Rockharbor is an awesome church with an amazing team behind it. In the fall of 2017, Chad Coltman, the Director of Operations, partnered with our team to perform a website audit that included a user experience study alongside a content analysis to help shape their website design priorities. After hosting stakeholder interviews, researching over 150 church websites, and digesting our findings with the Rockharbor team, we came to the conclusion that their new website should:
- Use a funnel-based approach to content strategy
- Leverage a pillar page topic cluster content strategy for the main site structure
- Facilitate a simpler pathway to real, human engagement
- Have a thoughtful approach to assimilation for new members
Once we were aligned on priorities, we began our website road-mapping process. The road-mapping process included documenting project priorities, defining Rockharbor’s desired future state, identifying the appropriate technology stack, creating the final website architecture, and building out key wireframes. This process ensured that RockHarbor’s key stakeholders were aligned and that we had a clear path for content creation, design, and development.
As the roadmap gave us a cohesive plan, the design and development phase brought all of our hard work and planning to life! Rockharbor is a church that is marked by volunteerism, hospitality, and creativity, so we knew it was essential for the site design to have a very vibrant presence and for the user experience to be unique and engaging. As websites are often the first impressions of a church, it was important that the design reflected the heart and energy of Rockharbor visually. The use of video, gradients, and bold type was an integral part of this design. In certain areas of the site, the gradients are constantly shifting and rotating through an energetic palette to emphasize the energy that Rockharbor creates.
On the technical side, this website is very special. Built on Wordpress, our team was able to create a completely custom backend of the site where Rockharbor has full control to change content, images, page layouts, and colors without having to dive into code. With a click of a button, Rockharbor can easily manipulate the layout of a page and create a new design based on the library of elements we standardized with the RH team. We also worked with Joe Benson, IT Director, to integrate Church Community Builder for membership, Intercom for engagement, and a custom solution for the message video and audio archives.
We loved working with Rockharbor on this project and are so pleased with the final result. This project was an absolute blast and we are so excited to see how they use this as one of their primary communication and outreach tools.