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Submitted By Agency Partner –  Okam

How Vanier College Unified and Enhanced Its Digital Presence with Okam

Vanier College faced the challenge of unifying its fragmented web presence. The need for a cohesive and efficient solution became paramount with numerous accounts/microsites managed by different internal teams. They partnered with Okam to transform their digital infrastructure using Directus.

Project Overview

Objectives

Vanier College aimed to achieve the following:

  • Unify all web content on a single platform to provide flexibility and ease of use.

  • Centralize all sub-platforms into one cohesive system to streamline management and improve efficiency.

  • Simplify navigation for quick and intuitive access to information.

  • Prioritize content for prospective students while maintaining effective communication with other users.

  • Improve mobile responsiveness to ensure a consistent user experience across all devices.

  • Ensure online accessibility standards are met, allowing everyone to navigate the platform easily.

Strategy

The strategy involved transitioning from WordPress to Directus to leverage its flexibility in content management and its capacity to integrate with modern technologies like React and Next.js, enabling more interactive user experiences.

  • Directus Implementation: Centralized all content on Directus, streamlining content management and enhancing flexibility. Its user-friendly interface enabled the standardization of content entry and page building.

  • Headless CMS and Front-End: Combined with Directus, it provides performance, flexibility, and security, enhancing user experience and simplifying maintenance and scalability.

  • Design System with Storybook: Facilitated collaboration between developers and designers through reusable components, ensuring design consistency across the site and optimizing development and maintenance.

  • AI-Assisted Migration: Combined web scraping with large language models (LLM) to automate and optimize the migration process for specific sections with structured content, such as blog articles, events, articles, courses and so on.

CMS Programs

How Directus Simplified the Structure

Directus's features played a critical role in simplifying the site's structure:

  • Centralized Management: By consolidating all content into Directus, the platform eliminated the complexity of managing multiple systems, allowing for a streamlined approach to content updates and maintenance.

  • Flexible Content Modeling: Directus's flexible schema allowed for easy adaptation and organization of content, catering to the specific needs of different user personas.

  • User-Friendly Interface: The interface simplified the process for non-technical users to manage content, ensuring that updates could be made quickly and efficiently without extensive technical knowledge.

CMS Course

"The challenge was considerable in simplifying navigation and consolidating numerous subsites into a single, integrated platform. Okam was sensitive to our users' needs and provided valuable advice and guidance. With their support, we met our objective of creating a mobile-first, streamlined site with longevity, discoverability and uniformity top of mind."
- Isabelle Moncion, Director of Communications and Corporate Affairs

Results

Implementing headless technology transformed the site's performance, making it faster and more secure. The navigation was redesigned to offer a smooth and intuitive experience, allowing users to find what they need quickly.

In the first 10 weeks after the launch, preliminary results showed:

  • A 19.4% increase in active users

  • A 26.8% rise in new users

  • A 21% increase in active users on mobile

  • User engagement was up by 26.6%

Content prioritization: Essential information for students is now prominently featured. The site's responsive platform fully optimizes mobile access, minimizing UX frustrations.

Nav Mobile

Finally, we successfully centralized and optimized the content in both the front-end and CMS and enhanced the relevance of available information.

Conclusion

The redesign of Vanier College's web platform not only resolved initial issues but also transformed the site into a dynamic, user-centred tool, intending to enhance engagement with prospective students. Directus was instrumental in achieving these objectives, providing the tools for effective and adaptable content management.