What do some of the most successful Drupal projects have in common?

Last month FFW released the eBook, 10 Project Pitfalls to Avoid. As Director of FFW's Center of Excellence and author of the new eBook, I can tell you that the most successful Drupal projects don’t just avoid these common pitfalls, they understand how to turn each of them into opportunities for creating successful web properties and user centered applications.

Below are just a few tips that we share in this ebook:

Think about Discovery as you would planning for building a new home.

How hard is it going to be to get that concert grand piano up to the second floor living room? Is the dog going to trample the english country garden? How hard is it going to be for the grandparents to operate a cutting edge home automation system when they’re babysitting? Discovery is all about embracing the complexity of your project, identifying priorities and focusing on what matters most to your end users. Do this really well and you’re one giant step closer to a great project launch.

Would you attempt to build a house with only subcontractors?

A project manager is like a really good, honest, general contractor who knows what sub contractors to hire and who makes sure they build to your specifications. A good Project Manager who understands Drupal and open source technologies will help your decision makers and technologists stay within budget, launch on-time and deliver satisfaction.

Think about the Content Audit as you would moving into your new home.

If you hire movers to come in and pack everything up without sorting it all out first, you'll fill up your new home with a lot of clutter you don’t really need or want. Which means you've just spent a lot of money and time moving stuff you don’t need and you have less budget left over to furnish your new home with the latest fashions. The content audit is an opportunity to get rid of what you don’t need and create a plan for what you want. Why are visitors coming to your site? Keep your content relevant and don’t clutter your pages with unnecessary information.

I’m always interested in comments and feedback from other professionals. We want to hear from you:

• What do you think is the most common pitfall?
• What is the most difficult pitfall to avoid?
• How have you recovered from any of these missteps? 

Have a pitfall disaster or success story? We want to hear from you!

To learn more about successful Drupal projects, contact us, or download our eBook. It's full of great information on how to make common Multi-Site and Continuous Development challenges become opportunities and how you can use the open source Drupal community to help you succeed.