Blog General University Social Media Proposal
University Social Media Proposal
Written by Joanna Bergdoll Wednesday, 08 September 2010 00:00
We created this proposal for a social media system aggregate system for JMU, but did not get the opportunity to implement. The designs included with this articles were created for JMU, but the system and designs could be implemented for any company or institution with similar needs. We're sharing this because we believe there may be universities and other high-learning institutions which may be searching for this same system. Please contact us for pricing information.
Executive Summary
Overview
Social Media is one of the most active and growing spheres on the Internet today. Only in the past few years, various systems and platforms have arisen that have gained millions of users. These systems allow people to interconnect and exchange information.
Social interaction that once could only be conducted by phone calls, emails, and “talking at the club,” for example, can now be more rapidly and effortlessly conducted by status updates, comments, tweets and posts.
News that once broke fastest by large tabloids, TV and radio, is now breaking in close-to-real-time via Twitter or Facebook. For any large organization, it is helpful to have a tool through which it can centralize its social media research as well as conduct and measure the effectiveness of various campaigns.
Such a tool needs to understand and be compatible with the various systems, networks, and formats used across the social media space. It also needs to have internal tools to classify and analyze that information.
In this proposal we will enthusiastically present our solution and show how it can help the University monitor, leverage and evaluate social media activities.
Background
We believe we are a good fit for this project, not only because we understand social media, but also because we have a strong background in web application development. Those two factors yield a social media management system that is robust and comprehensive.
Social Media
WinWorld has conducted extensive research in the social media realm over the past few years. Our primary service is web application development, but since social media has been such a “hot topic,” we’ve been motivated to stay abreast on the latest developments in social media. We’re not only aware of the existence of new technologies and trends in social media, but we make it our business to understand specifically what they do, how they function, how they can be leveraged in web application development, and most importantly, their significance and impact on business strategies and goals.
Understanding all of these factors enables us to determine if certain social media related strategies are technically possible or even if they are worth pursuing.
We use social media, such as blogs, Yammer, Twitter, and Facebook, every day both personally and whilst communicating for and within our business. We make a point of observing social media trends and considering their implications on higher levels. Since we serve as technical consultants to a number of large national organizations, we are expected to comment authoritatively on social media strategies and implementations.
Web application development
We methodically plan and develop web applications that function solidly and are simple to use.
One can write almost any system in any language and it will technically work. We’ve learned there is a difference between meeting technical requirements and knowing the right way to meet those requirements.
We’ve participated heavily in Open Source projects such as Joomla, WordPress, Drupal, Magento, OS Commerce and TinyMCE. We use, observe, and integrate with applications by highly regarded developers such as 37Signals, ZenDesk and Salesforce.com.
We put great emphasis on developing interfaces that are simple, clean and easy to use - utilizing Web 2.0 technologies and interface styles in order to make the user experience as thought-free as possible.
Agile Methodology
Our approach to development planning is to use interfaces as the primary driving factor for functional requirements and then to go through small iterations of development, testing and revisions. Using this approach gives us the agility to adapt to feature requests as needed, provided the resources may be able to accommodate for any change in scope.
We utilize preexisting frameworks such as Symfony, Zend or CodeIgniter in our development that enable us to program faster. There is no need to spend hours writing a “dropdown box” when it’s already been done thousands of times. We would rather spend our development time focusing on the core defining features.
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We believe in developing applications for the long run. Many of our clients have been with us for a number of years and have been through multiple cycles of upgrades and additions. We will work with a client to craft a support and maintenance plan that is the right balance for them. We base this on user competency and overall volume and demand on the system.
All of our web applications come built-in with management features that make it easy to maintain the day-to-day activities of a website. We will often collaborate on the harder or non-repetitive tasks, providing custom services and development where needed.
Specifications Documentation
Please note that this is not a specifications document, it is a proposal to establish project scope and budget. A detailed specifications document will be a part of the project and will be a required step of our own planning process.
Summary of Project Approach
Our project approach is practical and disciplined, incorporating the University's input throughout the entire life cycle on priorities, scope, findings, recommendations and, most of all, expected deliverables.
We will leverage best practices while adopting them to the University's needs and culture. The goal is to ensure that the University receives value and its expectations are exceeded as they relate to investment of time and money.
We leverage our Client Engagement Process, which provides the foundation for all project communications. Those components include:
- A review of tasks, responsibilities and expected deliverables before each phase.
- Regularly-scheduled project update meetings with project stake holders.
- Meeting recaps.
- On-time / on-budget reviews.
- Identification of project concerns, risks and issues.
- Obtaining University feedback and taking appropriate actions.
- Escalation process.
General
Much of the demonstration we will make in this proposal will refer to “Connect” social media system. Connect is our web-based solution that we will demonstrate meets the requirements of this project.
Connect
Connect is a “feed aggregation” system that will take feeds that are owned by faculty, staff, alumni and other stakeholders from multiple social networking properties and bring them under one roof.
When we use the term “feed” in this proposal, we are speaking of any media source that is able to be retrieved via some sort of transportable format such as RSS, XML, API, etc.
These feeds, or news and social media sources, would be added by an administrator of the system, or individuals could apply via the front end of the system to have their feed included in the aggregation.
Using this system would enable the viewer to see a "live combined feed" from all the social media properties that have been included – providing a snapshot of “what’s happening now" and would also provide important metrics for evaluation across many types of media.
Below is an annotated screenshot of the front page of the system with all of the features explained.
The demonstration for your perusal is online at:
Username: jmu
Password: publicity
Front page view
When a public users first arrives at the Connect system, they will see a layout similar to the below screenshot. The features on the system had been numbered with explanations below.
- Place holder logo, this could easily be reset by the administrator of the system.
- Connect will support the use of “modules.” The modules will be positionable around the main content of the site in the header or down the right/left columns of the layout. The module shown in the header is one that would allow an administrator to view all of the photographic content that has been imported into the system and select those notable photos they would like to feature.
- The search box will allow a single or multi worded search across all posts and comments that have been loaded into the system.
- A link to the university website.
- The user could toggle between two views. One to show all posts chronologically that are being imported into the system across all various media. This would be the “live” view.
- The other setting would show those posts that have been marked as “features” by an administrator, manager or moderator. Features could be the most notable posts considering current events or could correlate with those agendas that publicity is promoting at a given time.
- The feedback link would launch a form to provide actual feedback on the Connect system itself.
- The “add your feed” button would expand a form that would allow any one to “apply” to have their media source included in those which Connect pulls in to monitor. All sources would have to be approved by an administrator.
- The RSS link would provide an RSS formatted feed of the posts that are being shown from the current view. This would be just one way that Connect would take in many different formats of media and redistribute them via homogeneous streams.
- Each media source could either automatically pull or be assigned a main badge, identifying those posts with the original source. Clicking the badge or the name of the source below it would filter the posts so you would see only posts originating from that source. This form is shown later in this proposal.
- The actual post itself would occur in the main body of the layout. Clicking the title or the “read more” link would lead to the page only showing that post and providing more functions, such as commenting (see below).
- The share button would allow users to share the specific content via some of the following sources:
a. Facebook
b. Email
c. Print
d. Twitter
e. Favorites
f. MySpace
g. Google
h. Digg
i. Live
j. Delicious - This would represent a module placement in the right column of the frontpage layout. This module would show the most recent comments on the Connect system globally so that a user could jump into a comment thread that may look interesting.
- Categories, or tags, would allow a user or administrator to apply a category to a post or all posts that come in via a designated source. Clicking on a category would allow you to see all posts from various media sources that fall into that category. Categorization or tagging is also a powerful feature when it comes to reporting and evaluation as it allows for metrics to be supplied globally across many types of media and for trend information to be observed.
- This would show what “type” of media is being shown. Connect is modular so that new types of web-based social media could be added indefinitely. Clicking on the type associated with a post would show only all posts from that type of media source.
- Connect can integrate on a higher level with Facebook allowing, not only for posts to be shared, but for Facebook to supply back an overall number of shares. Via “Facebook Connect” users could also establish accounts with a third party system such as this system.
- This is similar to the Facebook sharing option but for Twitter.
- This widget would show the number of comments a post has garnered so as to give a snapshot of its popularity.
- The total number of views a post has received can also be shown. This would be calculated across views to the feed, RSS, as well as the page that only shows that specific post.
- This is an example of a module whereby an administrator could select certain videographic content they want to feature on the site, similar to the photographic module shown in the header.
- These photos would be pulled from a service, such as Flickr and would launch in a fullsize “lightbox” (an animated popup that does not require opening another window).
- Users could click “more images” to then visit the original gallery of images.
- This is an example of a short message format, or microblog format from the service, Twitter.
- This is a module that would show some posts from an officially sponsored Facebook page. The module would show the most recent posts to that page as well as some people who are connected with the page. If a user is logged into Facebook at the time, the module will try to show their friends in the list.
- This is an example of video content being included from a remote media property such as Youtube.
Additional Module: Polling
One functionality that is not displayed in the screenshots that may be desirable is the ability to survey or poll users on various topics.
Online surveys allow you to build questionnaires and tabulate results. We’ve done various types of work with this ranging from simple poll modules where multiple choice options can be input and results are shown in a bar graph to extensive surveys with many types of questions.
Single post view
When a user clicks on a single post to view its contents, they would be taken to a screen similar to the layout shown below. The purpose of the layout is to provide any further reading or links on the topic as well as providing further integration widgets, comments, and rating systems. Many of the items on the page have been explained in the front page view above; however, other unique functions have been numbered and explained below.
- In some circumstances, the text provided in the RSS feed from the original media source may be merely an introduction to the full text. Alternatively, it may be considered appropriate by the administrators of the Connect system to only provide a brief introduction to the text so that a link can be followed and the full text can be read at its original location. In these situations, a full link will be provided so that the full article can be read at its original source.
- A comments thread will be provided below the post. It’s important to note that when comments are made on a post from a “pingback” or “trackback” enabled source, such as WordPress blogs, the comments made on the Connect system will also be included on the original source. By using the “pingback” protocol, various media sources will be able to benefit from the dialog that may take place on the Connect system.
- An RSS feed of comment threads will be provided so that those wishing to remotely follow an interesting discussion may add it to their own feed reader and be notified of any updates to the conversation.
- If the person leaving the comment has associated their email address with a photo they have loaded on Gravatar.com (or another supported avatar system), their picture will be shown by their comment.
- Replies will be indented to show clearly which comments are original and which are in response to previous comments.
- If desired, the Connect system will also be able to allow a connection to be made between the user and their Facebook account. If the user utilizes this, their picture will be shown on their posts as well as giving them the option to post their comment on their Facebook page.
Administrative Control
What is not depicted above is an administrative management system, or “back end,” that would allow the system to be configured and maintained from day to day.
The administrative system would be broken apart into the main sections designated below with their corresponding sub-features noted.
- System
- User Manager
- List users
- Add/Edit/Delete Users
- Assign User Levels
- Roles
- Define access
- Configuration
- Site name
- Number of posts to display
- User Manager
- Feeds
- Manage Feeds
- List Feeds
- Approve/Deny/Suspend Feeds
- Edit/Configure Feeds
- Apply default tags
- Update Frequency
- Manage Posts
- List posts
- Moderate Posts
- Feature Posts
- Feed Types
- Manage Feeds
- Comments
- List comments
- Moderate Comments
- Tags
- List tags
- Add/Edit/Delete Tags
- Tagging Configuration
- Reporting
- Messaging
- Publicity Contact Manager
- Send Messages
Web based – multiple users and accounts
All of the software we’ve ever developed has been web-based and by its very nature supports multiple users simultaneously. We generally develop on Linux based systems with an Apache web server using PHP as our language of choice and MySQL as our database system of choice.
Within PHP we leverage frameworks that already support user management systems and logins such as Symfony, Zend, CakePHP and CodeIgniter. Our systems are configured with different users levels with varying levels of access such as Super Admin (access to everything), Admin (access to all but global configuration), Manager (access to one section), Publisher (access but requiring approval), Registered User (access to view), etc.
Here is a snapshot from the contemplated user manager of the Connect admin:
These interfaces are built via the preexisting Zend application frameworks that we utilize for development.
As displayed, this user manager would:
- Give you an overall count of users and allow you to page through them in set quantities
- Add new users from the admin
- Search for users by various fields and generate quick reports
- Sort users by various fields
- Allow you to perform actions on users in bulk such as delete and bulk email
Mobile computing
We all carry iPhones at WinWorld and breathe a sigh of appreciation whenever we go to a site on our phones that automatically displays a mobile friendly interface. We’ve worked with mobile computing interfaces as far back as 2005, when assisting the world’s largest mobile payment processors, Cibernet, with their PayPal competitor mobile interface (pictured left below).
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In order to make a web application mobile-friendly, the browser is automatically detected and then an HTML5 variant of the layout can be provided to the mobile web browser that displays a simplified version of the full web version.
The layout provided by the WordPress mobile version is a good example (above right). Only the date, title, author, category, and tags are displayed in the condensed list view on the first page. The usage of “badges” and other condensed interface methods make reading and navigating the mobile interface easy.
What we envision for Connect is very similar to the display shown by WordPress showing posts in chronological order. The user would have the ability, as they would on the full web version, to filter down by category, tag, post type, and author.
Our goal would be to provide response comments, tagging, social bookmarking, posting, and forwarding features on the mobile application. This would allow posts to be promoted from the Connect mobile system as well as the web version.
Supported browsers
We adhere to Yahoo User Interface A-Graded browser support list as a designation for which browsers and platforms we support:
The only exception is IE 6. We phased out support for IE6 in March 2010. Google and many others are phasing out support for IE 6 throughout 2010.
Accessibility
Basic accessibility measures have long been a standard part of our development. For example, in undertaking quality assurance on a developed web template, one of our project managers will generally do the following:
- Ensuring that all images used permanently in the design have alt/title text.
- Ensuring that contrast between styled text and backgrounds is great enough
- Ensuring that they can increase/decrease the font size and it will not “break” the template visually or make it inoperable.
- Minimizing the browser window as much as possible to ensure, once again, that the template maintains integrity and is still navigable. (This is a quick simulation of lower resolution environments which can be encountered for people with visual disabilities).
- Ensuring that any menu items or form fields can be tabbed through and accessed via the keyboard correctly.
W3C compliance
Since we have been in business for so many years, we have extensive experience working with web standards throughout their evolution. We have a deep level of knowledge on W3C standards and make time to monitor their evolution and educate our selves on new developments and issues. We use http://www.w3.org/ as our primary technical reference supplemented by numerous other sources.
Our developers have undertaken detailed research to be come familiar and fully educated regarding the following standards:
- WAI
- WCAG 1.0
- Section 508
- CSS 2
- XHTML 1.0 Transitional
We use the following tools for testing compliance.
- WC3 Log Validator
- WC3 Markup Validator
- WC3 Link Checker
- WC3 CSS Validator
- WC3 MobileOK Checker
News and Social Media Outreach
Database of news and social media outlets
The Connect system can allow two major databases to be maintained:
- Input:
- A database of feeds from different social media systems including Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Podcasts, etc. A list of items being pulled “in” to the system for evaluation.
- Output:
- A database of people/destinations the system can send notifications “out” to. The ability to redistribute inputted content via email and other channels.
The outreach functionality of the Connect system would deal with the latter. We will describe the functionality below.
Note however, WinWorld will not be able to provide a fully furnished database of bloggers, podcasters, etc. We will be able to provide the system to host this list and send out emails, etc to the people on the list; however we’ve never been in the business of providing the lists themselves. These lists can be bought or built manually over time.
Outreach Database Purpose
Let us outline first what we believe the purpose of such a database would be through the following scenario:
If JMU Public Relations were to be working on a campaign related to a specific public relations agenda, they may want to promote a certain social media item that they feel clearly communicates the topic from a unique perspective. This social media item could be a blog post or perhaps it is a video posted on YouTube. The source is one that the administrators of the Connect system have officially included in the list of “followed sources” and JMU public relations would like to redistribute and promote it to focused destinations.
The administrator of the Connect system would start by building a filtered list of people who have been loaded into the database hosted therein. They could select a list of people who are located in a specific number of states, who deal in a particular genre of news, such as sports, and who also work for specific types of news outlets, such as newspapers.
Once the list is built, the administrator of the Connect system could then select an article that has already been “pulled in” to the Connect system. They could then fashion an informal “news release,” that could be sent out to the designated list via email or other channels.
The Connect system would provide reporting on the number of “opens” and “visits” from this email. It would also allow the receiver of the email to log into the Connect system and manage their own communication settings, such as unsubscribing from further notifications or adding a new preferred direct communication method such as Twitter.
Publicity Contact Manager
Similar to the user manager featured above, the database of “publicity contacts” could contain those fields noted in addition to other configurable options.
As shown, it would allow you to:
- See the total number of contacts loaded into the system
- Page through them
- Choose the number to view per page
- Import and/or export the data at any time
- Order by any field
- Search/Filter by any field (E.g., pull a selection of all Newspaper contacts in a range of zip codes.)
- Order/Sort by any field
- Perform actions on multiple contacts at once such as delete or send email blast.
You’ll notice we added “Twitter” and “SMS” to the list of fields in addition to email. We think it would be optimal to send out these promotional messages via more channels than just email.
In order to use Twitter as a messaging system, the Connect system would have to be associated with a primary Twitter account that it would be enabled to use for outgoing communication, posts and direct messages. If a journalist were to “follow” that Twitter account, the Connect system would then be able to send communication to that journalist via a Direct Message as opposed to an email. It may be that the journalist pays more attention to the short form brief messaging format contained in Twitter for their news updates than they do their email account.
SMS
If you were lucky enough to have the mobile numbers of media contacts (likely if they signed up with you) you could also send short text messages to their mobile device to “break” news to them. They would have to provide you with their cell number and provider and “opt-in” to having text alerts sent to them.
Other direct contact formats
Other direct contact formats could be added over time as new formats arise. For example, Facebook could be used to reach out and connect with media contacts.
Sending an email blast
Once a selection has been made of the media contacts within the Connect database, they can be saved to a list. That list could then be contacted via the above interface.
Connect vs. Constant Contact®
We should point out that, as it appears to us, much of the functionality mentioned within these set of requirements already exists in services such as Constant Contact®. It may be best to evaluate the requirements against those features provided by Constant Contact® and then also compare the cost of ownership between the two.
The Connect system is definitely capable of hosting the outreach functionality, hosting a database, providing email and distribution list capability; however, these requirements could be broken out into a different system that already exists on the market.
We’ve provided you a demonstration of these requirements as part of the Connect system and will also provide pricing below for your evaluation.
Broader redistribution methods
Posts from those feeds that are being followed by Connect will show on the Connect system. As described above, direct communication could be sent to targeted lists of people, leading them to specific posts, or groups of posts. Aside from visually displaying the content on the system itself and allowing the user to sort and evaluate it in many ways, Connect will also allow for that content to be redistributed to many social media channels.
XML-RPC ping
In order to further the publicity of those social media posts deemed worthy of featuring by the administrators of the Connect system, there will also be an option to publicize some or all featured posts via XML-RPC ping. XML-RPC ping is a publication mechanism whereby a media source can notify public aggregation sites, such as technorati.com that new content is available.
Those users who do not frequent or know about the Connect website, may be come aware of it by seeing a post as it has been distributed through the “blogosphere.”
Each post will then be able to lead the visitor back to the original source via Connect, garnering valuable traffic, interest, rating, and/or comment statistics while they visit.
Twitter broadcast
If the Connect administrator chooses to do so, they may designate a master Twitter account through which all of the posts they would like to feature can be posted. By redistributing featured content via Twitter broadcast, featured posts can be seen by those who use Twitter more frequently than visiting websites. By placing the post in front of them, they will be given the opportunity to click on the link and read more about the post.
RSS
Once content has been amalgamated into the Connect system, there will be various RSS feeds through which those posts will then be redistributed. Users may choose to follow posts from only one category, or only posts that have been featured by the Connect management users. RSS is another form of content redistribution that may allow for various posts to be noticed by a more widespread audience that may not be normally visiting the Connect website to browse.
News and Social Media Monitoring
Provide and archive copies of posts
Using Connect, sources will first have to be identified that the system will follow. Sources will be restricted to those types of systems which output their content in easy to read formats such as XML. It is contemplated that the Connect system would initially support the following formats of media source:
- Blogs (blogger.com, wordpress, etc.)
- Youtube
- Flickr
- Podcasts
The above sources provide public “feeds” of information in various XML formats that makes it possible for a third party system, such as Connect, to download and “parse” the XML data into a database. It can then redisplay and distribute the data in any format required.
Additional support for formats
The way Connect includes and supports various sources of content is in a modular fashion. As new types of media sources become available, it would be relatively easy to add support to those formats to the Connect system.
It is also conceivable that a “scraping” mechanism could be included whereby, if a certain HTML-only news source is identified and if an administrator can help identify the portions of the source systems layout that contain regularly published content, then Connect could scrape the content off of that website, so long as their original layout says relatively the same.
The Connect system would do this by recognizing the formatting that wraps the regularly published new content and then extract content pieces, such as a title, date, body and author from the page.
Terms identified
Building the list of sources that Connect follows can be accomplished in two ways:
- An owner or affiliate of such a social media property could “apply” on the Connect website to have their feed included in those which the Connect system is following.
- An administrator of the Connect system could manually add a social media source via their management controls.
The front-end submission form would look like this:
Once an applicant fills out the form to have their feed included in the Connect system, an administrator would receive a notification. The administrator would then be able to log into the admin, view the new feed pending approval, view the original site to review it for content, and then make a decision on whether they will allow the feed to be included or not. Pending feeds could be left as pending (unapproved) or deleted.
The owner of the feed would be notified of the action taken.
Near real time
On average, XML formats such as RSS have a time frame that defines how long an aggregator should “cache” the feed before returning to grab a fresh copy of the latest posts. This time frame can be 5 minutes, 5 hours, or 1 day for example. The time frame is offered as a guideline by the originating system. By default, Connect will observe this time frame for all feeds individually. However, if desired, the administrator could globally override the timeframe, requiring that all feeds be updated every 5 minutes. The administrator could also override the timeframe for specific feeds where they feel the information is being refreshed more frequently than the source says it is.
Pubsubhubbub
Recently, a new format of RSS based on the Atom feed was released called ‘pubsubhubbub’ also known as PuSH. What this format accomplishes is the ability for the source (hub) to notify (bub) subscribers (sub) when new content is published (pub). This saves the subscriber from continuously polling the source and also saves the source from having to waste unneeded bandwidth.
The Connect system will support incoming feeds using the pubsubhubbub format. Only a limited number of blogs however might support the format on an outgoing basis. We know that WordPress is amongst the blogs that already offer pubsubhubbub.
Predefined search terms & actions
As all of the posts are pulled in minute-by-minute to the Connect system for those sources it is following, the administrator may set search words or phrases that he/she is looking for. Upon finding that word or phrase in a post, the administrator may be able to then set a corresponding action to be taken.
Actions may include:
- Blank out the word
- Mark that particular post as unpublished and requiring approval to be shown publicly
- Delete the post but allow others to show
- Suspend the entire feed
- Email a link to an admin
- Email the text of the post with a link to a defined list of people
- Automatically apply a “tag” to the post
- Automatically apply a hidden tag to the post to be pulled in a report later
- Automatically mark the post as featured
Real time search
The system will also allow you to conduct key phrase based searches of all posts/comments at any time using the search field found on the public view of the system as depicted above.
Data retention
Posts will be retained in the Connect database indefinitely. The administrator may set a duration however, after which posts can be moved to an archive or deleted. The administrator may also from time-to-time, manually prune older posts en-masse or delete unneeded feeds and their associated posts. There will be no limit to the amount of posts and textual data the Connect system will be able to store.
Monitoring both large and small outlets
The Connect system will be able to monitor any news source that offers up its contents in a format that it is able to read. As new systems and format arise, it will be easy to update the Connect system to be compatible with data served by those systems. For example, if a new video sharing website becomes available and it serves its videos via a special form of “SOAP XML” that requires some sort of authentication – it will be possible to integrate with this service by adding a plugin to the Connect system that makes it compatible with the new format.
Our approach to including content within the system is modular and can be updated by simply adding or altering modules as opposed to changing any code that is core to the system functionality.
We’ve already taken this approach with some of the video integrations we’ve done to-date. Please see the section “Play embedded flash videos” in Appendix 1.
Assign a tone or tag
For each post that comes into the Connect system, the user will be able to click in to view that post. On that page there will be a place to tag and rate the post. The tagging and rating abilities would be positioned as an available module on the left or below the post itself as depicted here:
As you can see a number of other modules would be available in addition to rating and tagging, such as those that enable the user to redistribute the content on their own personal networks.
These capabilities would likely also be a part of comments that might be made in reference to the post.
Match articles to distribution
The Connect system will be able to associate all incoming data with its original source and date of publication. Although it will be possible to show posts in aggregate format, it will also be possible to see them isolated as one feed. By clicking the name of the source on the system, you will be able to view posts from only that source.
Volume, popularity, and geography
Volume
From the time Connect starts following a feed, it will record the time that each post is made. By counting the number of posts over a given duration of time, the Connect system will be able to gauge how active the news source is and provide data on volume as it pertains to the overall number of posts.
It will be possible to organize news sources by the volume of news they produce. Post frequency will be comparable against other news sources.
Popularity
Popularity will be gauged by monitoring the overall number of views a posts receives. This will be inclusive of overall views spanning across the Connect web system as well as any views that have occurred by pulling the content in its redistributed formats, such as RSS.
We’ve assigned a popularity indicator to show what posts are most popular:
The overall number of views will always show for a post but those defined as crossing an upper threshold defined in the Connect administration will be marked with a “flame” to indicate their current popularity.
Popularity may be a good indicator to the administrator of the Connect system as to which posts they may want to feature in the modules that surround the feed in the header and right hand column.
Geography
When a feed is added to the Connect system, it will be possible to identify the geographic origination thereof. By using this place holder, it will be possible to associate content as having come from various geographic regions.
Via an advanced search feature, it would be possible to filter feeds and the posts thereof by selecting from available zip codes and/or cities.
News and Social Media Evaluation
Global site metrics and data
Connect is fully compatible with Google Analytics (GA). We would recommend using Analytics along with the internal reports defined below. GA will provide some higher level data as it pertains to the overall traffic that is coming in to the site. Here are some of the reports GA provides:
- Unique site visitors graphed over time
- The average number of pages viewed per visit
- The percentage of people who come and leave rapidly (bounce rate)
- The average time someone spends on a site
- The percentage of visitors that are new
- The geographic origination of visitors
- Pages of the site ranked by popularity and pageview quantity
- The referring sources of traffic such as direct, search engines and other websites.
- What search phrases are being entered to find the site
- Browsers, Operating systems, screen resolutions being used by visitors
- Internet Connection Speeds
- And much more.
GA is one of the most comprehensive reporting packages available on the web. Since it contains so many helpful metrics, is continually being improved, and finally, since it is free, it makes sense to incorporate it into the reporting that is utilized for the Connect system.
For an overview of what reporting Google Analytics provides, visit: http://www.google.com/intl/en/analytics/tour.html
Internal reporting
The Connect system will be able to display table reports that will allow you to filter and sort by certain criteria. It will also show trends over time as well as pie graphs to show an overall snapshot of a given metric.
The most valuable way to sort most data will be by “tag.” Tags will be a way for users and administrators to apply categories to feeds and posts. Tags will be applicable to all types of feeds or posts being pulled into the system, so it would allow you to view metrics across many various sorts of medias including short messages (Twitter), blogs, pictures (Flickr) and videos (Youtube, etc.).
You would be able to view the overall “activity” in a given category or the positive vs. negative sentiment by filtering to a given tag or category.
The following reports will be available:
Rating tables
Each table will have the ability to be filtered to a certain date range. Most will also be filterable to only show data within a certain “tag” (or category) and also restricting data to a certain “type” of media (such as blog, photo, video, news paper, etc.)
Feeds
You will be able to “rank” feeds by the following fields (this will function by clicking the column header for that field):
- #posts
- #views
- #comments
- #positive
- #negative
The feeds table would be laid out as follows:
| Date range filter | Tag filter | Type filter | ||||
| Feeds | Type | # posts ^ | # views | # comments | # Positive | #Negative |
| JMU Eats | WordPress | 12 | 45645 | 45 | 23 | 12 |
| Study Abroad | Flickr | 32 | 456 | 312 | 233 | 122 |
| SMAD | Youtube | 45 | 4666 | 865 | 622 | 23 |
Utilizing this would let you see the following types of reports:
- Total Number of Feeds being followed by the system
- Feeds ranked by the highest number of posts descending
- Feeds ranked by popularity based on the highest number of views
- Feeds ranked by popularity based on the highest number of comments
- Feeds ranked by positive or negative sentiment
Ranking could be made ascending or descending showing the lowest or the highest first. The above reports could also be drilled down to only show feeds that fall within certain categories or types. So, for example, you could view the above reports for only video feeds or you could view these reports only for feeds that are categorized as “sports.”
Posts
You will be able to “rank” posts by the following fields (this will function by clicking the column header for that field):
- #views
- #comments
- #positive
- #negative
The posts table would be laid out as follows:
| Date range filter | Tag filter | Type filter | ||||
| Posts | Feed | Type | # views | # comments ^ | # Positive | #Negative |
| Outback | JMU Eats | WordPress | 123 | 12 | 23 | 12 |
| Japan |
Study Abroad | Flickr | 321 | 123 | 233 | 122 |
| Visitor Vid |
SMAD | Youtube | 334 | 1233 | 622 | 23 |
Doing this would let you see the following types of reports:
- Total Number of posts in the system
- Posts ranked by the highest number of posts descending
- Posts ranked by popularity based on the highest number of views
- Posts ranked by popularity based on the highest number of comments
- Posts ranked by positive or negative sentiment
Ranking could be made ascending or descending showing the lowest or the highest first. The above reports could also be drilled down to only show feeds that fall within certain categories or types. So, for example, you could view the above reports for only newspaper feeds or you could view these reports only for feeds that are categorized as “alumni.”
Tags
You will be able to “rank” tags by the following fields (this will function by clicking the column header for that field):
- # feeds
- # posts
- # views
- # comments
- # positive
- # negative
The tags table would be laid out as follows:
| Date range filter | ||||||
| Tags | # feeds |
# posts |
# views V | # comments |
# Positive | #Negative |
| Food | 12 | 32 | 4232 |
43555 |
23 |
12 |
| Abuse |
2 | 55 |
234 |
5433 |
233 |
122 |
| Study Abroad |
8 | 45 |
789 |
786 |
622 |
23 |
Utilizing this report would let you see the following types of metrics:
- Total Number of tags in the system
- Tags ranked by the highest number of posts descending
- Tags ranked by popularity based on the highest number of views
- Tags ranked by popularity based on the highest number of comments
- Tags ranked by positive or negative sentiment
Ranking could be made ascending or descending showing the lowest or the highest first.
Types
You will be able to generate a ranking report that is indexed by source or media type. Various types of content available in the system will be blog, newspaper, magazine, podcast, short message, video, or photo.
The following fields would be available in the report:
- # feeds
- # posts
- # views
- # comments
- # positive
- # negative
This table would be laid out as follows:
| Date range filter | ||||||
| Types | # feeds |
# posts |
# views |
# comments |
# Positive ^ | #Negative |
| YouTube | 3 |
45 |
345 |
23 |
23 |
12 |
| Flickr |
5 |
23 |
888 |
2344 |
233 |
122 |
| WordPress |
8 |
55 |
677 |
77888 |
622 |
23 |
Utilizing this report would let you see the following types of metrics:
- Types ranked by the highest number of posts descending
- Types ranked by popularity based on the highest number of views
- Types ranked by popularity based on the highest number of comments
- Types ranked by positive or negative sentiment
Ranking could be made ascending or descending showing the lowest or the highest first.
Charts and graphs
When reading metrics, it is of course essential to see some of the data displayed visually in order to gain more insight into trends that may be occurring. The Connect system will host both line graphs that let you see trends over time as well as pie-chart style graphs that let you evaluate and compare snapshots of metrics during a given period.
Line graphs
The following image depicts the form a typical line graphic within the Connect system would take:
Posts over time
A report will be available that will first allow you to select a time range such as “today,” “this week,” “last month,” “this year,” “last year,” or “all time.” You would then be able to display overall posts throughout that time period.
The facility would also be available to only show these trends within a certain tag. Doing this would, for example, allow you to see visually a spike or rising interest in a category such as “chemistry.” Also you would be able to restrict the graph to only consider posts that are of a certain type of media, such as “news paper.”
Comments over time
The same type of functionality will be available as it relates to quantities of comments within the system. This is an important metric since, although there may only be an average number of posts that pertain to a certain topic during a time period, it could be that the response to that topic is very high. Seeing overall comments overtime broken down by category or media type would give you a helpful gauge of what is of actual importance to the users of the system.
Views over time
This graph will simply show traffic trends over time for the whole system or for the selected tags or media types.
Posts over time
By leveraging the rating data that has been entered in by users of the system, the Connect system will be able to display indicators of sentiment over time. The manager of the report would be able to select to see positive or negative trends, or both as different lines on the same graph. They would select a time range.
Overall sentiment could be viewed for the entire system or it could be drilled into a certain category or type of media.
Pie charts
In order to gain an overall snapshot of various types of data, 
the following pie chart graphs will be available:
- Posts by tag
- Comments by tag
- Views by tag
- Posts by type
- Comments by type
- Views by type
- Tag with positive vs negative rating
- Type with positive vs negative rating
By using one of the above reports, you will be able to first select a date range and then the graph would show you out of that date range, for example, the tag with the largest proportion of comments during that time. You could also view a chart that contrasts positive vs negative sentiment regarding one type of media, such as magazine articles.
Sharing
One item that was not mentioned in the RFP but that you may also want metrics on is the amount of sharing taking place via the article system. The Connect system will be equipped with multiple tie-ins to social bookmarking services such as Digg and Delicious. It will provide the ability for users to also share articles via Email, Facebook, Twitter, Buzz, or Myspace, amongst many others.
Much of the sharing will be performed via “Add This” – a service that keeps up to date on may of the sharing options that are available. They provide good metrics on what content is being shared most and also which methods of sharing are most popular. Here are some screen shots from that service that you will also be able to access via Connect.
The above shows overall shares from the site. This can also be drilled down to specific content.
The service will also display how much of the traffic is actually coming to the site via links that other users have sent out for sharing.
AddThis will provide metrics also on what services specifically are being used the most to redistribute information.
Export Chart Data
All data from internal reports is downloadable in CSV format.
Examples of past work
Below we provide examples of past work that are relevant to this project. We’ve been focusing in the area of social media for some time and are proud of our work both visually and functionally.
The Association of American Educators (AAE)
http://www.aaeteachers.org/ -- February 2010
Heather Reams
Associate Director
The Association of American Educators approached us with one primary goal, to increase the social media utilization of their website through a full upgrade.
They wanted to strongly utilize blogging and also the integration of various social media mechanisms, such as RSS, social bookmarking, and Twitter.
This design contained strong elements of social networking within it. The site needed to take the old look and feel and move it towards a layout that is more relevant to their audience – young adult teachers. This project is still in the design phase. Their old site can be viewed at http://old.aaeteachers.org
The site contains a blog, links to Youtube, Twitter, Facebook and RSS feeds. The blog page is the central focus of the new site. They will be able to place Youtube videos in content and there are features such as a tagging system, tag cloud, related articles, recent articles, popular articles, rss, permalinks, share links, etc.
A module such as a tag cloud may be something that could be valuable within the Connect system.
Neighborhood Friends
http://winworld.com/nf/ -- February, 2008
Extreme Exposure Media
We recently worked on a prototype “location based” social networking system called “Neighborhood Friends” (NF). There is a prototype accessible at the URL above.
We did all of the design for this project as well as the build out and programming. The project has since been branched off by a different group and now operates under a different name and design.
The system, as we designed it, incorporates many features such as mapping, events, blogs, photo sharing, friends, messaging, profiles, etc. We coded the system from scratch in the ‘Symfony’ framework. Using this framework allowed us to rapidly develop the application in a period of about 2-3 months.
The general concept of this system was that it introduces more geographical relevancy into social networking. One of the shortcomings of Facebook is that it does not use proximity as a primary consideration. Proximity can be a consideration, if you are looking to connect with a jogging partner in your neighborhood, for example. There are many other scenarios that involve proximity that this system accommodates for.
With the increasing popularity of GPS enabled wireless devices, location-based networking becomes more and more relevant. Other companies, such as Brightkite, Gowalla, and FourSquare that started up when NF did, continue to pursue this model. Twitter has recently released location awareness and there is talk of Facebook considering it. Location based social networking is a hot topic in the social media realm this year and we are happy to have been working in this area as far back as 2008.
We spent a great deal of time researching and developing this system before building it. One of the aspects we are most proud of is the “group theory” that is integrated into the system. Unlike groups in Facebook, which tend to be rather rigid, groups in NF are more fluid and more easily adapt to the way people groups and social circles work in the real world.
James Madison University
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George Administrator |
Judith A. Dilts, Ph.D. |
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| Outreach and Engagement Carol Fleming Administrator |
Chemistry Department Prof. Richard Foust Administrator |
The above websites were produced to be consistent with JMU identity guidelines. They operate on the Web Manager 2 system.
Potomac Conference of Seventh Day Adventist
http://www.pcsda.org – November, 2009
Frank Cox
IT Director
The Potomac Conference of Seventh Day Adventists (PCSDA) approached us with a desire to make their website more interactive and helpful to their constituency. One of their main goals was the development of an online document management system through which their many forms could be entered by users and processed by their administrative departments. WinWorld developed a management system that combined a user database, access control and a complex form management system. The site also incorporates blogging, sharing,podcasting, mapping, and video media.
Human Life International
http://www.hli.org/ -- June, 2009
Steve Phelan
Communications Director
Human Life International was seeking a company to assist them with their website upgrade project. We equipped them social bookmarking, enhanced donations tracking, and newsletter system.
Responsibilities
WinWorld’s Responsibilities
WinWorld is responsible to:
- Provide the University with professional and satisfactory completion of the stated work in Project Timeline.
- Provide a designated point of contact for Design, Development and Content prior to the initiation of the project.
The University’s Responsibilities
Prior to the delivery of any services defined in this Proposal, the University will designate a person as WinWorld’s Primary Client Contact (PC). The PC will be the person to whom all WinWorld communications will be addressed and who has the authority to act for the University in all aspects of the project.
The PC’s responsibilities will include:
- Serve as the interface between WinWorld and the University.
- Obtain and provide information, data, decisions and approvals as defined in the timeline, unless both parties agree to an extended response time.
- Work with WinWorld to administer the Project Change Process.
- Resolve deviations from project plans that may be caused by the University.
- Help resolve project issues, and escalate issues within the University’s organization.
- Monitor and report project status on a regular basis to the University’s team.
Distinctive Aspects of this Proposal
Staff Experience - The resources that WinWorld is proposing to engage in this project have considerable experience in web development. In addition, WinWorld’s resources have extensive experience with leading and managing projects of this nature. It is also important to point out that WinWorld is committed to maintaining the same set of core resources throughout this phase and all subsequent phases of said project.
Engagement Methodology - The WinWorld Methodology is a disciplined approach to project communications and project management and control. It incorporates timely check-points to ensure client expectations of deliverables are consistent with that of WinWorld’s expectations.
Engagement Scope
WinWorld will provide professional consulting and/or development services to complete this project. This engagement will focus on the following high level activities:
- Planning & Design: Includes the project timelines, tasks and milestones during the design phase of the project.
- Development: Includes completion of all the site development as stated in the provided RFP.
- Quality Assurance: Scheduled project reviews with JMU including the testing of all new functionality.
- Implementation: Final approval of site and Launch.
Milestone Billing
The project shall be billed in the following completion phases.
Planning & Design............................................................................................................................................... 25%
Development....................................................................................................................................................... 50%
Quality Assurance and Implementation............................................................................................................. 25%
Deliverables
This engagement is focused specifically in providing JMU with the system defined in the provided RFP. Given this, WinWorld will deliver all services necessary to complete the following deliverables:
- Planning & Design: Includes the project timelines, tasks and milestones during the design phase of the project. Also, a more detailed specifications document will be included.
- Development: Includes completion of all the site development as stated in the RFP
- Quality Assurance: Scheduled project reviews with JMU including the testing of all new functionality.
- Implementation: Final approval of site and launch.
Constraints and Exclusions
Constraints
- This engagement will be a highly focused effort that will be limited to the scope identified in this document and defined as part of the deliverables.
- No additional constraints have been defined at this time.
Exclusions
The following areas are not included in the scope of this engagement
- Any ongoing training.
- Any related, software, hardware, or network connectivity not included in the proposal.
- Antiquated, end of life (EOL) end of support (EOS) technologies
- Content development/revisions
- Anything outside of the deliverables within this document.
Logistics
Completion Criteria
The project will be considered complete when the deliverables described in this Proposal have been fulfilled and have been delivered to JMU’s PC. A final Acceptance Form will be presented to the JMU’s PC for agreement and execution indicating completion of the project.
Project Change
It may become necessary to amend the Proposal for reasons including, but not limited to, the following:
- Discretionary changes to the project schedule.
- Discretionary changes in the scope of the project.
- Requested changes to the work hours of WinWorld personnel.
- Non-availability of products or services that are beyond WinWorld's control.
- Environmental or architectural impediments not previously identified.
- Lack of access to client personnel, data or facilities necessary to complete project.
In the event that it is necessary to change this Proposal, WinWorld will initiate the Change Control process with the PC.
About Us
Founded in 1999, WinWorld has been helping clients create strong websites and web-driven application for more than a decade. From small ministries to publicly-traded companies, WinWorld has the flexibility and experience to come up with creative, effective solutions. Our vast range of clientele has afforded us the opportunity to work with churches, para-church organizations, non-profits, medical organizations, educational institutions, manufacturers, logistics companies and many other businesses.
In April 2009, Harrisonburg-based Extreme Exposure Media merged with WinWorld to expand their collective geographic boundaries and also offer a new level of consolidated service to the expanded client-base.
Regardless of the size project, we give the same great service and attention to all of our clients. Our reputation as a company with integrity is of the utmost importance and we will do our best to meet your expectations on-time and within budget.
We love to solve problems! So bring us your difficult situations and questions and let us get to work on a solution for your organization today.
Our Team
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Byron Winters, Business Development Director A co-founder of WinWorld, Byron currently serves as Business Development Director. Since WinWorld’s inception in 1999, Byron has worked tirelessly to refine the business offerings and internal processes. Having worked in numerous areas of the business, he finds true fulfillment in cultivating relationships. Passionate about solving problems, Byron works to understand organizations and their points-of-pain. It is through this that he is able to provide advice on how to embrace technology and experience operational efficiencies.
Byron holds a B.S. in Business Administration from
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Jase Clamp, Director of Operations Currently serving as Director of Operations, Jase manages the day-to-day operations and advises in strategic solutions to our clients’ needs. While a large part of his daily activities include managing projects and personnel, Jase is driven to improve product and service offerings. Jase has worked on two patents for innovative software technology and has been instrumental in the development / deployment of our content management system, Steller™ CMS. Under his direction, numerous web applications have been developed to extend the functionality of Steller™, meeting the needs of niche |
| clients and industries. Jase has served as an expert consultant and speaker in Web 2.0 and social networking in various parts of the nation. One of his digital marketing SaaS web products was positively reviewed by Forrester Research and Symantec. His story of passion, vision and commitment to excellence raises the bar in all areas of our business.
The son of missionaries, Jase was born in |
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