07-12-2017 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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STAFF REPORT TO: Mayor Keis and Members of City Council FROM: Bryce Shearen, Parks & Recreation/Community Services Manager DATE: July 7, 2017 RE: Website Design and Hosting Services Staff has been researching a new provider to re-vamp our city website. Our current website is approximately 16 years old and is currently hosted by GovOffice. The current design is outdated and in need of a fresh new look with the ability to add additional services. We want to create a website that acts as an inviting and easy to navigate “front door” to all of our great services and amenities that we offer to the community. The re-designed website will be easier to use, offer improved search options, and allow a mobile friendly interface. What the users of the website see and experience is very important. It is also equally important to have the administrative side be user friendly to allow for the continual updates that happen on the website. The current administrative side of GovOffice is very cumbersome to use. The new website will have “Live Edit” or WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get) which is what the administrator sees on the screen will be exactly how it will appear to the user. Staff had reviewed GovOffice, Revize and CivicPlus in detail, and spoke to a few other vendors. GovOffice had not made any improvements to the administrative side of their websites, which is not user-friendly. Updating the current website with GovOffice would be approximately $6000 - $10,000 depending on what features were chosen. The current annual maintenance fee for GovOffice is $750, and is anticipated to increase if the website is upgraded. Revize’s proposal was $9475 with an annual fee of $1900. Revise package was more of a template design that did not offer as many of the services that CivicPlus had to offer. After review of all materials submitted, website demos and viewing existing clients’ websites of each entity contacted, staff has concluded CivicPlus is a reputable government focused website provider that not only designs websites, but can provide the City of Little Canada with full service solutions tailored for local governments. Services included, but not limited to, maintenance, hosting, 24-hour support, continuous upgrades and updates, E-government tools, interactive features, user-friendly navigation, and Government Content Management System. CivicPlus will also train staff on the new website and the statistics and analytics to go with it. Some key features of the new website will be: • Google Translation Tool – Converts entire website into many languages • Social Media Integration • Alert Center • Responsive web design (reformats the webpage to any mobile device and window size) • Ease of navigation and search features