- Industry
Government
- Background
The I♥NY brand is one of the top 25 most recognized brands in the world.
- Challenge
The site had to be updated by multiple users, with different admin roles with little or no technical knowledge. The web application had to integrate easily with the existing SQL and CRM databases.
- Why Sitefinity
I♥NY required a robust CMS solution to meet its laundry-list of CMS needs.
- Technical Details
The I♥NY website took 1 year to build, utilizing the services of 4 developers. The site was developed mainly in ASP.NET and integrates with Numerous SQL and CRM databases.
- Results
The I♥NY website successfully anchors the long term growth efforts for NYS tourism.
The Challenge
The new website‘s mission was to provide potential travelers from around the world with an array of information, that they can easily search for the specific details they need to plan their trip.
One of the main challenges the project faced, was the need to give non-technical administrators the ability to manage the web application via a robust CMS. TheCMS had to offer a platform that is pre-existing and established. It also had to provide the capability for multiple users with different roles - this included an audit trail, content approval (writer publisher), workflow tools and access privileges on a table by table basis. In order to have control over the content created by different users, the CMS had to provide log-in history and problem/issue notification.
It was crucial to have an intuitive WYSIWYG editor, since the administrators were going to be non-technical people and needed to be able to create content using tools they are familiar with, such as the ability to drag and drop content, spell checker, undo.
To ensure the web application is crated with minimal effort and will have a pleasant and consistent look and feel, the CMS had to include the ability to build micro-sites and also have various skins, styles, and templates. Since the visitors of the site would come from all over the world, the CMS had to support multilingual content. It also had to provide the ability to implement events and news section, FAQ, surveys, site map, user contributions, search, asset library, support various files, provide file info, etc.
The new web application needed to integrate with the current technologies utilized by the client, such as, Siebel CRM, MapInfo, current CMS technologies, SQL databases and ASP.Net technologies, as well as the Online Reservation Partners. It had to allow for full integration with the CRM (for tracking data).The system needed to offer a document management system allowing non-technical administrators to update and manage electronic documentation available on the web site.
The Solution
The I♥NY web site provides usable, readily accessible and in-depth information for destinations, attractions, activities, accommodations events and other tourism facilities and services that combine tomake New York State “THE” destination of choice for travelers. The new web site also assists and complements the work of the various Tourism Promotion Agencies.
More than 6 micro-sites have been developed, with more to come in the future.The micro-sites are managed and constructed via the Sitefinity CMS interface that allows non-HTML administrators to build and manage sites easily. In our experience, Telerik’s Sitefinity database-driven content management system proved to be a powerful web-based content authoring and editing tool, that allowed our clients to create online HTML editing for real time web content publishing. With Sitefinity CMS it is simple to facilitate ongoing updates and customizations of Web sites, with little or no knowledge of HTML or experience with different technical products.
The I♥NY website, a browser-based, and data driven application, is very user-friendly to maintain and edit. It allows for multiple updates of the same information throughout the site simultaneously. Due toSitefinity CMS the database became a searchable, archived and vital information resource for the client.
Development time was approximately 1 year and utilized four web developers on the project. Site developed primarily in ASP.Net. Numerous SQL and CRM databases were utilized.
The Results
The I♥NY website earned the 2007 W3 Silver Achievement Award in Tourism. It has successfully accomplished one of its main goals - to improve communication with potential visitors from around the world, as well as state residents, and in this way enhance economic development throughout the state. The site leverages technology to deliver the best presentation. With Sitefinity CMS employee intervention and maintenance time were minimized.
The I♥NY website successfully anchors the long term growth efforts for NYS tourism.