Digital roundup september 2012 - Max Green (HMS)

Digital Roundup LiveSeptember 21, 2012

Max GreenDirector, Interactive Media

Harvard Medical School

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Communications & External Relations

Overview

• HMS mission

• Web strategy

• A few issues we’re dealing with

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Communicating the HMS Mission

• The mission of Harvard Medical School is to create and nurture a diverse community of the best people committed to leadership in alleviating human suffering by disease.

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Aspects of HMS’s mission• World leader in biomedical & scientific research

• Excellence in medical education

• Diverse community & inclusive culture

• Affiliate relationships º 17 hospitals & research institutesº Mass General, the Brigham, BI, Children’s Hospital, etc.

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Harvard Medicine’s “personality”

Harvard Medicine is...

•Game changer

•Innovative

•Epicenter

•Nimble

•About serving patients

Harvard Medicine is not...

•Reactive

•Stodgy

•Insular

•Slow moving

•Just an educational or research institution

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Translating the mission into actionable, communication objectives

• Two ways OCER serves HMS missionº Steward its public discourseº Defining & fostering the school’s identity

• Education vs. biomedical research vs. serviceº Emphasis on biomedical research often a priority, even if not

reflected in Web traffic

• Audienceº Internal vs. externalº Includes researchers, students, prospective students, alumni,

donors & supporters, faculty, staff, news media, clinicians, community members, consumers

º Varies by project

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Web strategy• Build HMS’s reputation via multiple channels

• Establish a unified brand identity

• Develop our Web infrastructure

• Use analytics to optimize content

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Web strategy #1: Define & foster HMS’s reputation via multiple channels

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Phase 1 of Web site redesign launched March 2012

• Home page, "About HMS," News, etc.

• Drupal 6 content management system

• Other features: Events, blog, and people search

• Successful launch

• High-caliber Web site completed "on a shoestring”

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Since then we’ve been developing our Web channels

• Web site 202,535 visits/month

• Mobile visits 11.5% of Web visits

• Facebook 42,643 fans

• Twitter 21,178 followers

• YouTube 4,974 subscribers

• Weekly e-letter 26,424 subscribers

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Web team launched “Paper Chase,” which searches PubMed

A section of the HMS Website that collects publications listed in PubMed for HMS, HSDM, and our sixteen affiliates.

Launch Date:Sep 20

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What can it do?Allows visitors to search by keyword or MeSH topic, a technical category system used by PubMed and many medical journals.

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Specialized FilteringVisitors can use the links in the right sidebar to filter the list of results by the recognized top ten journals and by HMS, HSDM, and sixteen affiliates

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Mid-summer: launched HMN e-newsletter

• Harvard Medicine News was created as the new vision of the HMS print newsletter, Focus.

• A more timely publication. News now delivered weekly, not monthly as before.

• A more digestible design than the Focus eNewsletter and widely viewed vehicle for our social media channels.

• Inaugural IssueJun 25

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(An important tidbit: HMS senior leadership are big on serif fonts!)

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Challenges• Designed and built

in-house

• Need to support all major email clients, browsers on both Mac and PC

• Create a workflow that works for both editorial and interactive teams

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The future• Automatically

generated code

• More control given to editorial team in entering articles for layout

• Flexible template to accommodate extra content (i.e.: a third second-tier article)

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Other Web channels:

From 700 to 30,000 fans!

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We’ve had a few experiences with “stewarding HMS’s public discourse”

• Gabrielle - 14 year old freshman

• On August 30th, "Make a Wish" fulfilled her dream of “attending Harvard Medical School”

• Same day, Bloomberg wrote story about primate center issue

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We are exploring social media monitoring process, based on Air Force assessment tool

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One HMS channel that needs a little attention:

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Web strategy #2: Establish a unified brand identity for HMS

• Redesigned HMS Web site creates unified brand

• However, it only extends to top-level sections of the site – “Education,” “Research,” “News,” etc.

• Research department Web sites have different logo treatments, color palettes, navigation paradigms, etc.

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Phase 2 of Web redesign project to address research dept. sites• Extend current HMS Web site’s look & feel to basic

research department Web sitesº Multi-site Drupal 7 implementation º Custom logo based on HMS branding guidelinesº Main navigation customized to departmentº 3 banner options and 6-8 custom theme variant optionsº Restricted content areas using e-Commons credentialsº Faculty/student list & detail pages with tagging taxonomyº Trumba for external and internal eventsº Accommodation of existing databasesº Google Search Application integration & customizationº Blog landing pagesº Tag cloud

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Web strategy #3: Develop our infrastructure

• Drupal needs upgrade (6->7) to future-proof CMSº Google Search Appliance upgrade needed to improve relevancy of resultsº Enhancements to Drupal CMS' permissions model & content managementº Implement Kaltura for videoº Optimize content delivery for mobile

• Intranet (“e-Commons”) needs significant upgradeº Content not easily searchableº Not easy to communicate events º Piecemeal workarounds are non-scalable & sometimes non-secureº Content to be displayed publically may not always be appropriate º Causing scope increase in Phase 2 Web project, due to need for restricted

content areas

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Infrastructure development: E-newsletter uses Drupal API to pull content from CMS

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Web strategy # 4: Use analytics to optimize content

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A few issues we’re dealing with• Brand fragmentation & decentralization

• Establishing priorities within budget constraints

• Making data driven decisions

• Best practices for stakeholder approval

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#1 Brand fragmentation: Phase 2 to address “letting 1,000 flowers bloom”

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Trying to sensitive research depts. to untapped potential of their Web sites

• HMS brand doesn’t solely refer to visual aspect of website, but rather a user’s total experience

• All components – messaging, navigation menu titles, imagery & visual design – must combine to form a solution that answers users’ needs

• If users don’t feel a site is meeting their needs, they begin to form negative impressions about the site and, potentially, the institution the site represents

• Web sites should reflect HMS’ commitment to excellence

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By and large, Research Directors seem mostly receptive to switching over

• Incentives we’re pointing out º HMS templates with department-specific logo,

main nav & default searchº State-of-the-art CMS allows for easy updating º Advanced functionality for calendaring, faculty &

student listing, content blocks, etc.º Optimized for mobile, multimedia, social media,

searchº OCER to perform the content migration

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#2 Establishing priorities: How do achieve goals, given budget constraints?

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#3 Data-driven decision-making

• Instant results from Web publishing can be a blessing and a curse

• Still, it seems essential to connect to an audienceº Content is expensiveº Always important to show ROI

• In a politicized, decentralized environment, to what extent are you able to effectively use Web analytics to guide decision-making?

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#4 Stakeholder approval: An ongoing challenge for us

• The Project: Develop a video to accompany Dean Flier’s “Welcome to the New Year” email to the community.

• The Proposal: Produce an engaging piece using the “Sideways” editing style.

• The Challenge: We operate in a complex academic environment.

• Reframing the Conversation:

• How can we encourage stakeholders to embrace innovative storytelling?

• What’s the best way to make the case for fewer content points and shorter videos?

• Do you have strategies for managing stakeholder involvement to keep complex projects moving?

Digital roundup september 2012 - Max Green (HMS)

Education

web team

hms redesigned hms web

current hms web sites

web visits facebook

hms seniorleadership

hms printnewsletter

hms channel

biomedical research