Sehmel, H. (2002, June). Websites and advocacy campaigns: Decision making, implementation, and audience in an environmental advocacy group's use of websites as part of its communication campaigns. Business Communication Quarterly, 65(2), 100-107.

This article summarizes case-study research she performed in which she examined how a small environmental advocacy group used its website. Sehmel states that she hopes the article will “provide people working in small organizations with information about how they might improve the decision-making processes they use regarding their Websites” (100), especially those groups that “sell ideas, rather than products” (100).

Sehmel critiques existing research as being primarily focused on larger organizations with substantial publication departments. Additionally, Sehmel alleges that existing research inadequately explores how organizations integrate web publications with other communication tactics. For her case study, she conducted interviews of four out of five members of the advocacy group as well as the webmaster, who worked on an hourly rate and was not part of the company. She observed several planning meetings, analyzed planning e-mails, and analyzed the organization’s website. Finally, she surveyed visitors to the organization’s website and participants in the organization’s e-mail list.

Sehmel found that although the group had clear goals for its websites (which the websites seemed to support), the group experienced other challenges. For example, the employees did not have a clear grasp of the alternatives available to them, nor feedback on the choices they made that would “enable them to become more expert rhetoricians on the Web” (104). Several factors Sehmel states are likely to be experienced by other small organizations, such as the following (105):

• ·         Employees have no training in web design.
• ·         The webmaster is perceived as a technical expert rather than a rhetorician.
• ·         The organization has limited knowledge of its web audience and little feedback about their web communications.
• ·         The organization has limited time and money.

In Sehmel’s estimation, these limitations did not result in a failed website, but rather one that did not live up to its potential. Sehmel suggests that “researchers encourage groups to conduct some of their own research and to support them in conducting it, thereby helping them learn more about their audiences and about whether the choices they have made worked for them” (106). While this is an interesting suggestion, it is difficult to see how very many groups could take advantage of the opportunity to partner with a researcher, especially those organizations that are based in areas far from a research university. Indeed, Sehmel’s implication section is the weakest part of an otherwise intriguing essay.

Ironically, what Sehmel recommends is very close to what I propose to do for my class project. As a “researcher,” I propose to work with my college to address many of the same areas Sehmel does by examining my college’s new websites, flyers, and informational mailers targeting veterans. The group in my college that has been tasked with developing the materials shares many characteristics with Sehmel’s environmental advocacy group—limited resources, limited experience in web design, and imperfect feedback processes to gauge the effect of their communications. I will be looking more at the documents themselves rather than the people and design process. Still, I expect Sehmel’s article will give me an idea of things to look for as I perform my own research.