Request for Proposal Website Redesign and Maintenance

Transcription

1 Request for Proposal Website Redesign and Maintenance August 6, 2014 Newark Downtown District Newark, New Jersey Contact Information Anthony McMillan Chief Executive Officer Newark Downtown District 15 Clinton Street Newark, NJ

2 Newark Downtown District Request for Proposal: Website Redesign and Maintenance Project Description The Newark Downtown District (NDD) is the Special Improvement District of the central business area in downtown Newark, NJ. It is a 501 (c) (3) non-profit organization, dedicated to revitalizing downtown Newark by improving the economic viability of the central business district. The NDD works hard to enhance the quality of life for those who live, labor, and leisure in Newark, by providing supplemental cleaning and safety services, as well as marketing and physical improvement programs. It is funded through a special assessment on district commercial and residential properties, billed and collected by the City's tax collection department and turned over to the NDD for operation management. The NDD is overseen by a Board of Trustees consisting of business and property owners within the District, representatives of non-profit organizations, as well as municipal officials and staff. The NDD is seeking proposals to redesign their website, This includes merging the content of the NDD Geographic Information System (GIS). The firm will be charged with redesigning the NDD website and addressing the objectives outlined below: Objectives for the Website : Our new website should be designed mobile-first and should automatically resize for all screen sizes: computer, mobile phone, ipads, etc. The website should promote vibrant living, working, and playing in Downtown Newark. We are very interested in content exchange and partnerships with other downtown organizations (example: newarkhappening.com), and would rely on the firm to assist and create partnerships. The website should appeal to consumers, residents, office workers, tourists, investors, developers, business owners, and anyone interested in making Downtown Newark the place where they live, labor, and leisure. The website should create a significant buzz for the Downtown Business District as the premier destination in Downtown Newark for dining, the arts, culture, events, shopping, and living. Personalize: The new website should focus on the personal experience of the user, with a positive emphasis on the experience of living, working, and playing in downtown. Emphasize the downtown business owner, the downtown loft dweller, and the downtown tourist. Simplify: Simplify how to get here and where to park. Promote that a visit to Downtown Newark is an afternoon spent car-free/traffic-free. Entertain: Entertain users with a variety of meaningful and fun-to-browse content which also promotes the diversity of Downtown Newark in general, and encourage discovery of similar content. Populate the site with compelling dynamic content including itineraries, guides, photography, and dynamic videos.

3 Editorialize: Highlight the finer points of Downtown Newark through bite-sized featured content, and update this content regularly to enhance social media presence and provide SEO (search engine optimization) benefits. Empower: Provide tools for site visitors to discover all Downtown Newark has to offer and to then book their reservations, create a personalized itinerary, or share content. Engage: Set up additional analytics for specific goals to measure the best type of content to promote, and the best ways to drive growth in mailing lists and other conversion points. Adapt: Use responsive design to deliver device-appropriate content, incorporating a mobile first philosophy in building for the future. * The NDD Mobile App also needs to be redesigned as part of this proposal. Streamline: Enable businesses to edit all related content through their own login allowing NDD staff to quickly deny or edit and approve, triggering automatic notifications. Connect: Change our map to be more useful to the consumer and easily used on smart phones. Consolidate: Work with NDD staff to discuss if our blast content can be pulled directly from our website, and/or how can we streamline and avoid repurposing content in our blasts and social media; Incorporate our social media and create an RSS feed. Partner: How can our events calendar seek listings on its own? Include Sections such as (but not limited to): Business Investments: including linkages with pop-up maps and dropdown or sidebar information to area multi-list realtors with information on available business properties of interest to merchants and businesses interests in locating or investing in Newark. Doing Business in Newark: including linkages and dropdown or sidebar information on business licensing or permits and application forms, building and development codes and inspections, business assistance, and economic development Our Community: including linkages with pop-up or dropdown or sidebar information in area climate and geography, demographic and economic statistics, city and area history, neighborhood maps, attractions, other news and events Living: including with dropdown or sidebar info on culture, family, jobs, churches, parks, facilities, schools, leisure Gallery Pages: including factoid sheets, photo galleries, e-postcards, e-newsletters, requests for brochures or other promotional material About the NDD The NDD is the special improvement district of the business improvement area in Downtown Newark, NJ. It consists of 630 property owners committed to enhancing the quality of life in downtown Newark. Founded by an Ordinance passed by the Newark City Council in 1998, the 501-c-3 nonprofit organization helps the 100-block district achieve its full potential as a great place to live, work, play, by providing supplemental cleaning, horticulture, hospitality, safety, and marketing services. A major part of the

4 NDD s mission is to increase the economic viability of the central business district by revitalizing the downtown, in order to attract retailers, restaurants, bars/nightclubs, office tenants, developers, investors, housing, etc. to Downtown Newark. The NDD Clean Ambassadors are renowned in the downtown district for the excellent job they do providing daily supplemental cleaning services within the District, picking up litter, eliminating graffiti, and removing posters and illegal signage. Wearing bright yellow and black jackets, the NDD Clean Ambassadors have a welcome presence on Newark s streets, providing hospitality services in addition to their pan-and-broom sweeping and litter removal. There are also a team of NDD Quality-of-Life-Ambassadors who patrol the District and work closely with the NDD Community Resource Center (CRC)/Newark Police Substation. The QoL Ambassadors are a trained group of professionals whose friendly and welcoming presence can be spotted all throughout the Downtown Newark area, where they patrol the streets daily via Segway, foot, or bicycle. They assist people in the community by answering questions and providing information, and they act as extra pairs of eyes and ears on the streets. The main focus of the QoL Ambassadors are to alert the Community Resource Center via the Mutual Link system of activities they encounter, including both emergency and non-emergency situations. The data then gets entered into the NDD Geographic Information System (GIS). Once the complaints are logged into the system, an gets sent to the proper parties so that every issue can be resolved in a timely manner. The QoL Ambassadors look for various maintenance and Quality of Life related issues including panhandling, unlicensed vendors, disorderly conduct, illegal dumping, etc. Together with the help of the NDD and the Newark Police Department, the QoL Ambassadors will continue the on-going process of revamping Downtown Newark to make it a more welcoming place for the community to visit, while putting a large emphasis on both public safety and outreach. * It is part of the NDD s mission is to market and promote the NDD s brand, these above-mentioned programs, the many benefits of living in the downtown district, and to promote all of Downtown Newark in general. Current Situation The current website functions primarily as a portal to a variety of basic information about the organization. While our long content history and repeated use of keywords related to Downtown Newark have rewarded the site with a high profile in search engines and an increasingly distinct profile in the community, the most common words used to describe the website seem to be stagnant, sluggish, and dull. The site has an extremely useful Geographic Information System with the capability to locate specific types of retail, restaurants, entertainment venues, hotels, etc. but analytics indicate that these features aren t being utilized, perhaps either because users have rendered this aspect of the site difficult to locate, navigate, or maybe too overwhelming to explore. The site is full of useful tools, but visitors do not seem to be using them. The NDD needs to have a website that reflects the role of the organization: the words VIBRANT and REVITALIZED need to be synonymous with Downtown Newark, and thus, they need to be synonymous with the downtownnewark.com website. In addition to getting the people to use the GIS to locate restaurants/retail, etc., the primary and original goal of the GIS System was to encourage them to become active members of the downtown community via a See Something, Say Something campaign, where the user could easily report both Quality of Life issues (drug-dealing, pan-handling, etc.) as well as maintenance issues (broken streetlights), through the

5 website or their mobile device. Obviously this enables the appropriate parties to respond in real time, while collecting important data so the NDD staff and the Newark Police Department can run reports and analyze crime patterns and other trends. Current analytics show approximately 1,000 unique visitors per month; the NDD s goal would be to increase to 3,000 unique visitors per month. As mentioned previously, the NDD would like to build in some additional promotional opportunities into the site for businesses and venues located within the Newark Downtown District, giving those businesses the ability to edit related content through their own login allowing NDD staff to quickly deny or edit and approve, triggering automatic notifications. (Restaurants can upload daily menus and specials, realtors can update available space for lease, etc.) Monthly Maintenance Contract Requirements Upon completion and launch of the new site, any unresolved bugs discovered during the site launch, QA process or related to updates made in response to these updates should fall within the original project scope for a 30-day guarantee period. Following this period, a monthly maintenance contract will begin for ongoing support in troubleshooting newly discovered bugs. This contract should be revisited annually but should be open to cancellation, increase, or decrease following a 30-day advance notice. Agency Responsibilities Response to urgent items should be maintained within 24 hours, or 48 hours for more involved issues. Pre-planned work can be paced throughout the month as appropriate Available hours and an upcoming work schedule should be provided on a weekly basis Any cost overruns should be submitted for approval prior to expending hours Invoices should be issued monthly for the prior month, and include an outline of work performed which includes description and related time expended Any additional special projects arranged under a new Work Order should not impact maintenance schedules or hours, unless agreed upon by both parties Any agency-identified improvement ideas can be shared for consideration in the priority list of small projects NDD Responsibilities A single Project Manager will act as primary contact and will prioritize department issues and work with agency staff to coordinate any required schedule updates Project Manager will provide documentation of identified issues including links to affected page(s), system information, screenshots, description, and any hard deadlines Project Manager will provide this information via , make note in any required app/software, and if any matter has become extremely urgent will call agency to confirm receipt and anticipated timeline for resolution Proposal Content Company Information List three companies your firm has worked with that best reflect your work and relevancy to this project. o Briefly list the role your firm played in each project. Visuals should be submitted and links to active websites. Please provide current reference information for each company. Briefly describe your firm s mission, length of time in business, and core competencies.

6 o Include your organizational capacity (staff, location, etc.). Disclose any existing relationships and previous work done with NDD staff or NDD Board members or similar related party transactions. Process & Product Briefly describe how your firm would approach this project and take us through the process of a website redesign. Include meetings, reporting, major milestones, and evaluations. Respond to the Objectives for the Website Costs, Timeline & Proposal Provide a cost proposal and timeline to accomplish the scope outlined in this proposal. Share your terms and conditions. Evaluation Criteria Proposals will be evaluated with the following criteria: Innovation and Creativity - 30% o Prior work demonstrates innovative ideas that have engaged audiences and delivered results. Expertise & Experience 30% o Expertise in recommending and communicating appropriate solutions, as evidenced by the proposal and references. Candidate has successfully completed similar projects and has the qualifications necessary to undertake this project. Suitability of the Proposal 10% o The proposed solution meets the needs and criteria set forth in the RFP. Price 10% o The price is commensurate with the value offered by the proposer. As a non-profit institution, the NDD is able to accept pro bono service and recognize the provider to the full extent allowed by the Internal Revenue Service, including naming the proposer within the website and other collateral as a supporter and partner. Staffing 10% o The candidate firm has appropriate in-house staff for the project. We would like to work with a company whose employees will conceptualize, create, produce, and manage the project, rather than hire sub-contractors or freelancers. Presentation 10% o The written proposal is presented in a clear, logical manner, and is well-organized. Proposal Format and Timeline Format Please provide responses to those items outlined in Proposal Content. There is no required format for your response. After the finalists are chosen, you will need to provide 2-3 creative concepts for the interview to give us the visual look and feel of your proposal. The proposal must contain the signature of a duly authorized officer or agent of the company submitting the proposal. If your price excludes certain fees or charges, you must provide a detailed list of excluded fees with a complete explanation of the nature of those fees.

7 If the execution of work to be performed by your company requires the hiring of sub-contractors you must clearly state this in your proposal. Sub-contractors must be identified and the work they will perform must be defined and approved by the NDD. We will not refuse a proposal based upon the use of subcontractors; however the majority of the work must be completed in-house. Deadline Proposals may be ed or sent via hard copy. All proposals must be received no later than 5pm EST, Friday, September 19, 2014 Questions may be directed to Anthony McMillan, Chief Executive Officer, Newark Downtown District anthony@downtownnewark.com If ing your proposal, send it to Anthony McMillan, Chief Executive Officer, Newark Downtown District at anthony@downtownnewark.com. If delivering a hard copy of your proposal, please deliver three copies and one digital copy on a flash drive to the attention of: Anthony McMillan, Chief Executive Officer, Newark Downtown District 15 Clinton Street, Newark, NJ Anticipated Project Timeline Wednesday, August 6, RFP released Friday, September 19, Proposals Due Monday, September 22, 2014 to Tuesday, October 7, Proposals considered Wednesday, October 8, Friday, October 17, Interviews with selected finalists Wednesday, October 22, Project awarded & commences Interviews for the finalists will take place at our office with our evaluation team. You will be notified if this is requested. The name of the candidate firm who has been selected will be decided on or about October 22, All other candidates will be notified on or about the same date. Nonresponse is considered disqualification. Process Information This is an open and competitive process. Provisions of this RFP and the contents of the successful responses are considered available for inclusion in final contractual obligations. Parties submitting separate proposals may not discuss pricing information or they will be ineligible to bid on the project. Bidder must disclose any relevant conflicts of interest and/or pending lawsuits. The lowest bidder will not necessarily be awarded the contract. Design Requirements Current Platform Hosting Provider: Optimum OS: Windows Web Server 2008 (dedicated, collocated) Databases: MySQL 5 Scripting: ASP Staging and Launch Prototype build can reside on the existing NDD servers.

8 Upon final launch, existing site should be properly archived for historical reference, as possible. Following launch, permanent redirects should be filed for prior pages to prevent loss of traffic. Following launch, a file versioning system should be set up to allow for cleaner team coordination of future updates. Updates should run on a random schedule and also allow for manual triggering of updates as necessary. Contract Terms The NDD will negotiate contract terms upon selection. All contracts are subject to review by NDD legal counsel, with additional approval by the NDD Board of Directors. The project will be awarded upon executing an agreement or contract, which outlines terms, scope, budget, and other necessary items. The proposal remains the property of the NDD once submitted. The proposal must remain valid for a period of six months.