Website of the Month: NewRetirement
Anders, Susan B
New Retirement LLC uses its website www.newretirement.com to promote its retirement planning products and services. Visitors to the site can create a free personal account to use the discussion board, or simply take advantage of the substantial resources that are accessible to the public. While NewRetirement.com is directed to individual retirees, CPAs will find many of the tools to be quite useful. The site contains substantial practical advice that may introduce topics for discussion with clients.
Organization
The home and main pages present a similar general appearance, with the banner heading of “NewRetirement: secure Your Future,” log-in and keyword search functions, and a main navigation bar. The main menu covers the major features of the website: retirement planning information, retirement calculator, answers, retirement news, and “my NewRetirement.” The bottom of the home and main pages offer a secondary menu bar that includes other resources, blogs, and site map.
The home page is divided into segments that feature information from the main areas of the site and promote examples of resources. The major resources-retirement planning information, retirement news, and the discussion board-are consistently cross-referenced, enabling users to locate information on a particular topic (e.g., annuities, debt management, healthcare, insurance) from several navigation paths. Unfortunately, the topics are named and arranged inconsistently across the site. Although the website is generally well-organized, given the variations in the topical indexes and the large number of resources, the site map is a useful navigation tool.
Topical Information and News
The site’s “retirement planning information” section contains a large number of web articles, tools, and related links, and is easy to navigate. Clicking on a specific topic heading on the left-hand navigation index reveals a drop-down menu with links to an overview page, as well as additional related pages. The drop-down index for a given topic appears throughout the subsidiary pages, making searching within and between items extremely easy. For many topics, links are provided to other resources on NewRetirement.com.
In addition to the navigation tools in the retirement planning section, each subsidiary page is organized consistently and provides tools to print, e-mail, or bookmark the page. Each page offers a discussion of the topic, often with embedded links to related pages. Following each article is a collection of links that may include contacting an expert, tools, related articles, and the discussion board.
Reverse mortgages, a hot topic for seniors, is one of the largest sections of the website. The resources offered include interviews with experts, FAQs, and advantages and disadvantages. A substantial section on retirement risks contains thought-provoking discussions and statistics.
The left side of the retirement news main page provides an index of news category hyperlinks, as well as monthly archives going back to 2004. The news digest provides summaries of articles from the New York Times, U.S. News & World Report, and other recognized sources. Recent monthly news digests have averaged around 20 articles. Categories with the most articles include reverse mortgages, leisure and lifestyle, and retirement plans.
Discussion Board
The answers section provides a well-developed discussion board that is linked to other features on NewRetirement.com. Users must log in to post questions or answers, but can view other subscribers’ contributions without registration. The main page of the “answers” discussion board presents the most recent posts and allows users to search by category. The discussion threads are organized by 21 major categories, many with several subtopics. “Ask Bud” is a feature of the discussion board, but is most easily found from the left-hand index on the retirement planning information main page. Users can submit questions to author H.K. Bud Hebeler, and selected questions are answered on the website.
Other Features
In addition to the retirement calculator, which is accessible from the home page, tools available throughout the website include reverse mortgage, lifetime annuity, and starting age for Social Security optimization calculators.
Two gems from NewRetirement.com can be found under the retirement planning topic on the retirement planning information main page. The first is a collection of quotes from “Famous People on Retirement,” which provide both humorous and serious thoughts. The second is modestly titled “Other Retirement Planning Websites,” and contains three dozen websites grouped by category, such as working in retirement, health and retirement, and retirement advocacy and research. The website list can also be reached via the “Other Resources” hyperlink at the bottom of the home and main pages.
A link to the NewRetirement blog can be found at the bottom of the home and main pages. The postings are organized under categories similar to those on the main website; however, the entries are not cross-referenced to resources on the parent site. Most of the posts are provided by Bud Hebeler or Digg.com.
Susan B. Anders, PhD, CPA, is a professor of accounting at St. Bonaventure University, St. Bonaventure, N.Y.
Copyright New York State Society of Certified Public Accountants Sep 2008
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