When is the best time to launch your school website?

One of the biggest considerations within a state school website project is deciding on a date to launch your new website.

Without doubt, the most popular date is September, due to it coinciding with the start of the new academic year.

To many, September may sound like the perfect time to launch your new state school website.

You are anticipating the arrival of new school teachers, new pupils attending classes, new parents, and a new academic year.

However, the combination of all of these reasons can often be why September isn’t the best time to launch your new website.

In this blog post, we will discuss some of the key reasons as to why you should avoid this period, and will suggest some suitable alternatives to launch your new state school website.

Reason 1 – Consistency is key.

The start of the new academic year is a fantastic time for any state school.

Everyone has just enjoyed relaxing over the Summer Holidays, and arrives back fresh faced for the year ahead.

There are often a lot of new faces, whether that may be new staff, new pupils and their parents.

Many of which will have spent a lot of time on your website in recent months, whether that may be searching for information to prepare for an interview, checking term dates so that holidays can be planned, or possibly just familiarising themselves with key members of staff and what they can expect when starting the new school year.

Therefore, to alter the website whether that be design, structure or navigation, may actually complicate things and run the risk of confusing your key stakeholders.

This may lead to an increase in emails and calls made to your school administration team, increasing their workload.

The last thing you need is to add any more complication or confusion within a period of the school year where people are very much finding their feet, and require familiarity, consistency, and assurance.

Reason 2 – Try not to commit to too much!

The new academic year also brings with it a whole host of other priorities, activities and tasks.

Such as inducting new members of the school team, integrating new pupils into the school routine and the adoption of new technology and systems.

Adding into the mix the launch of a new state school website, may be just one of too many changes!

The launch of your brand new school website should be something that you truly celebrate as a school community.

Not something you dread may add to the heightened stress levels that come a couple of weeks into the new school year.

Reason 3 – Key staff being away over the summer holidays.

A new school website project requires the input from several key stakeholders within a state school.

If you’re looking to launch in September, then realistically, you will be starting the process in May, which is a challenging period in itself as pupils are preparing for and taking their exams.

It also means that by the time the project heads into development, when you and the team will be getting ready to change or update the website’s content, the majority of the school will just be starting the Summer Holidays.

By the time you’re getting ready to upload that content, key decision makers may not be around to sign this key part of the process off.

Even if you are lucky enough to have staff that work outside of term time, you will be working around a number of other tasks.

By trying to navigate all of this at the same time, will no doubt add pressure on your team.

Our recommendations.

Now, there isn’t an exact answer when it comes to the best time in the school year to launch your new website.

Ultimately, the best time to launch your website is up to you and the rest of your team.

Some of our suggestions include:

• October half-term – October can be a great time for those of you that want to launch your new school website early in the academic year. The rush of the new school year has settled, and new members of your team will be finding their feet with school life. By choosing October, you can use September as a month to review and refine any last minute website content that needs to be added.
• Early December – Now, December can be a fantastic date to launch if you time it right. As the school gets ready to celebrate the end of the year, you can direct the audience and promote the launch of your new school website in line with the start of a new calendar year. However, if you time it late and only give you and your team a matter of days to finalise everything, the process can be rushed, particularly if there are any post launch changes that are needed too.
• End of January – Many schools choose to launch towards the end of January, as the feeling of the new year is still there, and it is regularly considered as a period of change. By this time, the school is back in full flow, and often the January weather can leave people a little deflated, so timing the launch of your new school website can help to give everyone within the community that little lift, providing something to cheer about and celebrate.
• Summer – Summer can be a perfect time to launch your new school website, as it will allow you and your team to familiarise yourself with the technology, and how everything works. There are less people around too, so by the time they see the website for the first time, you will be able to answer any questions with ease.

Lasting thoughts.

Whichever period of the academic year that you and your team decide on, just make sure that it works for you.

Try not to put pressure on yourself by trying to align it with a particular event within the school calendar.

Allow yourselves to enjoy all of the rewards which come from launching a new school website.

Such a project often requires a lot of investment in both time and money, so be sure to be able to celebrate it once it’s completed.