IA and site migration for Zurich Municipal, Engineering and News and Insight
Overview
​
Zurich Municipal provides insurance for public sector institutions, from schools and councils to hospitals, and oversees engineering services that assess the risk of the buildings they insure. They also run an industry news and information hub, News and Insight.
​
The project involved replatforming three key sites—the main municipal site, the engineering services site, and News and Insight—onto an upgraded version of Sitecore. This included revising copy, imagery, information architecture (IA), and design. The goal was to integrate all sites under the Zurich.co.uk umbrella, requiring careful consideration of user journeys and IA.
​
With strong involvement from legal and compliance teams, I managed the projects end-to-end—from defining the scope and conducting card sorting and tree testing with end users, to delivering updated designs, content, images, and redirect mapping. My aim was to enhance the user experience, ensuring that the often-overlooked valuable content was easily accessible and engaging.
​
These projects also involved close collaboration with the brand team to ensure that the user journeys aligned seamlessly with ongoing brand campaigns, creating a smooth and cohesive experience for the user.
Step 1: Defining and explaining the process to the business
In every web migration project, I follow a core 7-step process, which may adapt slightly depending on specific project needs:
-
Site Review & IA Setup
Assess the current site structure, IA, and navigation. Identify existing content and determine necessary redirects. Frame a new IA and navigation strategy. -
Design
This phase involves content design, template design, and creating low-fidelity wireframes. Once templates are agreed upon, I integrate content and develop a prototype to visualize the user journey. -
Testing
Conduct user testing on the prototype, iterate on designs based on feedback, and re-test. Feedback is presented to stakeholders, explaining the reasoning behind design decisions. -
Build
Work closely with development and CMS teams to build the site in a UAT environment, testing and tweaking as necessary, before preparing for production. -
Sign-Off
Plan sign-off early in the project timeline. Depending on stakeholder involvement (technical, legal, compliance, brand teams), sign-off can be straightforward or more complex, and it’s crucial to factor this in to avoid delays. -
Launch
Execute a launch plan, typically early in the morning, with a team to monitor and fix any issues before the site goes live to the wider audience. -
Ongoing Optimisation
After launch, continuous monitoring and analysis of site performance is crucial. Whether in-house or in a consultancy role, I ensure that the team is set up to track performance and drive ongoing improvements.
Step 2: Content audit, URL mapping and IA
Site Audit and Content Strategy for Web Migration
​
To begin the migration, I crawled each site to assess the existing pages, collaborating closely with the business to review content. The engineering site, in particular, had been neglected for a while, and I identified many outdated or legally non-compliant pages.
Working with legal, financial promotions, and marketing teams, we conducted a thorough audit, agreeing on which pages should be removed, updated, or created. Each page also required sign-off from stakeholders, making this process quite detailed and time-consuming.
​
Once the content was agreed upon, I worked with the SEO team to map redirects and establish new URLs. From there, I developed a comprehensive IA map outlining how each site area would be organized under the main Zurich umbrella.
Step 3: Navigation and page templates
Redesigning Navigation & Templates for Zurich Municipal
​
With the new IA in place, I redesigned the navigation for the main .co.uk site to ensure clear, user-friendly paths between different sections. Each site’s navigation was tailored to reflect its unique content while maintaining consistency across the user journey.
I then began wireframing and designing new page templates and components for both the Municipal and Engineering sites.
​
For the News and Insight section, I developed separate templates to restructure content into categorised "buckets," colour-code subject areas, enable tagging, and allow content to be assigned to specific areas. I also prioritized making the CMS UX just as seamless as the front-end user experience, ensuring editors could easily feature and personalize content.
Step 4: Imagery and alt text
Imagery Overhaul & Content Population for Zurich Municipal
​
Each page required new, inclusive imagery aligned with the updated brand templates, which was a significant shift from the traditional, less inclusive imagery used on older financial services and engineering sites. This change was a key part of the project, aiming to reflect Zurich's more modern, inclusive brand.
​
All imagery was approved by the marketing team before the CMS team populated the pages and updated document libraries, as both the Municipal and Engineering sites require numerous downloadable resources.
​
With everything in place, we were ready for launch, and the process went smoothly.