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Forwarded message:
From:   [log in to unmask] (Holly Henry)
To:     [log in to unmask]
Date: 97-03-19 21:08:31 EST

Hi Tchira,

I was the Webmaster/Systems Administrator at the Fort Worth Museum of
Science and History (until my resignation in August) and thought I would
pass along my "insights."  ;-)  At the time I was with the Museum, all
pages were done in-house. The homepages were primarily done on my own
time and at no added expense to the Museum. (Unfortunately, since my
resignation, the Museum has not updated their homepages due to
HTML-unskilled staff.)

The Museum's pages, if you'd like to view them, are still out there with
my name on it. The address is:
http://www.startext.net/homes/fwmsh/index.htm.  In addition to these
pages, I am also the Web consultant/programmer for a local non-profit
service agency which provides Web services (along with most other
PR/Development services) called DGPR.  I am in the process of getting
these pages out.  If you'd like to view the "work in progress" for that
group, they are at: http://www.startext.net/homes/hhenry/dgpr.htm for
the moment.  DGPR and I are working with the Museum to get their
homepages updated.

Just an FYI:  I am the consultant-member on a panel at the AAM
conference in Atlanta on the subject of Internet and the needs/uses of
homepages in Museums.  The museum-based members include David Bridge of
the Smithsonian Institute, John Chadwick of the New Mexico Museum of
Natural History, and Margaret Lyman of the Atwater Kent Museum.  The
panel discussion is called: "Are You a Deer in the Headlights of the
Information Superhighway."  If you attend the conference, please stop by
and say hi!

I hope my answers will give you some useful information.  If you have
any questions, please do not hesitate to e-mail me.  And, please, send
me your URL when you have your site in place.  I'd love to see your
Museum.

Good luck!
Holly Henry
http://www.startext.net/homes/hhenry/index.htm



>
> WEB SITE SURVEY
>
> 1. What were your primary reasons for creating a site (i.e. public
relations;
> education; to increase membership, number of donors/foundations,
> contributions, attendance; bring in more children/adult groups, etc.)?

Primarily for public relations needs.  The Museum of Science and History
is a technology-based museum and felt the need to publish pages on the
Net to stay current.  The Net also provided a much larger audience base
with information on tickets, times, classes, etc.


> 2. How did you do your research? How did you start the process of
developing
> your site?

Research wasn't really a factor.  We knew the Net was going to be
important for a science/technology-based museum such as ourselves.  One
of the main targets we wanted to "hit" were the teachers in the outer
suburban areas of the DFW Metroplex.  Most of the teachers had access to
the Net via Tenet (Texas Educator's Network) through the University of
Texas in Austin.  Our first set of homepages were "housed" on a Tenet
server in this area.  (They still reside there as well as the Fort Worth
Star-Telegram's Server...local newspaper.)

The process was started by gathering information we thought would be
useful for our audience. Special information for teachers (regarding
field trips, upcoming exhibits, etc) was included.  As we grew, we
incorporated our PR brochure into the pages.

> 3. Who did you work with to create/develop your site?

As Webmaster/designer/programmer, I worked with all departments.  I got
PR releases from our PR department, membership information from
Development, etc.

> 4. How much did the project cost overall?

The cost of the project was a donation of my time to the Museum so it
cost them very little.  The entire project took about 100 hours of my
time (mostly nights and weekends).  At the time, I was making about
18.00 an hour as Systems Administrator/Webmaster, so if you put a price
on it, it's still very little.  As a consultant, though, in comparing
prices with other consultants, I found out that homepages can cost from
$700 for about 5 pages to about $20,000 for pages developed by a PR firm
in this area.  (I know of one group who paid more than $12,000 for a
clickable map!  The PR firm outsourced the pages to another PR firm and
had to pass along extraordinary prices to the organization.)

> 5. What were the cost break-downs in-house?

Time mostly.  It took time for people to pass along information.  In
most cases, it was just a copy-to-diskette-type procedure.  In some
cases, someone would have to write copy specifically for the homepages.
It depended entirely on what the specific information was.  The amount
of time it took the other staff members was never a problem.

> a. Domain name
$100 for the setup fee.  The domain name was gained after I left,
though. I can't remember what the monthly fee was.

> b. Physical site set-up
We didn't have a server ourselves.  We housed our pages on other
companies' servers.  The space was, and still is, donated by those
companies.

> c. Computer
I used what I had.  I worked on both Macintosh and IBM.  Macintosh setup
was about $1800.  IBM setup was about $1400.  Both had internal modems.
The software I used, for the most part, was Shareware.  On the Mac, I
used Photoshop (which was the only purchased software).  On the IBM, it
was all shareware from the Net.  Even now, on all my other sites, I use
the IBM and shareware.

> d. Scanner
We used  a scanning service which took photos and put them on CDs.  The
cost varied from $5 a picture to $45 for about 20 pics.  I did buy a
digital camera in the end which saved money/time immediately.

> e. Modem
Again, it was an internal modem.  Generally, it was a 14.4.  On the IBM,
I had a 28.8.  Now, I use a 33.6.  We did have an ISDN hookup in one of
our exhibit halls.  It was extremely expensive, but was one of the first
ISDN hookups in the area.  Now, they're cheaper and easier to get.  The
modem itself was $495.  Service was $125 a month.  Phone hookups were
costly because the phone company here wasn't quite ready to handle ISDN.

> f. Software (i.e. Photoshop, Adobe Illustraotr, Quark, etc.)
Again, I vote for shareware.  Photoshop is very, very useful, but Paint
Shop Pro 4.12 is almost as good and a lot cheaper (if you're on IBM).  I
also used Gif Converter, Transparency, Arachnophilia, and Web Weaver 4.
All was shareware ($75 or less for the full-blown versions).

> g. Hardware
See above.

> h. Production/design
Again, it was a donation....and worth every minute!  :-)  I love
programming and graphics design.

> 6. What were the cost and type of break-downs for consultants?
Now, as a consultant for profit companies on the Web, I charge $30-$40
an hour...many of my cohorts charge anywhere from $30 to $250 an hour.
PR firms are always higher because of their inherent overhead.

> 7. How frequently is your site updated? What type of staffing is done to
> maintain the site on a frequent basis (in-house, or by a consultant)?
I updated the Museum site on an as-needed basis.  For the most part, I
think you need to handle updates in that way because things are
ever-changing and you don't want a patron to show up and be surprised at
the cost, times, etc.  For my regular sites, I still do the same thing.

> 8. How much does it cost to maintain the site on a monthly and yearly
basis?
If the server's in-house, I would *imagine* it's more than a regular
computer, but not a great deal more.  On the site itself, monthly, I
would spend about 6-8 hours updating it on an average.

> 9. What have you noticed since your site was launched?

> Increases in:

> a. Attendance:  Not really; the Museum's attendance fluctuates between 1.2
and 1.4 million visitors a year.
> b. Membership:  Not really...memberships were not sold over the Net...just
information was given.
> c. Donors/Foundations:  Not really...we used it to promote ourselves with
corps/foundations which were not local, but for information purposes only.
> d. Contributions (gifts, etc.):  Not really
> e. Adult/children tours
        Since our site was originally setup for teachers and field trips, we
found the teachers had more information and would schedule more trips.
The Museum had around 100,000 school children via groups per year when I
left.  Before we started, it was around 90,000.  I can't say this was
directly due to the site, but it helped get the information out to more
teachers.


> Do you have statistics for these categories? How many site and page hits do
> you get per day/week/month?
No.  At the time, there was no way to place a counter on either site.
The Star-Telegram has finally added that service, but it was after I
left the Museum.


> 10. What other museum/arts organization sites do you consider to be
> exemplary?
On my personal homepage, I've listed my favorite sites.  There are
several listed under the Museum sites page.  I think what makes an
exemplary site is a site that has the information you NEED or want.  I
hate to go to pages and not be able to find things like prices, times,
what's showing, and examples of their collections.


> 11. Who do you consider to be the best web designers?
From my experience, someone who loves the Museum (and of course has the
knowledge) is the best web designer.  You have to have a sense of what
the organization is like to pass that along in a web site.  If you don't
pass along the basic mission (not the mission statement...I'm talking
about the idea or feeling of the Museum itself), it's just another
boring website.


Well, again, I hope I haven't wasted your time and you can find some
helpful information in all of this.  And again, send your URL out.  I
would love to see your Museum, but don't get to California very often!
:-(