Delegates from the south east region should note that their discussion group session will be the largest. In order to provide sufficient time for everyone from this region to give their views on the topic (which is Content Management Systems) we invite delegates from this region to go to the discussion group page for the South East region and use the Wikalong annotation tool to give their thoughts on the most important issues related to CMSs prior to the event.

During this session there will be an exploration of the use of Web 2.0 technologies in brand based marketing. The session will use the results of the recent collaboration between the University of Southampton and Precedent Communications http://www.southampton.ac.uk/isoton to demonstrate how developing a consistent approach to the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies can be acheived by considering your institution's corporate objectives and audiences. Discussion Groups will consider how the Web 2.0 technologies used in brand based marketing can be applied to their institution. The session was facilitated by James Souttar, Precedent.

Ester Ruskuc is a Project Manager in Business Improvements of the University of St Andrews. Ester has a background in IT and a wide ranging experience of many aspects of higher education administration, information flow, data management and administrative systems. She is involved, and has a keen interest in, the management of IT related projects, business process re-engineering and change management. Ester gave a plenary talk with Heidi Fraser-Krauss and co-facilitated a workshop session with Heidi Fraser-Krauss on From Swipe Card Machine to the Computer Screen.

Heidi Fraser-Krauss is the Director of Business Improvements (BI) at the University of St Andrews. BI is a relatively new Unit which combines the traditional MIS function with project management and process analysis/re engineering expertise. Heidi has a background in management and has worked on a number of research projects aimed at improving communication and business processes in manufacturing companies. Before she took up her current post she was part of the team who introduced e-business to the University of St Andrews. Heidi gave a plenary talk on E-business: Why Join In? and co-facilitated a workshop session on From Swipe Card Machine to the Computer Screen both jointly with Ester Ruskuc.

Scott Wilson, CETIS, Ben Ryan, KaiNao, Manchester Metropolitan University and Vashti Zarach, CETIS will invite attendees to critique the XCRI concept and comment in particular on the challenges and opportunities for implementing XCRI in their own organisations.

Pete Walker, Internet Development Manager, ILRT, University of Bristol and Stuart Church, Pure Usability Twill provide an insight into common pitfalls of Web sites and outline some easy methods to undercover how your site is being perceived and how it can be improved.

Helen Sargan, University of Cambridge will show that there are several realistic alternatives to using a slide presentation tool such as Powerpoint or similar. she'll give an overview and demo of several Web-based alternatives with the pros and cons of using them, a profile of the constituencies who would benefit, and what skills and support they might need to succeed.

In a follow-up to last year's session, User testing on a shoestring budget, Emma Tonkin, UKOLN, demonstrates two methods of user testing. One, the cognitive walkthrough, an be carried out by a single evaluator. The second, the think-aloud protocol, is all about observing the way Web visitors interact with your Web site.

Ross Gardler, OSS Watch, University of Oxford and Andrew Savory, Managing Director, Sourcesense UK will consider what makes a service usable and sustainable? Is it one that offers you a service level agreement (SLA)? Or is it one that has sufficient clients that it is likely to survive long-term? And can a service that is principally a "social" service be sustainable? And how might communities of practice relate to the sustainability of an open service?

Paul Kelly and William Mackintosh, University of York will discuss various web usage statistics packages.

Peter Reader, University of Bath explains that E-communications, e-marketing and social media are hot topics for university marketers and communicators, with old ideas of 'control' looking more and more unrealistic. Now the talk is of 'influence', viral marketing, students as customers, and of client management, with the web and web technologies seen increasingly as the university's most important marketing tools. So what are the challenges, and what are the issues with which marketers will face us? Expect more of "why" and "want" than of "how"!

Steven Warburton will discuss how the notion of community continues to be recognised as a fundamental aspect within descriptions of shared human activity and group bonding. In his socio-cultural analysis of the work place Wenger defined a particular type of communion, which he termed a community of practice (CoP). The concept of a CoP has been somewhat abused in current literature yet it does provide valuable insights into how communities evolve, behave and sustain themselves. By elaborating dimensions of community such as shared practice, dialogue, legitimate peripheral participation and negotiation of boundaries, Wenger has provided a model that can be applied to a number of differing groups of activity. This talk will explore what we can draw from the work on CoPs, in terms of the role and identity of institutional web manager, one that is inseparable from a field of practice that remains dynamic, fluid and under constant negotiation.

Chris Young, Netskills, University of Newcastle and Paul Trueman, Netskills, University of Newcastle will be looking at accreditation systems. You may be new to a Web-role or you may be more experienced, with a set of useful skills. Either way, increasingly there is a need for recognised individual development and accreditation in order to progress in within your organisation and with your own career.

Emma Tonkin, UKOLN and Adam Hardy will consider that User testing is often considered to be prohibitively expensive, complicated and time-consuming; the good news is that at least two of these assumptions are wrong. This hands-on session demonstrates how to use scenario-based user testing to check out the usability of a small application. It concentrates on accessible and practical real-world techniques for user testing, analysing the results, and working out how to apply them - as quick fixes, long-term aims or feature requests.

Duncan Davidson, Information Manager, University of Abertay Dundee and Donna Wilkinson, Information Specialist, University of Abertay Dundeed will look at their University's development plans, the related projects - University Portal and Information Architecture, where we have been, current work and the road ahead.

Paul Trueman, Netskills, University of Newcastle will be facilitating this session. Web services technology provides the opportunity to integrate applications and business functionality in to existing Web enabled VLEs. A Web service exposes business functionality by both consuming and producing data in XML format. Future online learning environments may be fully developed and maintained using a web services infrastructure. Web services solutions as yet still need to reach their full potential; particularly in the academic sector. In this session Paul will demonstrate potential uses of web services to support e-Learning and present guidelines on how to consider making best use of this emerging technology.

In previous IWMWs sessions have focussed on issues such as: Should we buy or build our CMS? Which CMS should we implement? How do we implement our CMS? How can we measure the impact of our CMS Implementation? And how do we address The CMS Challenge? But last year it was claimed that "There is no such thing as a silver bullet" and that a CMS will not solve all your problems. Has the CMS bubble bust? Has content management become content mis-management? In the light of new approaches, such as Web 2.0, and new 'ways of doing things' is there a feeling of disillusionment with 'ye old CMS'? Or does a CMS remain the backbone of a good institutional Web site? In this debate you will hear the arguments for and against content management systems and will have an opportunity to express your views.

IWMW 7: Institutional Web Management Workshop 2003: Supporting Our Users, held at the University of Kent at Canterbury on 11-13 June 2003