Unifying all IDG’s English B2B websites worldwide onto one CMS
IDG’s technology media brands are read all over the world. Many of IDG’s international business units produced their own country-specific versions of these sites. The goal of this project was to unify all IDG’s US brands, creating one set of templates for homepages, articles, slideshows, and reviews, and then to update international editions to use the same CMS (content management system) and templates. Ultimately, we’d use one .com address for each brand, and make international editions accessible from the main US site.
The Problem
My role
We completed one project that unified all the US sites under one CMS, but the sites still had custom homepages, which made it difficult to implement new functionality and to share resources between sites.
Our proposed solution was to create a new homepage template comprehensive enough to be used by all US brands. Once we established this universal template for US brands, we would be able to update IDG's international brands to use the same US CMS with the new homepage and inner-page templates, effectively creating editions.
The UX department, comprised of three people, collaborated with stakeholders from each business unit/brand, the engineering department, and project managers as we worked to unify IDG’s brands worldwide.
As a UX Designer on this project, I:
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Researched how users interacted with the current sites
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Planned ways to keep most of the functionality of sites being combined as we moved toward universal templates
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Designed the layout of the homepage
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Developed modules to work within the new homepage template that met the needs of each business unit
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Created wireframes, user journeys, and prototypes for approval by stakeholders
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Worked closely with front- and back-end engineers to ensure the developed product successfully captured the design and met stakeholder expectations
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Implemented UI changes within the CMS to work with the new homepage template and modules
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Devised new ways to insert advertising on the redesigned homepage template
The Process
Research
The UX team sent out surveys to a small portion of readers to get some ideas about what they liked and didn’t like about our existing homepages.
We examined site analytics to get a feel for what users gravitated to and what they avoided.
And we interviewed the project’s many stakeholders to make sure all the functionality they wanted was reflected in the new design. Retaining that functionality was a difficult task, considering one homepage template needed to represent multiple brands.
Design
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Created a flexible hero display that could accommodate one to five stories
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Designed multiple modules that could be turned on or off in various positions on the page, which gave business units the flexibility and functionality they were looking for
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Created a nameplate section at the top of the page for the brand’s logo, which allowed brands to easily insert new background graphics for an updated site look
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Developed an idea for what we called a mega menu, navigation that would take over the browser window and could be filled with all the links and extras a business unit wanted
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Designed a new way for one advertiser to take over the homepage while maintaining consistency with the design of the page and without overwhelming the user with a negative ad experience
Outcome
This was a massive project, one that took over a year to complete. In the end, our research, planning, and the redesign came together, and we achieved our goal.
We were able to create international editions of IDG’s US sites and unify all its brands and business units under one CMS. This allowed engineering to update the sites universally, instead of implementing separate code for each site.
Unifying all the sites also improved readership. After the launch of the new unified sites, homepage traffic increased for all the brands at an average of approximately 30%.