Georgia Institute of Technology’s Distance Learning and Professional Education has redesigned its professional education Web site, www.pe.gatech.edu, making it easier for visitors to search for and find information on job-focused short courses, certificate programs and customized training taught by Georgia Tech faculty and industry experts. A significant feature of the redesigned site includes robust search capabilities allowing courses to be located by title, keywords, subject, instructor, location, date and format (onsite or online).

According to Bill Holm, associate vice provost for Georgia Tech Distance Learning and Professional Education, the new site is designed to meet the needs of professionals and organizations interested in taking advantage of career-advancing educational opportunities. “In today’s business environment, professionals are truly time-starved and simply don’t have the time to browse the variety of rich programming and courses we offer. We concluded that the way to address their needs was to build a powerful search feature that enables them to quickly examine the opportunities to identify the best options to help them advance their careers.”

Research played a significant role in the redesign and ensured that the most important customer needs were met. Synaxis, a national strategic marketing, branding and technology firm, was selected for the Web site redesign. In conjunction with associates at Georgia Tech’s Distance Learning and Professional Education, Synaxis conducted both qualitative and quantitative research among professionals from a wide range of industries. In addition to focus groups and online surveys, visual designs were tested, and many of the insights were incorporated into the final site.

“We pride ourselves on offering outstanding programs taught by accomplished educators who bring tremendous practical industry experience to each course,” added Holm. “We are confident that we deliver outstanding value to professionals seeking to advance their careers and to organizations committed to enhancing their employees’ skills, and we did not want to present our curriculum without more insight into our customers’ needs. The research we conducted provided invaluable input that we applied to the Web site, resulting in an extremely functional and user-friendly experience.”