The challenge
The organization's WordPress site was managed by an outside vendor, so even small updates were slow to happen. The site was slow, worked poorly on phones, and offered almost no visibility into who was visiting or why. Donations ran through a third-party platform with high fees and forms that couldn't be customized to match campaigns or the brand.
What I built
A fast, modern site rebuilt from the ground up and owned by the organization:
- Mobile-first design with an interactive program map, outcomes data, success stories, and location pages
- A content management system so staff can update content without a vendor
- Custom donation forms with lower processing fees, built for each campaign
- Analytics (GA4), technical SEO, and optimization for AI search engines built in from day one
- Automated uptime and performance monitoring that alerts before visitors notice a problem
Results
- Website traffic up 47%
- Donation processing fees cut from 10% to 2.9%, which keeps about $7,100 more per $100,000 donated going to the mission
- Non-technical staff update the site themselves through the CMS, with no vendor queue
- Full visibility into traffic, sources, and conversions where there was almost none before
- Launched the first week of August 2026, about six months after kickoff