"The site has received many positive comments for its clarity and innovative use of multimedia characteristics, but more importantly we have seen a real uptick in visits overall."
Colin Couchman
Manager, Media and Information Systems, Faculty of Education
University of Western Ontario
At Academica, we adhere to web best practices when developing higher education web sites. We have also developed a distinctive discovery and review process to assess, advise and regenerate the higher education web experience. The results are significant. Our HigherEd Inception Review Process is a methodology we have built and utilized to improve web site re-development for numerous schools and that has resulted in some significant successes.
At Durham College after we completed a HigherEd Inception Review Process assignment, Carol Beam, Director of Marketing, Durham College commented, "this has without a doubt been the most successful launch of a redesign we have ever had and I attribute that largely to your input and creativity along the way."
At the University of Toronto, School of Information Sciences, Dean Seamus Ross responded to the results of a recent HigherEd Inception Review Process consulting assignment as follows. "The multi-layered process that the Academica team took us through has resulted in some significant improvements to our online presence… Academica put us on the path to having a stronger website."
At Canadore College the HigherEd Inception Review Process was the front end of a major re-development of the site that we completed. Barry Bousfield, the Director of Marketing sated that, "the Academica web team really helped us to re-define our web experience and guided us through an extensive re-design and development of the Canadore site".
At Academica we believe that collaboration is the key to success in higher education communications. Today, collaboration platforms offer a set of software components and software services that enable individuals to find each other and the information they need to be able to communicate and work together to achieve common business goals.
We have now developed our own HigherEd Collaboration Platform. The core components of the platfrom are as follows.
We have long been advocates of Drupal (the leading open source web content management (CMS) platform) and have recently released the new Drupal 7 version our HigherEd CMS.
Using CiviCRM, arguably the leading open source CRM platform, we have just launched our new HigherEd CRM. We have configured Civi specifically for the higher education market and can now bring the cost of realtionship management software down for many Schools.
Facebook is great, but not very private. We have partnered with Inigral to help bring their Schools on Facebook product to market – and integrate the new Social Trends Research Dashboard module from Academica
Often you need to go further than a simple PDF and move into truly interactive hyper-text reading. We offer a full suite of e-publishing products, including the ability to upload your marketing publications into a special iPad App for PSE Canada and HigherEd in the US.
A Full Portfolio of Web Products & Services
Academica Group delivers the right message to the right audiences at the right time through memorable visuals and compelling copy. Our suite of services includes the following
We have recently optimized our new Drupal 7 build to integrate responsive design techniques – for example we have developed a new super menu module that will adapt as the screen area changes – making any site mobile friendly. As with most web technologies, responsive web design is semi-reliant on adoption from the various platforms on which users can consume content. But the reality is – everyone knows this is a path that is going to be adopted in one form or another, so they are adapting fast! And we have our solution ready to go.
