The Marketing and Technology departments are in the process of making changes to our website. It will be a bumpy road and things will be a little different. But we ask for your cooperation as we not only give this thing a new paint job, but we are rebuilding the engine underneath to give our members the best possible online experience. That’s not as simple as just a new design, and this is going to happen in stages.

So why are we doing all of this?

As a simple experiment, go to Google and type in “How to be an electrical distributor?”

We want this to be better. We don’t want to be a hidden gem, we want to be THE answer to all questions on electrical distribution.

Why can’t we hire an agency?

We can, but they will want to know how our members are using the website and what would they prefer to do? And to be honest, we just don’t know. Our current website doesn’t give us enough information about our visitors' behavior. So before we can even contemplate hiring an agency, we need to collect data.

In order to keep all technology efforts moving forward, M&T has approached this project the way one would a fixer-upper house. We’re flipping the house to save money, get settled and save for the kind of house we DO want to live in–and one our guests (members) like visiting. We can’t possibly know what they like visiting though until their online behaviors show us more. The website needs to be rebuilt in a way where it can collect this type of data. This will also expedite our marketing automation efforts overall with the Hubspot CRM.

What does it look like?

M&T has an aggressive goal to get the site migrated and stable by January 1. Our first priority is to complete this migration while also monitoring all activity on the current site. We’re working in multiple systems and it’s a drag. The plan is to first fully migrate everything for stability and SEO, then work with each team to review their section, discuss any unknown factors, remove old content and capture everyone’s feedback in an organized plan. Tom will get the first peek, then the M&T team will contact your team for review sessions. If you have feedback for the site, we want to hear it–we just want to schedule time to listen, discuss and factor in all parts accordingly. Taking these careful steps will help minimize the disruptions to our members.

How will website requests be handled?

Beginning immediately, M&T is going to put a freeze on any navigation/large section/new page requests. The navigation and linking on the site is one of the most critical operations of this entire project. The freeze is necessary because tracking all the changes on multiple navigation menus in multiple platforms is truly a time-consuming nightmare. When the site is stable, UAT testing complete and has gone live, M&T will have a process for how website changes are submitted for larger items like section location, page additions and navigation. You can continue to send web requests to web@naed.org without hesitation. If we see an edit that comes through that is part of this freeze, we will let you know and try to help you find a solution. Also, we will need to completely shut down the website for one to two weekends. THIS WILL BE ANNOUNCED IN ADVANCE.

The Top-Level Plan

• Migrate the entire site Jan 1.
• Review with teams (date coming soon)
• Site Down Weekends (date coming soon)
• Go live (date coming soon)

Want to work with us?

We want everyone to like the new website, but our primary goal is to have NAED function and operate smoothly. We’re rolling up our sleeves to create a better experience for our members and our co-workers. We are open to your feedback, but we DO have to triage your requests with larger technical issues that will sound like white noise if we open our mouths! Send any concerns to web@naed.org and if you don’t want to share there, please send Ed Orlet an email with your concerns/desire to be more involved.