Case Studies

Ironworks was engaged by American Cancer Society to redesign and rebuild their primary public-facing web property, Cancer.org. Ironworks’ challenge was to rebuild the existing site that had grown to over 20,000 pages. In designing how the new site should work, Ironworks was asked to create strategies around search, localization, metadata, content, accessibility and other aspects of the user experience. The Society requested that Ironworks provided a technology infrastructure and code platform that would not only serve Cancer.org, but upon which the Society could extend and manage many of its other web properties. Ironworks was also asked to integrate a new site architecture and design with a new content management system. The navigation and organization of the site needed improvement and business owners needed the ability to quickly and easily manage their content.

The site is built on a fully integrated UCM / .NET platform which can be leveraged by the Society as they move additional web properties to this infrastructure in the future.

A new content management system provides the Society with a website that can be easily maintained by all content contributors within the organization. Content contributors are now able to add, modify and publish their own content to the website without involving IT. This improves workflow, decreasing the time-to-market for content.

An OpenID "single sign-on" solution included in the infrastructure called "ACS Account" provides the capability for constituents to have a unified login across web properties as well as leading social media platforms like Facebook, Gmail, Yahoo, and other OpenID-supported services.

Site search is an important component of the new Cancer.org. For the search solution Ironworks implemented the Google Search Appliance and extended its functionality to include faceted search, predictive search, glossary matching and a localized search experience.

The project followed an Agile methodology, during which the combined ACS and Ironworks teams were able to benefit from a custom dashboard application integrated with Team Foundation Server.

The Society now has the tools to better manage, organize, and present its content. They also have a technology platform upon which to build and manage its web properties. End users now have a better organized, better performing, more functional, and more integrated web experience.