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Reef to Outback - www.reeftooutback.com

Reef to Outback has bases in Townsville and Darwin. The Youthful Web and Media Company started working with Ken Mulligan the base director in early 1998. At that stage Reef to Outback was a small pioneering base with a handful of staff and one DTS per year averaging 15-20 Students. Their offices were operating out of a single house in West end with a couple of staff houses surrounding.

Originally Reef to outback had a very simple web site created by a friend of the ministry in their spare time. Visitors to the site were several per week.

Ken explained his vision to me of a comprehensive and interesting web site to highlight all of Reef to Outback's advantages and reach a wide range of people. Of course our location in Australia featured highly in the original design with a very strong outback and reef theme. We also favoured a large amount of information about the base and the very important Discipleship Training Schools.

The site featured many testimonials from Staff and Students about their experiences at Reef to outback to give the web page a friendly and personal feel. Base news was important although at that early stage we did not have a dynamic content management system in place. All news needed to go through myself to be manually placed on the site.

This first iteration of Reef to outback worked extremely well in its desired results and there was a steady growth in Students and staff to the base.

After approx 12 months it became apparent that the manual way of transferring news onto the site was not working as well as it could. Ken also realised that unless his team could communicate effectively with their friends' family and supporters the chances of them staying long term in the ministry were limited. He asked us to come up with a way that each staff and student could have their own simple web page that they could keep up to date themselves.

Hence birthed the idea of a basic content management system for the Web Site. Initially the site was programmed entirely in HTML but these changes required a new programming language to be used called ASP (Active Server Pages). After a few months the Youthful Web and Media Company arrived with a solution that gave the power back to the people. Each staff could now effectively keep everyone of their support base up to date on a daily basis if they so desired.

Along with a site news page that the staff could contribute as well the Web Site suddenly took on a life of it's own. Many days I would visit the site myself and see content that was new and exciting. This new energy was a huge boost to the visitor numbers as now everyone associated with Reef to Outback or it's staff, no matter where they were, started feeling much more a part of what was happening at the base and amongst its staff and students. The staff pages quickly become the most visited part of the site and they have stayed as such ever since.

Within 12 months Ken felt that the site needed a major overhaul and we began work on a new improved look, easier navigation, more comprehensive content, and added functionality in the staff student pages.

The new site added some Flash elements to it for the first time with swimming fish and moving logos. Once again the updated site brought a renewed interest in Reef to Outback and reflected on it's growing maturity as a base. They were now running 2 DTS Schools a year with an average of 40-50 per school. Visitors to the site were around 5 000 - 8 000 per month.

Soon after the new site was launched Ken pushed the envelope some more and asked for a way that each area of ministry (or department) could have a small site for themselves to keep everyone up to date with what they were doing. A few months later this section was launched and now the Training Department or Hospitality could have their own news and share details of their victories and needs through the web site.

Several incremental changes took place over the next 18 months, fine-tuning different aspects of the site. It was during this time that we starting experimenting with the integration of a program called Goldmine into the Web Site. Simply speaking now when a contact form is filled out on the web site, the information is transferred directly to the base Contact Database program. This allows Reef to Outback to implement excellent follow up procedures to anyone who has provided their name via the web site. It also helps the administrator who does not need to re-enter details all the time.

Towards the middle of 2002 we once again saw the need for a complete redesign of the Reef to Outback site. The backend administration section had served them well but it also was due for a complete re-write.

In early 2003 the brand new site was launched with a cleaner, simpler look and a completely redeveloped back end. The new back end allowed users to log in to their own sections and then be able to modify any content from the entire site that they had permissions for. Added features also included HTML formatting of content (special thanks to Kent Morgan for developing this) and a new improved image and thumbnail system.

Currently Reef to Outback is running 4 DTS's per year with approx 180 - 200 students going through this year. Staff levels are around 50 - 60 with second level schools such as the Biblical studies core course and the School of Digital Communications also taking place. Monthly visitors to the Web Site averages 10 000 - 15 000 per month.

One of the keys to the success of the Web Site at Reef to Outback has been the development of a very strong Internet Culture. All new students and staff are trained in how to maintain their web site and other content areas they are responsible for. Everyone is aware that the Web Site forms a very strong relationship with everything that happens at the base on a daily level. Fortunately we are also able to provide an Internet Café to the Staff and Students to allow them to spend the time necessary on the site.

There are always digital cameras' available so that anytime something significant (or insignificant) happens someone is there to capture it. Ten minutes later it can be attached to a news article and uploaded.

Through the visionary leadership and direction of Ken we have achieved a lot with the Reef to Outback site but still there is much more to do.

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