli both have extensive experience in carrying out requirements analysis for clients seeking a new content management system and delivered to the usual Clicks and Links high standards.
Solution
In order to cater for AQA’s requirements, Clicks and Links developed a methodology which involved the following key steps:
- Assessing AQA’s original website and content in order to understand how it was organised;
- Developing usage scenarios for the new site, in order to identify user groups and stakeholders for the site and then mapping out several scenarios covering their usage of the site; Stakeholders included the site’s audience, editorial and content creation staff and site administration staff;
- The scenarios were then fully documented and subsequently mapped to the scenarios used by CMS Watch and other similar analysts;
- Using the analyst research to narrow down the CMS options to a shortlist of 3, as required by AQA;
- Developing a draft report which included recommendations of 3 possible solutions;
- Reviewing this report in consultation with AQA and developing the final report and set of recommendations.
The Result
AQA now have a comprehensive requirements specification, tailored according to their needs, which they use to base their procurement exercise on.
