Town website becomes more user-friendly

Shannon LeClair
Times Reporter

 

Navigating your way around the Town of Strathmore’s website just got easier with the launch of the new website. Tracy Simpson, community services coordinator for the town, said they went with a new company, Twist Marketing from Calgary, who are more marketing-based. Doing so will give the town more access to more features down the road if they want to do things like electronic newsletters or campaigns.
“There are more things you can do online through this (new website). Our citizen communication form you can do right online and submit if you have any concerns or questions for the town,” said Simpson.
“You can also book the mayor directly for your event in an online form, we’ll be able to add more and more of those things that you can do online instead of having to come in to the town, so that’s a great feature.”
Something new also coming to the site is a community group’s page that will act almost like a business directory. Any community groups, non-profit, sports and seniors groups will all be able to go on the site and create a profile that can then be searched by the website users.
“Let’s say you’re new to town and you have a 12-year-old and you want to know what’s out there, you can go in there and you can search certain parameters and it will bring up which groups kind of work with that parameter that you want,” said Simpson.
Because it is a big component of the site it’s not quite ready to launch yet, but should be accessible in the next month or so.
Another feature that’s different is the public advisory section, which is located on the home page, under news feed. The public advisory section can be small on the side, or it can be made large to go across the front of the main page so that people can see it if there’s an emergency, and easily find information and important details.
The previous website was outdated, and needed to be refreshed and made more user-friendly. It has been reorganized and any information not relevant to the public has been removed. Permits and applications forms can now be found online, and it is easier to search through to find what you want.
“We tried to organize it in a way that we felt made sense to the residents in Strathmore and not necessarily the staff,” said Simpson.
There may be changes to come as feedback comes in from staff and residents. Simpson suggests reaching out on Facebook or the citizen communication form on the website if you have suggestions.