Everyone knows that a company’s website is one of the most important assets in their ecosystem and engagement model. It becomes a recurring touchpoint in the customer journey and must deliver a high quality experience to each user and their unique needs in order to reinforce the overall brand promise. Here at Acquia, our team was recently faced with a challenging project involving our very own Acquia.com. Our task was to upgrade our website from Drupal 7 to Drupal 8, as well as undergo a total redesign to align to a new brand positioning and deliver a better experience to all visitors. Anyone who has gone through an upgrade/redesign project knows that it is a massive undertaking and requires a combination of skills, planning, and nerves to get through it. We all learn important lessons, and walk away wishing we knew then what we know now. In this webinar we will to discuss the key learnings from our Acquia.com redesign project so you can gain from our experiences and apply them to your next big project. Join Eric Williamson VP of Digital Marketing, Adrianna Shukla Web Operations Manager and Jeff Reed Senior Solutions Manager, Professional Services as they provide an overview of the lessons they learned with our recent redesign project. They will talk through the good, bad, and the ugly and host a Q&A in an effort to pass along our learnings to you.

1. I F W E K N E W T H E N W H A T W E K N O W
N O W
Eric Williamson, VP Digital Marketing
Adrianna Shukla, Web Operations Manager
Jeff Reed, Senior Solutions Manager
Stephen Dix, Technical Architect
Upgrading & Redesigning
Acquia.com

2. The Role of Acquia.com

3. The Center
of Everything
The Biggest
Lead
Source
The First
Introduction
& Opportunity

4. 2007 2011 2013
2014 2016 2017
Acquia.com Over the Years

5. P E R S O N A L I Z E D B Y A C Q U I A L I F T
Walking the Walk

6. A Few Things We Got Right

7. The
Brief
Making the
investment
case
Picking the
Right Team
The Pregame Effort

8. Document a North
Star
Include all
stakeholders in the
initial buy-in
Have an inclusive and
proper timeline – Gantt
Chart
Pick your promises
Make known the value
in the project – Long
Term & Short Term
Staying up to date
with latest
technologies is always
more scalable for the
future
Self – Team
awareness Augment
appropriately
Proper resourcing and
padded time frame
Think of all roles,
include development
and non-development
positions in all phases
of the project

9. Architect simple
conversion paths
Let the data
lead you
Prepare
for change
Taming the Content Sprawl
Migration not
1 to 1

10. Relevant
Cross
Promotion and
Linking
One Click to a
Conversion
Let the customers
lead decisions
Simplify - Audit
Functionality -
Less Custom
Modules
Have an upgrade
Path for Custom
Modules
Migration Paths
available for
Content Types,
Field Definitions,
Rank your
Content Audit
with the SEO
and Customer
Benefit
Unique Views,
Bounce rate,
Engagement
Levels
Set expectations
upfront
Implement new
processes and
governance
Keep Modules
up to Date and
Schedule time
for updates
Prepare for no
direct migration
path for certain
modules

11. Keep it
Simple Stupid
Build around it.
Not an add-on
Focus on
conversion path
Implementing Personalizaiton (Lift)

12. Don’t over complicate,
keep simple
personalization paths
to start
Achievable phases
and set the
expectation upfront
Personalize with
Products/Information
they are interested in
and location they are
coming from - Simple
Conversions to Start
Scale to future needs
Define your technical
AND content
architecture
Use paragraphs
module for scalability
and maintenance for
personalization, A/B
testing and
internationalization
One step to
conversions
Tracking and data is
important to make
sure there is no drop
off

13. A Few Things We Got Wrong

14. Spanning D7 and
D8 in sections
Potential redirect
404 whack-o-mole
Much Empty

15. Do a complete audit of the website including:
Custom Modules, Views, Admin Content Listing,
Blocks, Redirects
Don’t run two architectures at the same time
Have proper SEO plans in advance for URL
migration
Migrate existing redirects

16. “Damn...we should have integrated
DAM before the migration” — Dave Pierce
UI Integration up-front.
Build from DAM.
Power editorial and gated
assets and imagery from
DAM.
DAM Integration

17. Imagery Source and Gated Repository for Sales and Marketing
Distribution center for the company
One source document for changes – no need for searching
One stop for new style guide

18. “Ready for launch”
“Migration”
(Developers) (Marketers)
Speaking the Same Language

19. Make sure you have a well thought out timeline that includes:
Preplanning, Design, Development, Migration, Content Rework
and QA
Build in steady reviews with the full team so that you are all on
the same page.
Make sure you always accommodate for extra time for bugs
and pop up “extra requests” – Test early and Test often
Using the same content across the old to new site – never
happens – be prepared.

20. The Early Results are in

21. Traffic slightly down (-10%)
Conversion rate up (+50%)
Lift powered content
outperforming
control (+20-40%)

22. Thank You