The Challenge
When Eularis approached Bytanium Software for this project, they had very specific goals in mind.
Migrate existing content
All the existing content –available in two different languages, spread over one hundred pages, several hundred articles, multiple testimonials, case studies, conferences, speaking engagements and user profiles had to be copied to the new website. It was essential not to lose any information associated with those content items such as history, publication and modification dates, content ownership, permissions, etc.
The migration of the content could not cause external links pointing to the Eularis website to break. It was vital to issue a redirect on every affected URL, preserving that way, Eularis’ link popularity.
Port existing functionality
Eularis.com had been enriched with three custom modules and over twenty user controls. All this functionality would have to be ported to the new website.
Among the biggest challenges was the Knowledge Center, a collection of hundreds of highly valuable podcasts, videos, reports and articles created by Dr. Andrée Bates and only available to website members. Anonymous visitors could only see summaries of these documents, while registered users had full access to the Knowledge Center, being able to not only browse, but search through all these resources using advanced filtering criteria.
With all that valuable information available to website members, it was no surprise that the sign-up process had been tightened. Eularis was using a custom user registration workflow that involved verification and approval of users prior to granting access to protected resources. All this custom logic was perfectly integrated into the existing membership module and had to be brought to the new website as well.
While the Knowledge Center was the main attraction for website users, there was also a hidden gem in the backend of their website: a custom Analytics module. In an attempt to satisfy the commitment of Eularis executives to deliver relevant, personalized content to every single member of their website, they had built and integrated this brilliant, powerful component deeply into the core of Sitefinity. Migrating and improving this complex tool was also part of the job.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
For a business with a prominent web presence like Eularis, search engine performance is crucial to success. Therefore, Eularis was determined to take advantage of the relaunch to improve their search engine rankings as well. The strategy, provided by a top SEO firm, included a lot of specific on-site optimizations such as:
- Optimizing content (URLs, page titles, headers, meta tags, alt tags, and internal linking).
- Reducing page load time through the use of CSS sprites, HTTP compression, browser cache, etc.
Creating HTML and XML site maps to improve and monitor the indexing process.
- Integrating the website with social media.
The Solution
One by one, Bytanium Software tackled all the requirements. The development team faced complex scenarios that put to the test their creativity and the capabilities of Sitefinity 4 as an enterprise CMS. The custom modules and widgets that were created as part of the project made extensive use of the new API, validating, at the same time, the extensibility framework offered by the new version of Sitefinity.
While the project was in progress, Eularis’ stakeholders decided to allow content editors and translators to edit content within the website. This introduced a new challenge: the backend had to be configured in such a way that translators and other non-technical staff could do their jobs easily without breaking the website that was under development. Fortunately, Sitefinity makes this kind of setup simple; a few clicks later it was ready.
On the delivery date, Eularis received the new, shinning website they had imagined three months earlier. It was a fully customized, search engine optimized, flexible and user friendly solution based on the latest Sitefinity version available at the time: 4.1 SP3.
As part of the transition, Bytanium Software also trained Eularis’ staff on how to use their new platform.
The Results
In September 2011, Eularis announced the relaunch of their website in a special newsletter issue. By the end of the day, the president of Eularis had received multiple laudatory comments from website members, including a highly appreciated email from the vice president of GlaxoSmithKline Japan, qualifying the new website as ‘a quantum leap, the site is splendid and so easy to navigate; it is already in my bookmark list!’. It was the best possible confirmation that the ultimate goal –customer satisfaction- had been achieved.
Since then, traffic has been growing consistently and weekly SEO reports bring nothing but good news.