In October 2020, The Gulf of Maine Research Institute (GMRI), in partnership with Maine Aquaculture Association (MAA), and sponsored by FocusMaine launched The Maine Aquaculturist (www.themaineaquaculturist.org) a business knowledge portal. Our aim was to help Maine aquaculture businesses fully utilize the incredible suite of business-relevant support resources provided by various organizations. The site was created with one customer in mind –Maine’s aquaculture industry. Our process was driven by extensive user testing with a variety of aquaculture business including new and veteran growers. While we had our own ideas going into the development process, the team checked their assumptions at the door and listened; and learned a lot along the way. The resulting architecture, design, and features of The Maine Aquaculturist were created based on direct industry feedback during the user testing process.
After launch, anecdotal industry feedback was gathered, the site’s usage was tracked using Google Analytics and additional user testing sessions were conducted. As a result, it was decided to refine the first version of the site and The Maine Aquaculturist 2.0 was launched in September 2021. These updates included the addition of new pages, minor changes to the visual design, and the optimization of some advanced features. The portal currently includes a Getting Started Guide which walks you through starting your own aquaculture business, a Resource Database that houses over 250 resources, a Job Board, a Regulation/Legislation Updates page, and an Industry Perspectives page that contains insight for industry veterans. GMRI had continued to update content and gather feedback from the industry which has been positive and constructive.