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Norton Parish Council
WordPress // Web Design // Web Development
Project Brief
Having worked with companies large and small across the whole of the UK, and internationally, it was with great pleasure when we were contacted to work locally in the Doncaster community on the Norton Parish Council WordPress web design project.
Hero image courtesy of Barnscan Community Archive.
Concept
Norton Parish Council serves the villages of Campsall, Norton and Sutton on the outskirts of Doncaster, South Yorkshire. We were asked to design and develop a website for the local community, one which the councillors would be able to manage and update themselves.
Over the course of several meetings, we planned the content and structure, the main focus being for the website to serve as a community 'hub' with regular news and announcements, along with the ability for the councillors to add the Parish Magazine, upload minutes of their meetings and accounts.
the Magazine
the Website
The Parish Council has been producing and distributing the Magazine out to the villages of Campsall, Norton and Sutton for many years, the idea for the website was to compliment the Magazine, with the counsillors recognising that the Doncaster villages needed to have a digital prescence to keep up to date on news and announcements.
Web Design
We knew the website had to be practical, and functional as a community website. It was decided early on that this would be a WordPress web design, allowing the councillors the ability to manage every aspect of the website design, content and images.
As a WordPress web design, we had to bear in mind ultimately who would be managing and updating the website, so throughout the design and build, we liaised closely with the counsellors and whenever we could, created simple to follow instructions on how to update pages, copy, and uploading files, such as the monthly Minutes of Meetings. While keeping the design relatively simple, clean and easy to navigate.
Mobile Responsive Design
The website was designed first, tested, and with feedback from the counsellors tweaked several times. Mobile-first, always being at the forefront of our minds. Once the site had been designed, so began the conversion to a WordPress web design, perfectly crafted for smaller screens.
WordPress Web Design
For many years we dragged our heels in adopting WordPress web design, using every content management system out there from Craft CMS, Drupal and Joomla, to CMS Made Simple, Magento and Silverstripe, we've used them all.
Final Thoughts
Working on a web design for the local community here on the fringes of Doncaster was, and still is an absolute pleasure. We're always on-hand to offer support and to make any required updates when required.
Gill Morgan // Norton Parish Councillor
I approached David at design dpi as the Parish Council were wanting to set up a website to move into the technological age. No one on the PC had any particular skills in technology, hence we gave David a difficult task. We were very hazy about what we required and had limited ideas on how it should be set out. I think we tried David’s patience to the extreme but he was always helpful and managed to steer us towards the development of a website that meets our needs without being too complicated. Despite our often lengthy delays in giving him feedback David persevered with us until he was able to go ahead and put it all together.
I would recommend David to anyone wanting to set up a website as he will listen to your needs, suggest possibilities and create a site that exceeds your expectations.