Our new website - an update

1 March 2010

Our new website has been live for over three months now, so we thought we’d give you an update on how things are going.

Since launch, we have had some great successes:

• We’ve moved from a site with 250 pages to one that has 3,000+ pages with a refreshed design and structure
• Users now have their own personal dashboard for IOSH information: MyIOSH, and vastly improved online Continuing Professional Development (CPD)
• Our forums have been updated, made accessible to all members, have new features and increased security and accountability for contributors
• All our branches, districts and groups are in one place for the first time
• All our events are searchable and in one place
• 150 branch, district and group committee members will be able to maintain their own pages, without having to be technical web experts

What members thought

Member feedback following launch has been positive too. We had over 1,000 responses to a post-launch survey and over 100 took part in telephone interviews. Over 90% knew the site was going to be relaunched, and nearly three quarters said the site had met or exceeded their expectations. Over 80% agreed that they could now access IOSH services at their convenience. 60% of those that used the site weekly, or less frequently, said they would now visit it and use it more often.

Traffic to our new website

After a peak in the first week, and a slight dip in the first two months, traffic to the site is equal to previous levels, and growing all the time, with January’s figures showing a bumper month (63,000 visitors).

People are spending as much as 30% longer on the site, and viewing 14% more pages within it. Our old site drew most of its traffic to the forums, with 60% of visitors only viewing these pages. Now, 75% of visitors to the new site go to MyIOSH, MyCPD and Branch and Group sites, with 25% of traffic going to the forums. This was one of the key aims of the project - to encourage people to see more of IOSH, and especially, to fully experience the benefits of the branch and group network.

Unfortunately, a project of this size is bound to experience some technical problems.

The most significant technical challenge of the project was to migrate and integrate vast amounts of data. Combining two previous databases, connecting two separate software systems (our Content Management System with our membership database), migrating 36,000 CPD records and nearly half a million forum postings, along with individual access profiles for all members, caused some glitches in the immediate period post launch.

We were prepared for this and set up a web launch team to monitor and handle queries. In the first few weeks, we experienced a large volume of login and registration requests, and by the end of January, we had closed out nearly 3,000 member queries.

Technical bugs have been logged and fixed in order of priority, based on the impact to members. While we’ve been able to resolve about three quarters of the initial bugs, there are still some significant technical issues that remain unresolved.

There are more features that we hoped would be in place for launch, which are still in development. They include:

• a new version of join and renew online
• online event booking 
• the ability for members to update their own details in MyIOSH
• some branch, district and group 'member only' and 'committee only' features.

Working closely with our suppliers, the team at IOSH is doing everything we can to fix technical issues and develop new features. Our web, IT, networks and membership teams are working as hard as they can and have already put in place contingency plans, so that we can continue to look after members who are coming to the end of their CPD cycles, or renewing their membership.

We’re sorry for any trouble you may be experiencing with our site. Please remember that the site itself, and the principle of personalised content for every IOSH member and user, is sound, has been delivered, and is something we’re very proud of. And as we hope you’ll see from the statistics above, users are clearly enjoying using it, in ever-growing numbers.