Fishtank

Health and multimedia

Benevita, a subsidiary of the Belgian Onafhankelijke Ziekenfondsen - Mutualité Libre (MLOZ), assists the independent health insurance companies (Euromut, Partena, OZ, Securex, MLP and Freie Kankenkasse) in research and development of innovative technologies that will improve the service to their customers. Benevita is defined as a laboratory dedicated to innovation in the health care sector. As a research center Benevita sets up and tests prototypes for subsequent transfer and implementation in the mutual insurances of the MLOZ to the benefit of their members. The Benevita mission covers 3 tabs: the disease management tab supported by the multimedia tab and the e-health tab.

One of the first realisations of Benevita was the interactive digital TV channel ZorgTV, in co-operation with Belgacom and several medio-social partners. ZorgTV targets people with chronic diseases who need special care. They broadcast informational and educational programmes customised for the patient and offer personal support through the “Call and Coach” service.

Fishtank was asked to do the research, design and production of their multimedia projects in general and for the interactive TV channel in particular. We helped them out with functional analysis and service offerings. We created added value for members (patients), partners and stakeholders (idtv developers, media, telecom and socio-medical partners). Diabetes patients in particular seemed pleased.

Helping people innovate

IWT is a Flemish public institution supporting companies and organisations that want to innovate. IWT has about € 250 million funding a year to support these different projects.

They asked us to write a functional blueprint for their website, compliant with the internet standards of today.

To stimulate innovation and technology research, IWT offers a large portfolio of project funding types with extra allowances per sector. Alongside financial stimuli, they offer a wide range of consulting services. All of these funds, allowances and services have their own specifications, rules, manuals and target groups.

The challenge was to bring this vast amount of information (inclusding corporate information) together into a single user-centric web interface, offering easy-to-use navigation, tools and add-ons for maximal user experience. The website acts as a one stop shopping place for companies & intermediaries looking for public funding for innovation.

Stimulating entrepreneurship

Agentschap Ondernemen is the independent agency of the Flemish government, that stimulates entrepreneurship in the Flemish region. They created the Flemish Entrepreneurship stimulating Network (VON or the ‘Vlaams Ondernemerschapsbevorderend Netwerk’ in dutch). VON is an exchange platform for small and medium businesses, associations and government to share expertise and to collaborate online.

Our in-depth qualitative and quantitative research into the needs of the target groups taught us that entrepreneurship implies fear. There is a clear need for positive stories, testimonials, statistics to back things up as well as experts in specific fields, helping people to make the first step. We integrated these demands into the information model and business flows.

The next step was to define what the final application was to look like. We designed a use case model defining all the different functional modules in detail and how they interact with each other. An online community is about people. Not the organisation but the people, the website users, come to the forefront. Standard and proven methodologies like User Centered Design (ISO 13407:1999) and Unified Modeling Language (UML) helped us remember this.

Since Agentschap Ondernemen was very pleased with the needs and functional analyses we provided, they also asked us to build the platform. Have a look at the result: VON-online.

An online knowledge community for education

Agentschap Jongeren Welzijn and Kind&Gezin joined forces and gave birth to a competence centre for education support called Expoo (EXpertisecentrum OpvoedingsOndersteuning) in 2009.

An online knowledge community for professionals was one of the first operational creations of the centre. We helped them down this path.

Fisthank assisted Expoo on 3 levels: (1) bringing it all together into one comprehensible story, (2) building the knowledge community on appropriate technology (Drupal) and (3) helping them in bringing the community to life by embedding it into relevant social media.

Groeimee, which targets a different target group (not professionals but parents), will be imported into this Expoo platform. Same CMS, different looks.

Expats, the other Belgian community

xpats.com, the site for the Belgian international community, had a lot of potential that we were asked to unleash. We worked on a business plan and a redesign that is live as we write. The interesting element is the categorisation of locations and texts so that visitors can search content by keyword and location (review X of theatre representation Y in location Z). We also integrated the expats community by incorporating blog posts and allowing interaction on the agenda, Q&A and much more… ING has 50 % ownership of xpats.com and 50 % of Corelio.

Bigglab

For Bigglab we conducted a feasibility study alongside TNO on prediction modeling based on analysis of language. That study led to funding within the Small Business Innovation Research Programme 2008.

The fundamentals of an architecture magazine

CIAUD asked us to work at the fundamentals of A+ magazine, the leading publication for architecture in Belgium.

Different stakeholders wanted different things.

We built a future-proof plan and provided the interim management. We installed a new editor and got funding from the Kunstendecreet. Furthermore, we introduced online customer surveys, working with the perception, habits and expectations of the readers in order to design a better magazine.

Corelio

In 2007 we designed a business plan for the e-media division of Corelio. Corelio as a media group is the biggest newspaper editor in Belgium with 13 sites online.

We worked on portfolio, advertising, IT infrastructure, organisation and customer intelligence. We had been responsible for the previous design of the De Standaard newspaper site. We put a lot of effort into communicating brand strengths and paying services. We also developed a growth plan for the site of another newspaper within the Corelio portfolio: Het Nieuwsblad.

Groeimee

Bijzondere Jeudgzorg Regio Antwerpen launched the education portal Groeimee in 2007 offering parents and educators an overview of what is happening in their region. The website bundles news, in-depth dossiers, events, video interviews, pictures and more on to one online spot.

Fishtank defined the goals and scope of the website. We made the project feasible by using a low cost content management solution (Expression Engine) and extended it with popular social media solutions (Youtube, Upcoming, Flickr and Google Maps). We also created a “widget with an educational points of interest - google map” that can be integrated in third party websites.

Fishtank assisted Groeimee with strategic and operational advice once the site was live. We helped them with newsletter management, online branding and project planning. We also helped them choose the right partners.

Tuning project management

i-propeller offers consultancy to design new services allowing its clients to increase their business, responding to new and high demands created by societal trends.

i-propeller was looking for an easy to use online project management tool, that did more than Basecamp. We found one and tuned it so that it seamlessly fit their needs. Interested to know which one? Contact us.

Find, discover & understand what the Belgian Post can do for you.

We just finished the project that led to the Belgian Post’s new www.post.be website. User surveys taught us that people had difficulty to find, discover and understand what the Belgian Post had to offer.

The project implied building an online framework for the organisation, redefining roles and responsibilities, change management, processing and implementation of technology to come up with a consistent and updated offer.

The Post is a huge organisation with 35.000 employees and millions of customers. We organised numerous sessions between business, IT departments and the website team to create strategic alignment. We used statistical analysis and listening labs with users as a basis for discussion.

We also developed some tools alongside dotprojects.com such as a pricing tool where one master database feeds the whole site and serves as a basis for online calculator tools.

We had previously developed the websites for subsidiaries such as Belgium Post International and Taxipost.

Vitaya embraces Facebook & Twitter

The new Vitaya site offers Facebook and Twitter subscribers the possibility to log on with their existing username and password.

Registration becomes really easy in that way. And it leaves subscribers with the possibility to post their tips, comments or reactions with one click on their Facebook profile or on Twitter as well.

The Vitaya’s programming schedule is built around Health, Fashion & Beauty, Living or Cooking. Each theme has a online coach who offers advice and encourages visitors to post tips or recipes.

Your Facebook friends who have become Vitaya members, appear automatically on your Vitaya profile page.

We’ve chosen to use Gigya Socialize as an aggregator tool to securely transfer profile data, activity and friends.

Vitaya offers more online video, including the webisodes of Coastal Dreams and exclusive Els de Schepper footage linked to the TV broadcast of her one-woman shows.