Umbraco CMS Upgrade and Website Redesign

Old Dominion Athletic Foundation

The Old Dominion Athletic Foundation (ODAF) was established in 1964 with the mission to raise financial support for ODU Athletics and ensure their coaches and student athletes have the necessary resources to compete for championships. The organization is the channel through which fans and alumni can partner with coaches and the student athletes to support the advancement of the ODU Athletics program.

Through the generous efforts of their donors, loyal fanbase, and the community, the ODAF is able to provide funding for student athletic scholarships and endowments, capital projects, program-specific support, and athletic operations. For over 60 years, the ODAF has been dedicated to investing in the lives of ODU student athletes, and because of their supporters, they are creating winners in the classroom, in athletic competition, and in life.

Overview

Originally in 2016, the ODAF was looking to build a new website with custom features that would allow them to connect and engage in more meaningful ways with their students, fans, and alumni. Together, we designed, developed, and launched a new ODAF website using the Umbraco content management system (CMS) with features to support marketing efforts, ticket sales, donations, and social media engagement.

The flexibility, security, and scalability of the Umbraco CMS allows us to build websites that can stand the test of time, providing years of ROI to clients. However, design trends, UX best practices, and technology advancements wait for no one. Fast forward 7 years and several championships later – Go Big Blue! – the time for a full Umbraco CMS upgrade was in order for the ODAF website. As it turned out, it was also the perfect opportunity to review, redesign, and enhance the overall user experience of the site.

Challenge

Our goal was to design and develop a fresh look and feel for the website while also improving the functionality of the parking request process and overall website usability. These enhancements would then be implemented as part of a full Umbraco CMS upgrade.

Solution

Our team collaborated with stakeholders to discover how their goals for the website had evolved over the years and to explore user behavior and feedback. We created new responsive layouts overlaid with a revitalized, vibrant UI, and determined an updated UX strategy that made it easy for ODAF website visitors to find the content they need; complete important tasks such as viewing events, buying tickets, making donations, and requesting parking; and become more engaged overall with the organization and their mission. 

The Umbraco CMS was then upgraded from version 7 to 10, which is considered a full rebuild consisting of refactoring code from the .NET framework to .NET core, and required several stages of database migrations. During the upgrade, the new styles and feature enhancements were built in and ensured to comply with updated ADA guidelines.

Results

Our work provided ODAF with a redesigned, up-to-date, and secure Umbraco website with more flexibility and content customization, optimized performance and speed, improved usability, streamlined and intuitive task completion, and a sustainable online presence that can grow with them and their supporters for years to come.

Features

  • Improved security 
  • Long-term software support for the Umbraco CMS
  • Full responsiveness
  • Enhanced usability
  • Enhanced interactive parking request form
  • Donation tracker 
  • ADA compliance