Three Website Goals
a. I would like for my website to provide information about outdoor recreation available in Indiana. These activities would include camping, swimming, hiking, State Parks, State Reservoirs, and possibly theme parks.
b. I would want my website to be easy to navigate, with navigation links that describe exactly where the link will take the visitor.
c. I would want my website to closely represent what visitors can expect when visiting the facilities I feature on my website. To represent the facilities I will feature on my site I would want to include photos of the facilities. When I am featuring a State Park I could also include links so visitors can view the park maps and campground maps, and also the DNR central reservation system so visitors could link from my site to this site and make their reservations.
Identify the website target audience
a. My target audience will be people who are looking for alternative vacations that are closer to home instead of taking longer vacations. People who normally travel to destinations such as Yellowstone National Park, the Smokey Mountains, or to Florida to camp and hike, that want to stay closer to home to save the family money.
Collect information on four website competitors. See how they are presenting their product or service. Don’t steal ideas from them, but consider what is effective and ineffective on their site and consider what concept you could improve upon and implement in your own site.
http://gorp.away.com/gorp/location/in/in.htm. I like the information they provide but they also have information about hiking and camping that is not close to home. I want my site to be for people who live in Indiana or close to Indiana that are looking for alternative vacations that are closer to home to save money.
http://www.in.gov/dnr/2514.htm One thing I like about this site I could improve upon and implement in my site would be their navigation menu. Their navigation links have a feature when you click on it that has a secondary menu with items related to the navigation link. I could have something similar except maybe have a drop down list when you roll your mouse over it or click on it with links related to the main link. Such as if I had a link named State Parks I could have a drop down menu that has the different State Parks that are featured in this issue of the magazine, such as McCormicks Creek State Park, Lieber State Recreation Area, or Brown County State Park. This would provide the visitor with easy access to the information they are looking for.
http://www.in.gov/dnr/parklake/6707.htm This site is similar to the site above except it has information about one specific State Park, (McCormicks Creek State Park), this site mentions that this was Indiana’s first state park it mentions what services and facilities are offered at this state park but it does not provide the visitor with any pictures of the park. On my site I want to provide pictures of the most popular places in each State Park that I feature. I would want to have a page dedicated for each State Park, Campground, or Reservoir I feature in my magazine. http://campindiana.com/ This site has navigation links on the left side of the page that lets the visitor search for a campground by Name, City, or by Amenity. It would be good if I could offer some way of searching for the type of facility that the visitor is interested in. They could search for facilities by region, or by city. I would want it to be easy for my visitors to find the information they are looking for so they do not leave and go elsewhere for the information they are looking for.
I would also want to have a link so the visitor can contact me. They could ask questions about the facilities they are thinking about visiting, or directions to the park they want to visit.
Site Map View a Site MapMicrosoft word version of our Site Map document.