The largest educational software company in the world, Riverdeep, recognized the need for a comprehensive web site that provided the technology and resources for parents and teachers to research and purchase the best products for their children and students with special needs. Prior to the launch of the site, there had been no other entity that provided the interactive tools to determine which products were the best fit for each child's unique challenges. In addition, the lack of such a resource meant that teachers often spent months of research time to find the products they needed, purchasing these products well into the school year, reducing the effectiveness of the child's education in the process.The target market for the site was the parents and teachers of special needs students, therefore the site itself had to represent the best in technical awareness of specials needs issues. We built the site to adhere to the strictest level of the government's 508 standards, and worked closely with the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) to make sure that the site's access and usability was as easy for those with unique visual, aural, and physical challenges as those of the general public.
In addition to the challenges of accessibility, we also had to build the site to incorporate the enormous data requirements needed to represent the products of all major developers of special needs products. To provide the most intuitive means for our target to find the best products, a Search Wizard was developed that would take the answers to 6 targeted questions, and provide detailed results the user could use for comparison. They could purchase these products through an expedited purchase flow that also provided the means to generate a purchase order, a much needed item for teachers.
The site was a major success, generated considerable buzz throughout the special needs industry, and was nominated for a Codie Award.
- Site visitors need to create secure registrations
- Visitors required an intuitive and comprehensive tool to produce refined, targeted searches
- Product data for a wide variety of vendors required constant updating
- Product's had to be associated with a variety of attributes to match the challenges it was meant to address
- The purchase flow required the ability to generate a printable purchase order
- The site had to be a standard-bearer for web accessibility, and therefore needed to adhere strictly to the 508 Accessibility Standards.
- Working within the existing structure, we added some features that were missing to enable easier administration of the site
- We developed the Search Wizard, utilizing just 6 targeted questions to produce the most focused, appropriate results
- A system was developed that allowed the client to easily administer all product data through an intuitive content management system.
- The online store was developed to allow for a parallel flow ending with a printable purchase order, in addition to the ability to save this order for future completion
- Through intensive research and a close relationship with CAST, the site was architected and developed to be accessed using text readers, visual guides, and keyboard commands while still maintaining its distinctive, engaging design.
- MS SQL Server 2000
- ASP.NET
- Web Services
- 5 months