FAQs

In 2012, the school introduced a YSM-branded lab website template in its content management system into which we are transitioning all lab websites. All lab websites will be transitioned into the school's official template and web space will no longer be available for custom-designed sites.

The primary drivers behind this policy is two-fold:

1. The school has been rolling out a new branding initiative over the past year and is eager to move all public facing websites into the brand as part of Yale School of Medicine's identity.
2. The school has invested heavily in its web systems over the past five years to create a suite of web applications and services tailored to the YSM community, including a faculty profile system, clinical trials system, calendar, event registration system, news system, resource scheduler, etc. (you can read more here). By building sites within the school's systems, YSM is better able to capitalize on its investment and provide YSM faculty and organizations better support.
   

By moving to a branded template, the school is providing a supported platform that enable faculty to create a professional-looking website that we hope will have a positive impact on recruitment and reputation.

The distinction between the lab websites in the school's lab template, aside from the color options, will be content, both written and multimedia. The lab templates offer a wide variety of content templates. By fully utilizing videos, podcasts, beautiful imagery (microscopy, etc.), and well-written content, each faculty member will have the opportunity to create a fully customized experience for their web visitors. We hope that by focusing resources on generating excellent content and letting the school fund the website's design and functionality, faculty we will be able to create outstanding websites that better meet their recruitment and grant proposal needs.

Yes, you can have a vanity URL that points to the medicine.yale.edu address. We recommend using the naming convention organization.med.yale.edu or entity.yale.edu. We will order yale vanity urls for you as part of the website building process. All requests are approved through YSM-IPC. If you would like to discuss your organization's URL, please contact us.

You should contact the Office of Institutional Planning & Communications. The template is in a content management system, and we'll go through the steps and cost of building the site in an initial meeting with you. Read more here...

There are a few color options available within the content management system templates, but you cannot select colors outside of the pre-existing template. These colors have been specifically chosen to work in concert with each other, and to provide a usable backdrop template that highlights the imagery and written content, rather than overpowering them. Using colors outside of the available template would dilute the YSM brand, confusing the user. Branding, and that includes colors, has to be consistent: you’ve never seen a blue and yellow Dunkin’ Donuts sign or a purple and green UPS truck.