University of Rhode Island Foundation & Alumni Engagement (URIFAE)
Two new future-focused website projects boost connections and support for a dynamic public R2 research university
OVERVIEW
In recent years, The University of Rhode Island has earned national recognition for academic and athletic excellence, achieving year-over-year record enrollment and faculty growth.
To amplify these impressive achievements — and leverage the opportunities that they represent — we partnered with the university’s independent philanthropic and support partner, the University of Rhode Island Foundation & Alumni Engagement (URIFAE), for two ambitious digital projects:
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A comprehensive campaign aimed at making impactful investments in the university’s students, faculty, research, and facilities
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A new WordPress site for alumni and supporters that merged two related legacy sites
Projects
URI at a Glance
PAIN POINTS & CHALLENGES
The campaign website, which the client called “the most ambitious that the University has ever undertaken,” needed to elevate public perception of URI and raise participation and support from a global network of alumni and friends.
Both sites needed to provide a strong first impression for diverse audiences while clearly articulating the themes and human stories that resonate with the URI community, while highlighting the importance of staying involved and giving back.
Current user experiences were missing valuable opportunities to connect with alumni, donors, volunteers, and community members and derive maximum engagement through news, events, and success stories that matter most to users.
Important user functions like event registration and online giving had to seamlessly integrate with existing third-party provider platforms.
SOLUTIONS: STRATEGY MEETS CREATIVITY
The Campaign Site — Ambitious Goals Call for Ambitious Measures
Discovery
Step #1 in creating the campaign site was conducting a workshop to better understand this initiative’s content requirements and opportunities. Moving into design, we adapted URIFAE’s existing visual branding to better serve their needs on the web and the new WordPress campaign site.
Content Strategy & UX
Placing a spotlight on URI’s accomplishments, we organized the vast array of resources for the new site using five pillars — Student Access, The URI Learning Experience, Transformative Faculty Leadership, Innovative and Distinctive Programs, and Strategic Opportunities — with related stories tagged both by pillar and by their 11 individual colleges.
Viewers can now use those pillars to easily engage with information and personal impact stories that illustrate specific strengths, offerings, and opportunities — along with compelling calls to action for getting involved, volunteering, providing support at a range of levels targeted to a specific area of choice, and more.
We intentionally structured the architecture to address the need for alumni, faculty, and other internal stakeholders to have school-specific and program-specific content prominently displayed.
Flexible Solutions
While this project was initially intended to support a traditional launch event, the COVID-19 pandemic required revisions that turned the site into the central asset for a virtual campaign launch with related branded collateral materials.
Going forward, some of the more unique elements of this site — including a modern take on a real-time “fundraising thermometer” widget — can be repurposed in other ways to efficiently communicate quick visual bits of digestible data to visitors.
The site can now also smartly accommodate URIFAE’s growing content collection over time in a way that meets the needs of their various audiences, and encourages both new and ongoing financial support to sustain their initiatives over time.
The Alumni Site — A Welcoming Space for Lifelong “Rhody Rams”
Discovery
Leaning into the findings of stakeholder discussions, workshops, user interviews and surveys distributed to 1,000 alumni, we honed in on the issues that matter most to key audiences and the pain points users experienced with the legacy website.
The Most Compelling Content Topics
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Student/alumni success stories in specific/shared fields
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Present-day URI updates like campus news & rankings
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In-person events, stories of gifts/donations & virtual events
The Top Reasons for Giving
- A desire to help current students & programs
- Support for a specific program/initiative
- Feelings of pride for URI & a desire to give back to their alma mater
Web & UX Design
This valuable feedback guided us through creating user personas, a content audit, sitemap, wireframes, and the design, development, and launch of a more modern and focused digital experience. In the end, we’re proud that the new alumni site builds on the strengths of the merged legacy sites while supporting evolving organizational and user needs into the future.
