Website Re-design Launch Story: UC-AFT
New look, New platform: From Drupal to Wordpress, a new look and feel, and improved user experience
Overview of project
ucaft.org is a long standing website originally built on the Drupal platform for
University Council-AFT. It hosts information for chapters, individual members, contracts, news and history. Our goals for the redeisgn project were:
- Prioritized navigation structure for ease of use
- A fresh look from updated organization branding collateral
- Migrate from Drupal to WordPress
- Switch focus of website from organization archive to present-day relevant content
- Easier experience for content admins
Drupal to WordPress
Cross platform migration can be done by using scripts to map structure and content from one system to the next, or by rebuilding from a blank slate in the new system. Working closely with the client, we identified the content and structure that needed to appear on the new site, and what could be archived for organization reference elsewhere. We were able to save time and effort by building a leaner site afresh.
Information Architecture review
The navigation was restructured for ease of use of the site visitor.
- Everything is readily accessible from the home page.
- The main menu in the global header shows the most popular destinations outright, and contains the second most popular in a quick pop-up.
- There are helpful “breadcrumbs” on every page, and all main landing pages are shown in the global footer section.
- The travel path was optimized so that the user may find what they are looking for in as few clicks as possible.
Prioritizing content
We identified the content that should be featured on the new version of the site, and what could be archived for organization history from the original site. The most important destinations for users were identified and made the focus of the new navigation.
Pre-development content structure
The development structure was organized by two options:
- Global: this content can be found sitewide
- Local: this content is only found in particular sections
This organization made a larger project more attainable by creating re-usable content, and easier to manage in development.
Designs by component
The Design comps were created by component, and then collected together to show landing pages and travel path through the levels. There is a consistent look and feel throughout the site.
Implementation by component
A new custom WordPress theme was created for the client. Using an accessible and secure base theme, we built our theme by component as laid out in the designs, utilizing the powerful Advanced Custom Fields plugin among others to create an easy and intuitive workflow for the content admins.
Documentation along the way
The new site has a documentation section, which is only viewable for logged-in admins. This was built alongside the site, so that the clients could test out the new content areas along as we worked. We created a custom plugin for the documentation assets along with menus and breadcrumb navigation. These pages can be easily edited by the super admin into the future, when the content structure changes.
