• Download slides for “Bringing Mission, Justice & Stewardship to Your Website” – PDF (6.6mb)

Workshop handouts

• Download “Post Checklist” PDF (99kb)
• Download “Existential Questions” content strategy exercise PDF (138kb)

Content strategy

Tools

• Asana: project management tool for planning ahead, keeping track of maintenance, etc.

Guides

• “5 Techniques That Will Increase the Lifespan of Your Website” by Crystal Dionysopoulou on Nonprofit Tech for Good
• “How to Future-Proof Your WordPress Designs” by Liana Crisostomo, Stackable
• “What Is Strategy (and Why Should You Care)?” by Kristina Halvorson, Brain Traffic

Read more

• Sisters of Providence website redesign (case study) from Blustery Day Design
• Content Strategy for the Web, Second Edition by Kristina Halvorson and Melissa Rach. We really love this book — it talks a lot about many aspects of content strategy including content maintenance, working with your content creators, and talking to higher-ups.

“The core strategy sets the long-term direction for all your content-related initiatives—ensuring all activities, big or small, are working towar the same magnificent future.”

– Content Strategy for the Web, Second Edition, by Kristina Halvorson & Melissa Rach

Site architecture

Guides and resources

• “How to Improve Website Navigation (With Examples and Reasons on Why You Should Do It)” by Matteo Duò, Kinsta
• “Don’t be humble! Use testimonials as social proof” by Christina Blust, Blustery Day Design
• “How to improve your site with category & tag descriptions” by Christina Blust, Blustery Day Design

Read more

• Everyday Information Architecture by Lisa Maria Marquis. This book is a good introduction to thinking about site architecture, organizing information, and how to make good choices for you and your users.
• “What Really Matters: Focusing on Top Tasks” by Gerry McGovern

“The important thing is to recognize that organizational frameworks exist—that organization is never arbitrary. More to my point: it can’t be arbitrary, because every decision we make—or fail to make—changes the way the information is perceived. To create organizational structures that are the most effective for our users, we have to start with the meaning of the information—the content itself. And the only way to do that is to get up close and personal with what it is we need to organize.”

– Lisa Marie Marquis, Everyday Information Architecture

Technical foundations

Guides & resources

• “Websites, hosting and domains: a simple (illustrated) guide” by Jessica Yaeger, Blustery Day Design
• “Beginner’s Guide: How to Choose the Best WordPress Plugin” by WPBeginner
• DarkPatterns.org defines and shares examples of less-than-ethical website patterns from businesses, so you can avoid falling victim to them or accidentally creating them yourselves.

Accessibility

Note that “Accessibility” is often shortened to “A11y,” where “11” replaces the eleven letters in the middle of the word. (Yes, this is an ironically obtuse abbreviation!) You’ll often see a11y and #a11y out and about — this refers to the concept of accessibility.

Tools

• Tanaguru Contrast-Finder: color contrast checker that helps you find accessible colors close to your desired color.
• WebAIM Contrast Checker: color contrast checker
• WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool: browser extension to check websites for accessibility standards
• Text on background image a11y check: tool to see if text over an image is compliant with accessibility color contrast standards

Readability tools

• Hemingway Editor: online reading level tool
• Readable: free readability test tool
• Yoast SEO: popular SEO plugin for WordPress that includes readability tools and checks for grade level, transition words, passive/active voice, and more. There’s a paid version, but the free version is enough for most folks.
• The Up-Goer Five Text Editor: fun tool challenging you to write using only the 1,000 most-used words in English

Guides & resources

• Resources from The A11y Project: a great, comprehensive source for accessibility resources
• Writing for the Web from usability.gov: great tips about writing specifically for websites
• “Semantics matter: Choosing the right blocks for your content in WordPress” by Christina Blust, Blustery Day Design
• An alt Decision Tree from the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative: super helpful flowcharts to help you decide if your image or graphic needs alt text.
• Create and verify PDF accessibility with Acrobat Pro (Adobe): if you need to make a lot of PDFs that can’t be converted to text, consider learning about making PDFs themselves more accessible via tools in Acrobat Pro.
• “Social Media Accessibility” guide from California State University Long Beach: includes helpful info specific to social media posts too
• “Inclusive Design for Social Media: Tips for Creating Accessible Channels” by Katie Sehl, Hootsuite
• “Why Homepage Carousels Are Bad” by Joe Rinaldi. Worth reading if you’ve got a site with a big homepage slider (which we don’t recommend).

Read more

• Adorers brand extension (case study) from Blustery Day Design
• “Building the Woke Web: Web Accessibility, Inclusion & Social Justice” by Olu Niyiawosusi
• “The web we broke.” by Ethan Marcotte
• “Accessibility is a Civil Right” by Marcy Sutton
• Accessibility for Everyone by Laura Kalbag

“Right now, I’m trying to focus on this one question: What’s the one thing I wish I understood better about accessibility? The only way this work gets done is if we start small, and if we work together. … Basically, aim to do one thing this week to broaden your understanding of how people use the web, and adapt your design or development practice to incorporate what you’ve learned. And then next week, do another thing.“

– Ethan Marcotte

Inclusive design & content

In addition to all of the attributes making a site accessible for everyone, making a website inclusive means being conscious of all the many diversities of humanity.

Guides

• “Inclusive Design” resources from Microsoft: in particular, check out their “Inclusive 101” toolkit PDF as a great introductory resource to the concepts of inclusive design.
• ”Abolish racist language” guide from Intuit: includes great tips on how to identify if a word or phrase may be racist, plus a list of examples and what to say instead
• “Glossary of Ableist Phrases” from Lydia X.Z. Brown
• GLAAD Media Reference Guide for covering LGBTQ stories
• “The LSA Guidelines for Nonsexist Usage” from the Linguistic Society of America
• “Avoid Sexist Language” guide from University of Arkansas Little Rock

Read more

• “Designing for Cognitive Differences” by Brandon Gregory
• “The Real Difference Between Diversity and Tokenism” by Petiri Ira
• Writing for Designers by Scott Kubie

“We have the capacity to make a website not just bare-minimum usable, but inclusive too—giving all readers the same confident, enjoyable experience, regardless of ability. … We have the means—the obligation, even—to give all readers the respect they deserve.”

– Geri Coady, Color Accessibility Workflows

Privacy & respect for data

Also see our talk recap for “Rethinking Analytics,” which has a lot of privacy info!

Tools

• QuickForget.com: tool to help you share passwords or other sensitive information securely in a way that expires after a certain number of hours or views
• DinoPass: fun tool to help you generate strong & secure, but easy to remember, passwords. It says it’s for kids…but we find it works really well for elderly (and not elderly) sisters, too!
• Plausible Analytics: usable on any site or content management system, has small monthly charge
• Simple Analytics: usable on any site or content management system, has small monthly charge
• Koko Analytics: free plugin for WordPress sites
• Jetpack: Comprehensive WordPress plugin that includes statistics. (There are paid plans, but the free plan is all you’d need to get stats.)
• Scriptless Social Sharing: WordPress plugin enabling share icons (to Facebook, Twitter, etc.) that do not embed third-party trackers on your site
• Termageddon: Privacy policy tool & service that keeps up to date with new laws and regulations

Resources & guides

• AmIUnique.org: scans you as an Internet user and shows how, even without knowing your name/address, etc., your unique combination of browser and hardware settings makes you individually trackable.
• Free Online Privacy Policy generator from Rocket Lawyer
• “How To Create A Privacy Policy For Your WordPress Website” by Tom Rankin
• “Practical privacy tips for your business” by Adriaan van Rossum, Simple Analytics

“Third-party connections are one of the main reasons for slow sites. By reducing the number of tracking scripts, your site will be more ethical and human-friendly.”

– Marko Saric

Ecological considerations

Tools

• Shortpixel Image Optimization and Compression: online tool to compress images and reduce file size without noticeable difference. They also have a WordPress plugin.
• TinyJPG.com: another online tool to compress images and reduce file size
• “How to Optimize Images for Web Performance without Losing Quality” by WPBeginner
• “How to Use the Photoshop Save for Web Tool” by Eric Miller

“If you focus on just one thing when designing websites for sustainability, using images more efficiently has significant payoff.”

– Tom Greenwood, Sustainable Web Design

Guides & resources

• “Digital Declutter Toolkit” from Business Declares: online toolkit to help your organization assess their various digital and technological resources and make changes for better sustainability.
• “How to speed up WordPress for a faster, greener and eco-friendly site” by Marko Saric
• “Save paper & keep visitors happy with print-friendly websites” by Christina Blust, Blustery Day Design
• “How to choose a green web host” by Tom Greenwood
• The Green Hosting Directory: resource listing hosts who have committed to green energy. Note that in addition to this list, hosts using the Google Cloud Platform are also considered to be using green energy.

Read more

• Sustainable Web Design by Tom Greenwood
• World Wide Waste by Gerry McGovern
• “Hidden role of data in climate crisis” by Gerry McGovern
• “Why digital isn’t always greener or fairer” by Ayala Gordon, University of Southampton
• “Announcing ‘round-the-clock clean energy for cloud” by Urs Hölzle, Google Cloud Platform

“When I get overwhelmed with the bigness and sadness and sheer stupidity and waste and meanness of the connected crises we are experiencing I take that as a signal that it’s time to try to find something small and tangible to do that fits with the future I want to live into.”

– Dr. Elizabeth Sawin (@bethsawin) on Twitter. (If you’re a Twitter person, she’s a great follow for real talk that doesn’t descend into hopelessness.)

Maintenance & resilience

• Asana: project management tool for planning ahead, keeping track of maintenance, etc.
• Redirection: WordPress plugin (free) that enables you to set up redirects for content you delete, making sure you don’t leave a lot of dead links behind when you prune and reorganize your site.

Read more

• “How & Why You Must Improve or Remove Your Old Content” by Danny Goodwin, Search Engine Journal
• “Gardens, Not Graves” by Allen Tan
• “Feedback That Gives Focus” by Dave Peth
• “5 Techniques That Will Increase the Lifespan of Your Website” by Crystal Dionysopoulou on Nonprofit Tech for Good

“Our ability to create stuff using digital tools far outstrips our ability (or willingness) to organize and manage what we have created. Dealing with the consequences of easy production and poor content management is a growing challenge.”

– Gerry McGovern (@gerrymcgovern) on Twitter. (If you’re a Twitter person and want regular reminders of what you do better for sustainability, follow Gerry. Sometimes uncomfortable truths, but always thought-provoking.)

Top photo by mauro mora on Unsplash.