Southcentral Foundation WordPress Conversion

Newly launched Southcentral Foundation website, built in WordPress

Project Description

Old SCF website

Southcentral Foundation wanted to get more from their website. Built in non-responsive HTML without a Content Management System meant that all changes had to be handled by one web person and adding additional functionality would be difficult and costly. After taking our WordPress Work Shop, they decided to make the leap to WordPress. Contracting with SWS to handle this custom conversion, we handled their scale, complexity and precise design needs and built a custom WordPress website. Some of the highlights of the project include:

Challenge: Enable staff with varied technological skills to edit website content.
Solutions: We employed a combination of solutions for this particular challenge, including:

• Easy custom page layouts: we extended the built-in WordPress editor with a Visual Composer tool that enables in-page multicolumn layouts, thus removing the need to deal with confusing widgets. This way, staff can edit all content within the page.
• Custom user roles and permissions: With a large number of staff working in the site, it was paramount that users only be given access to the tools that they need to accomplish their particular job. We modified the built-in WordPress roles and locked down the admin area according to user type.
• Seminar training: We presented a complete walk through of the new website while all staff followed along in their own user account, practicing all of their tasks and getting to know where things are.

Challenge: Convert large Dreamweaver site to a mobile ready WordPress theme.
Solutions: The sheer number of pages and departments involved in this website required extra care and functionality beyond a typical WordPress site, including:

• Backend page navigation tool: We modified the WordPress admin to include a page tree so that all pages could be seen in a one page table of contents.

Challenge: Integrate ColdFusion applications from local network.
Solutions: To enable the IT department to manage various applications and data sources in-house we:

• Created a static HTML template: Identical to the WordPress website, this template is applied to pages hosted in-house to create a seamless user experience
• Embedded data via iFrames: For static data, iFrames were used to pull in information from the in-house servers.

Challenge: Ensure website integrity and security according to rigorous company standards.
Solutions: We added additional security features to the SCF WordPress website:

• CloudProxy “Firewall”: This provides a shield of defense to the outside world, which reduces brute force attacks, destributed denial of service (DDoS) attempts, hacking and malware attempts.
• HTTPS enabled: The entire website is encrypted via SSL.
• Password security: Complex password requirements and password expiration.