BACKGROUND

Enhancing Financial Innovation & Access (EFInA) is a financial sector development agency with a mission to make Nigeria’s financial system work better, especially for the poor, by facilitating the emergence of an all-inclusive, growth-promoting financial system. EFInA’s website is a key platform for stakeholders engaged and enabling them to benefit from EFInA’s market systems development expertise and resources as well as expanding its reach and visibility as a thought leader in financial inclusion in Nigeria.

As EFInA prepares for the deployment of its 8th national flagship survey, Access to Financial Service in Nigeria, the need to revamp and redesign the existing microsite which hosts all information on this flagship survey has arisen.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

EFInA is inviting proposals from reputable and qualified individuals or organizations with proven track records in designing and deployment of solutions to develop new templates for the current microsite, www.a2f.ng which will be linked to EFInA’s main website, www.efina.org.ng.

The redesign will provide a new look and feel to the microsite and will unlock added functionalities while displaying content in a more organized, attractive, interactive and user-friendly manner.

DESIGN FUNCTIONALITIES AND INFRASTRUCTURE REQUIREMENTS

EFInA’s new microsite must be robust, intelligent, engaging, and user-friendly, with the following key considerations:

Functionalities

The new template shall include but may not be limited to:

• A simplified navigation system that has a responsive design, and is scalable
• Allows seamless integration with mobile devices, apps, blogs, social media tools, and video
• Adds feed links
• An interactive dashboard containing geospatial information.
• Enables social sharing features – including Twitter share by text selection and Twitter feed by handle and hashtag.
• Search function by the news, type of publication/guidance, type of resource, events, and issue. Search functions must address current limitations, specifically difficulties in finding the information users are looking for. A new approach that combines semantic elements with the current trend of deploying open-source ‘elastic searches’ can be adopted. As visitor types in a search word, suggestions should be shown to direct visitors to discover resources relevant to the keyword being typed by the visitor.
• Utilizes and aligns with web analytical tools (e.g., Google Analytics)
• Interactive map including the report launch, the reports, articles, and the datasets.
• Signup for the latest news
• Ease of Administration & Maintenance: The delivered system should enable easy content and structure updates (including menus and sub-menus) by end-user editors without dependency or need for backend re-coding.
• Rollback on accidental updates should also be available. The system should have the capability to report dead or broken links or conflicting links.

The A2F website is linked to the main EFInA website www.efina.org.ng

Additionally, provide EFInA’s main website maintenance – should cover the maintenance and renewal of website hosting, plugins, and SSL. It also covers security, data backups and restoration where necessary, and the preservation of the integrity and aesthetics of the website.

Some considerations are:

• Use of a sustainable platform that is easily upgradeable
• No hardcoding
• Full source code including all developed libraries shall be handed over to EFInA
• Documentation (design, operation, users /editors/admin instruction), stylesheet structure, and codes should be delivered to EFInA at completion.
• Security, Performance, and Availability of Site: Necessary security controls must be configured to protect the EFInA website from being hacked/hijacked/defaced to prevent loss of information and to ensure the high availability of services. Robust and automated backup and disaster recovery are essential and mandatory. Webpages should load rapidly and securely.
• Bandwidth and Device Responsiveness: Webserver should be able to detect bandwidth availability, type of device, browser agnostic, and render webpages to maximize responsiveness and performance of page rendering. In consideration that many of EFInA’s stakeholders experience connectivity challenges, the new website will have to be accessible in low-bandwidth environments.
• Analytics: All pages, for example, should have a tracking code in the header to enable analytics. Monthly analytics reports should be generatable by EFInA, including data on any broken links, failed searches, etc.
• Support and maintenance: Administrative and technical support, and quality control for a period of 12 months post-going live for the A2F website and the EFInA website

REQUIRED SKILLS AND EXPERIENCE

• The developer should demonstrate and provide examples of previous experiences in the performance of similar services as follows:
• Be a reputable firm with at least 5 years of prior experience designing visually appealing and navigation-friendly websites
• Familiarity and relevant experience in using different Content Management Systems (CMS), particularly WordPress
• Have a broad knowledge of current web development technologies and design tools in the field, and new software and other web programming languages and programs including the use of HTML, XHTML, CSS, XML, XSLT, Macromedia Flash, Java
• Have experience in data visualization and geospatial mapping.
• Have excellent knowledge of recent trends in graphic design, websites, online video publishing, and social media networking.
• Demonstrate the ability to create an innovative and visually appealing design
• Identify the management and technical team, with their technical expertise in delivering the project e.g. (developer, graphic designers, migration expert). Include this Core team member CV’s must be included as well as identifying any additional resources required.

PROPOSAL CONTENT

Firms should submit their proposals which should include technical and financial that address the objectives outlined above.

The technical proposal must include the following:

• Methodology of how the project will be handled
• A comprehensive list of project risks and contingency plans
• Detailed work plan for executing the project activities
• A portfolio of previous work of webs with similar functionalities developed in word press
• CVs of the technical team
• The maximum number of pages for the technical proposal is 15

The financial proposal should contain the lump sum which you propose for the consultancy and a detailed breakdown of all costs including the budget narrative. This fee should be inclusive of ALL considerations including taxes. The maximum page for the financial proposal is 2 pages.

EVALUATION CRITERIA

All proposals will be evaluated based on the criteria listed in the table below.

In order to qualify for further consideration, the company must accomplish a minimum score of 80 percent in the offer.

The successful developer will participate in a debriefing session with the IT and programmatic team to understand the overall project and expectations.

Based on the debriefing session and the ToR, the developer will develop a maximum of three concepts for the microsite, a2f.ng. providing visual concepts and language for the site based on all the components outlined in the section “Design Functionalities and Infrastructure Requirements.”

The developer will adjust the concept based on feedback and comments from EFInA

Integration and provision of full source code

Pre-live test and final approval from EFInA

Proposals should be submitted electronically by 5 pm (Nigerian time) on 23 March 2023. Any proposals received after the deadline, will not be considered.

Queries

All queries should be sent to Adetunji Kazeem via email on akazeem@efina.org.ng and cnwaiwu@efina.org.ng