Samenvatting

Since the launch of UCee Station in Utrecht in 2007, the organisation has managed to introduce an innovative, unique and prize winning youth participation project in the Netherlands. The project offers an online media platform that is made by and for local youngsters. The most important communication tool of the project is the website www.UCeestation.nl. The website consists of a virtual network of platforms where local organisations and youngsters can communicate with each other. However, since the start of the project, the website has been built but no further steps have been taken to improve and promote the website online. Therefore, the central question asked for this dissertation is: How can the UCee Station website be optimized online in order to attract and generate more online traffic?
To answer this question, the website has been evaluated in order to give recommendations for improvement. This dissertation is roughly divided into a situation analysis and recommendations. The internal analysis gives further background information on the UCee Station project. The external analysis is divided into two parts: general external factors and possible online marketing tools. Primary and secondary research has been undertaken to answer the central question. A personal interview with online brand content manager and SEO consultant Micheal Borgs and a usability test with eight participants was conducted to offer qualitative information.
The conducted research shows that the website is the most important communication tool for UCee Station when it comes to communicating and cooperating with local partners, organisations and youngsters. That is why UCee Station needs to know more about the current online market and that such online marketing tools can work to their own advantage. In addition, the website needs to function properly, in order to start generating more online traffic. At this moment, the organisations'objectives are not being met online because the UCee Station website is not being perceived the way they want. Therefore, basic improvements with several marketing tools are necessary to make the site more attractive to the target group.
The recommendations given are for UCee Station to start improving their most important communication tool by changing the current weaknesses into strengths through the given opportunities. Improving the website will lead to more online and regular traffic in general and can lead to the faster realisation of the website's goals at UCee Station in Rotterdam and The Hague. The first steps are to use the W3C standards, improve the most significant usability problems and to apply the SEO tool. After the website optimization, further steps can be taken to start online promotion.