The information and transactions on our website must be closely controlled to ensure accuracy, relevance, consistency and purpose.

The website manager has ultimate authority over what content is published on the website. Requests from services may be challenged, such as for its relevance to users. The website manager will make their decisions based on user data we gather. For more information, see below:

One person has overall responsibility

We will follow best practice in having one person who is responsible for everything that is published. That person will ensure that the quality of content we publish never falls below our expected standards and has overall authority for what is published on the website (or sub sites).

This responsibility currently rests with the website project manager.

Designated owners

Each content page and transaction will have a designated owner within the council (usually the head of service), having responsibility for ensuring that the information is correct and relevant. It’s important to understand that this type of owner does not have authority for deciding how the information should be displayed online; this rests with the website project manager.

Where content is known to be needed on the website (defined by user need or legal compliance), but there is no owner assigned, then:

• if it’s urgent, the web manager is assigned initially and the council’s web board can decide later who should take ownership of it
• if it’s non-urgent, the gap is raised at the web board first and then an owner is assigned

There is one source of content.

We want to make it easy for customers to access our content in a way that suits them. Duplication causes confusion, potential conflicts of information and expense, so we’ll create content once, published in the most logical place.

Only approved microsites (signed off by the council’s technical design authority) will be allowed and each of these will be designed with our agreed principles.

Content creation

We’ll co-create content with someone representing the user (customer service, BA or UX), someone representing the service area (subject matter expert) and someone authorised to write for the website (content editor). This joined-up approach ensures we’re creating content that our user can read and understand and reflects the reality of the council.

Measurement is constant

We create online services for a reason. Measuring the outcome means we know how successful we have been and if we need to iterate the process to make it more successful.  Analysing website data should be done whilst analysing non-digital data as well, to fully understand user journeys and areas of improvement.