A school’s website is a vital tool for communication and information dissemination. It serves as a virtual storefront for the school, showcasing its programmes, facilities, and achievements to prospective students, parents, and the community. A well-designed and informative website can significantly enhance a school’s reputation and attract new students.

Here are some tips on how schools can improve their school website:

1. Prioritise user experience: make sure your website is easy to navigate and user-friendly. Use a clear and consistent layout, with well-organised menus and easy-to-find information. Ensure that your website is responsive and looks good on all devices, including desktop computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones.
2. Use high-quality images and videos: these can help capture attention and convey a sense of the school’s atmosphere and culture. Showcase your school’s facilities, students and staff. Include videos that highlight your programmes, events and achievements.
3. Keep content fresh and up to date: regularly update your website with content such as news articles, announcements and event listings. This will keep visitors coming back for more and show that your school is active and engaged.
4. Use social media to promote your website: share links to your website on your school’s social media pages. Encourage students, parents and staff to share their positive experiences with the school on social media.
5. Make your website accessible to everyone: ensure that your website is disability-friendly. Use alt text for images, provide transcripts for videos, and make sure your website is compatible with assistive technologies.
6. Get feedback from stakeholders: ask students, parents, staff and community members for feedback on your website. Use their suggestions to make improvements and ensure that your website is meeting the needs of your target audience.
7. Use a content management system (CMS): a CMS can make it easy to update your website without having to know how to code. There are many different CMS options available, so choose one that is right for your school’s needs.
8. Promote your website offline: include your website URL on all school communications, such as brochures, flyers and newsletters. At TT Education, we make sure that our website is visible on all of our collateral – here is an example; our CPD Course Portfolio Catalogue 2023/2024 includes our website throughout the online documeent and every website is linked to our homepage.
9. Meet Ofsted and GDPR regulations: make sure your school website is the best it can be with a website audit. We will do a remote check of your website, looking at the user experience and whether it is fulfilling its statutory requirements (including GDPR), and provide a detailed report outlining our findings.

By following these tips, schools can create a website that is informative, engaging, and user-friendly. This will help to promote the school’s brand, attract new students, and foster a sense of community.