CASE STUDY:
Site Audit Score
Analysis of more than 70 different metrics
Before Launch
One Week AFTER Launch
“December was standard traffic for the past 8-9 months prior to launch
and since January our traffic has increased 29%.”
Kara Klein, PMP | Director of Marketing | The Citadel
Top Technical Challenges
The Citadel was Facing
- The Citadel needed to convert their website (citadel.edu) so it would be compatible with mobile and tablet browsers using responsive website design.
- The design of the homepage was dated and antiquated. The goal was for a modern and appealing refresh, without compromising a conservative, military feel.
- Website menus were not user-friendly, or even usable, on a mobile device.
Results of the Website Redesign:
- Website traffic increased 29% since launch
- Fully responsive site for all templates created for The Citadel
- Successfully conveyed the message Dare to Lead through strong images in a fullwidth carousel
- Created editable widgets for the site in The Citadel’s preferred CMS
- SEO score increased 12.8%, from an initial score of 68.6 to 81.4 within a week of launch
- Video walkthroughs and access to help.energyhill.com (100% resolution rate for tickets submitted and a 77% FCR percentage)
- Migration of database from staging to production environment
- Created visual elements (icons and other graphics) to help guide user interaction to preferred content areas
Duration of the Project:
6 months
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Research Conducted
to Position The Citadel for Success
Our collaborative process started with researching the environment The Citadel was using and conducting interviews to aid in creating technical workflows for the project. The first stage in our process was used to create concepts based on the information gathered from our research.
Stage 1: Concepts created for The Citadel
The Citadel was suffering from a congested homepage that was not responsive and had information hierarchy issues. The Energyhill creative team quickly realized that creating a clean and full width responsive page would increase time on page and help users find pertinent information. From a technical standpoint the request was for three templates to be created. The templates created were: the homepage, the two column interior page, and the three column interior page. However, after further evaluation of the site there were more templates needed: article and news templates. Energyhill also created wireframes in this stage.
Stage 2: Modern Design for The Citadel Homepage
One of the main goals of the project was to create a clean and modern design for The Citadel homepage. Energyhill’s approach was to show three design options for The Citadel to choose from. After initial concepts, this creative stage allows the project to be focused and directed toward a viable solution for their website. This solution is shown in the format of mockups for any device (desktop, tablet, mobile). Although prototypes were not needed for this project they could have been used as well.
Stage 3: Deployment of The Citadel’s New Site
The expectation for development and deployment was to build out the three templates (homepage and two interior pages) as responsive pages. Energyhill was able to surpass this by creating additional solutions than originally requested. The carousel was created to allow for swiping slides for mobile and tablet interfaces. New responsive modules were created to allow for ease in updating the site. Google’s best practices were followed to aid in SEO. The navigation was rebuilt from the ground up to accommodate tablet and mobile as well as restructuring for a cleaner desktop experience. Created a succinct push list for working with The Citadel IT team as well as consulted during database migration.