The Chapel's 2024 Website Redesign
The Chapel in Sandusky, Ohio re-branded their church in 2020, right at the foot of the COVID-19 pandemic. At that time, a "branding to-do list" scribbled on a whiteboard in their office had the line item "Move Site to WordPress" on it. In 2024, we finally got to cross that task off their list!
Their were two main issues with The Chapel's previous site. First is that the site's backend was not set up appropriately to make managing the site simple, repeatable, or manageable. The second was that the site's navigation needed a complete overhaul.
Navigation is such a challenge for many nonprofits because they are known for covering such a wide array of topics and information. For The Chapel, that not only means having information about staff, locations, service times, and an archive of previous weekend messages. It also means having a calendar of events, information about study groups, ministries and volunteering, and even touching on outreach and partners. This complexity means finding a good way to organize a massive amount of information.
The project began in 2023 by first outlining all of the content and pages that needed covered and coming up with a rough sitemap. With over 60 pages in the initial sitemap, there was a ton of ground to cover! This sitemap was then condensed into a rough menu structure, and then the project was off to the races.
We then prioritized pages. Since not every page can get the same amount of attention, we selected about 10-or-so pages to focus on designs for, and then would design re-usable elements and structure for other pages on the site. The first of these was the menu design, which we wanted to keep compact but still full, so we decided to go with a hidden mega menu that reveals the menu structure. We structured the menu to follow the journey of a church goer by using verbs that would describe the path of someone learning about Jesus - Visit containing information for someone who may be attending church for the first time, engage containing information about how to get more involved with the church, and serve indicating how to take that next step and impact lives inside and outside of the church walls.
We designed customized templates and reusable components as well as a design language for the site that makes the site easily manageable and unites the style of all the pages on the site, keeping them consistent and reliable. We also implemented many custom solutions in the site, such as a script that automatically adds weekend messages to the site from their youtube channel, or a "Watch Live" page that automatically updates with the next livestream as they post it on their youtube channel. We also implemented an event manager to manage events, classes, and group meetings happening throughout the church and display them across the site.
This site is one major undertaking, and we only have plans to make it better in the future! A website like this is meant to live and breath and constantly change, and we're excited to see how this one will change over time.
