Website Policy

The website is one of the OST’s most important communication and marketing tools. With the ongoing increase in complexity of web communications, we must ensure the ongoing need for policies and workflows to manage web communications effectively and efficiently. This document outlines the strategic priorities, policies, and procedures of ost.edu. If you have questions regarding this document, please contact OST Marketing.

Website Responsibilities

Updating and maintaining the website is of the upmost importance to ensure a smooth operation, user experience, and image of OST. The technical maintenance and upkeep of the of the website falls under the scope of Information Technology (IT) and the content and branding design of the website falls under the scope of the Marketing department.

Web Strategic Priorities

External:

• Support OST’s mission by focusing efforts on the following key areas of the website:

  • Brand awareness and perception

  • School and program information

  • Student enrollment

  • Giving donations

• Expand OST’s reach by creating an on-brand website with consistent design, flexible features, and marketing-driven content to reach prospective students.

• Continuously improve the usability and accessibility of our website by ensuring:

  • User-oriented content that is current

  • Logical content structure

    • In-site structure and navigation

    • Information architecture of content

    • Mobile accessibility

    • 508 compliance for those with disabilities

Internal:

• Reduce website bloat and content redundancy with an improved information architecture, thoughtful navigation, and regular maintenance process.

• Guarantee stability and effectiveness of the website by resolving technology issues and performing regular maintenance.

• Ensure implementations follow web standards, accessibility, and usability best practices.

Strategic Standardization

OST Marketing and Communications in conjunction with IT should approve, create, and develop all official OST websites using the OST brand guide and current design best practices.

Major revisions to the website – including but not limited to site structure, code, design, components, and functionality – require the execution and approval of OST IT.

The strategic priorities of OST, brand integrity, site performance, security, and site-wide code base will be considered before these types of requests can be approved.

If institutes and departments want to create a new landing page, start a blog, add additional pages to an existing website, or request new features that require development work or third-party software, an official request must be submitted to OST Marketing and IT.

External Websites for Official Use

External websites or blogs (sites hosted outside of the ost.edu domain) to be used for official OST business, including those created for marketing campaigns, will not be permitted. Please direct all inquiries to OST Marketing and Communications. The only exception to this is if OST is an official host, sponsor, or partner for an event that needs a landing page for ticketing, information, registration, etc. that is not OST’s ticketing management provider managed by Continuing Education. In this instance OST Marketing and Communications must be aware of the external webpage and understand the full scope to which the OST brand will be integrated.

Third-Party Software Implementation

Third-party extensions expand the capability of the core content management systems (CMS); however, quality of extensions and compatibility with other add-ons to the CMS are not guaranteed. If not well managed, use of third-party extensions can easily lead to problems in reliability, regression errors in updates, managing the differences between sites that do and don’t use them, testing them, and ensuring a consistent and quality experience for users. For these reasons, OST IT must vet and approve all plugins and third-party applications in coordination with Marketing prior to purchases being made by school or departments. OST IT reserves the right to deny requests in order to maintain and protect the technical integrity of the official OST website.

Code Governance

Digital Marketing & Third-Party Advertising

Accumulation of digital marketing vendor tags on web pages can impact site performance in a number of ways, including poor tag design, slow response time associated with the collection servers, tag placement, and the number of tags accumulated on pages.

Requests for third-party code inclusion must be:

• Reviewed by OST IT and Marketing before inclusion.

• Applied in a standardized manner by OST IT staff or approved website developer.

CMS-Incorporated Standards

A great many of the technical issues associated with proper website design is implemented as part of the Content Management System, and thus will be at the discretion of IT. These include:

• Sitemap implementation

• URL structure

• Coding style

• Browser compatibility

• Many code aspects of SEO

• Visual identity and style

• Most aspects of layout format and elements

Requirements

• All official OST websites should use a ost.edu website address.

• All ost.edu websites must use the official header and footer.

• Websites on the ost.edu domain must follow the OST brand guide.

Content Policy

Ost.edu is user-first. It exists to deliver content that users need to complete an action or be informed.

All content requested to be posted on the website is vetted by OST Marketing and requires approval. Any content that promotes, advertises, publicizes, or markets by nature and is directly related, associated, or in conjunction, whether directly, loosely, or implied, to OST whether internally, externally, or by a third party is subject to the Advertising and Promotion policy and may be denied by OST Marketing.

Writing for the Web

Please contact OST Communications for questions on writing for the web.

Prohibited Content Topics

• Advertising non-OST entities, businesses, organizations or products.

• Content that implies institutional endorsement of entities, businesses, organizations, products, projects or services.

• Content that is inconsistent with OST’s mission.

• Links to pages that are inconsistent with the OST’s mission.

• Any content the violates or exists in opposition with OST’s Advertising and Promotion policy

Multimedia Policies

mages Due to copyright laws, images on ost.edu must be original content or considered public domain (free from copyright). Publishing an image that you do not own could result in legal action.

All images must be professional and reflect OST’s standards and legacy. Ensure images are reflective of an institution of higher education.

Include alt tags (for accessibility and search engine optimization). An alt tag is text associated with an image. It is not seen by the user, but is readable by search engines.

Directory Photos

The directory includes official headshots of OST faculty and staff. It is important that all images in the directory are recent (preferably within the past five years), high resolution and maintain a consistent look. Headshots can be scheduled via by contacting OST Marketing.

Graphics

Graphic content across ost.edu – including graphics, advertisements, illustrations, infographics, or other artwork – must follow OST’s brand guide, be properly formatted, and meet accessibility compliance. Graphic content that does not adhere to these policies is subject to denial of publication to the website at the discretion of OST Marketing.

Third Party Logos

Use of third-party logos on OST’s website must be approved by OST Marketing.

Video

Videos requested to be uploaded to OST’s website or OST social media platforms must follow OST’s brand guide and adhere to the Advertising and Promotion policy, be properly formatted, and meet accessibility compliance. Videos that do not adhere to these policies is subject to denial of publication to the website at the discretion of OST Marketing.