SCALABILITY AND AUTOMATION FOR AN INSTITUTIONAL WEB
CLIENT
EU Conference
TEAM
PM, Web & Backend Devs, QA and stakeholders
YEAR
2023
Built a bulletproof CMS and automated manual workflows for an EU institutional platform.
(One minute overview)
THE CHALLENGE
An institutional platform facing unsustainable maintenance. Every year, uploading new content broke the UI. Furthermore, event operations were entirely manual: attendees were validated one by one by reading emails, and the digital agenda couldn’t link talks directly to speaker profiles.
THE SOLUTION
We designed a system from the inside out. We created modular CMS templates to protect the website from editing failures. We automated registration by connecting the form to the database and pivoted the architecture mid-project to create a bidirectional navigation flow (Agenda ↔ Speaker).
KEY APROXIMATED RESULTS
(Project details)
01. DESIGNING FOR THE INTERNAL CLIENT
Every time they tried to update the «Past Editions» section, the site collapsed: broken images, misaligned text, and an infinite scroll because speakers were stacked vertically.
The solution was a «bulletproof» design. The result was drastic: the client now takes 60% less time to upload content, and visual bugs in production dropped by 90%.
Semi-automated templates
We created a modular system with locked fields in the CMS. The client no longer builds layouts; they just fill in data. Through strategic meetings with the client, we built a preliminary page design, confirming that the modular approach would solve the issue.
Visual scalability
We replaced the vertical speakers list with dynamic carousels. To ensure accessibility for these carousels, we implemented clear pagination controls and a «view all» button that led to a general page featuring all speakers (grid layout).
02. "KILL YOUR EGO": THE AGENDA'S TECHNICAL PIVOT
Initially, we developed the speaker bios as pop-ups (modals). This decision met the project specs perfectly: users could quickly read who the speaker was without leaving the main page. It was validated and ready to go.
However, while mocking up the agenda in dev, an immovable requirement arrived: we needed to directly link each talk on the agenda to its corresponding speakers. Since pop-ups don’t have their own URLs, that cross-linking was impossible.
We had to pivot fast and without ego. Together with the developers, we realized the best solution was to throw the modal work out the window and transform the architecture into dedicated pages (PDPs). We used the new space on these pages to integrate a dynamic block showing the time, date, and name of that guest’s talk. This circular flow (Agenda ↔ Speaker) helped increase page views per session by 35%.
03. FROM MANUAL BOTTLENECK TO AUTOMATION
Both event registration and inquiries were handled through a single generic form. The organizing team had to filter through the submitted requests to decide who met the requirements to attend. So we designed an automated onboarding process. In one stroke, we eliminated 75% of the event team’s manual validation workload.
Smart filtering with a safety net
We connected the form to the database to automatically approve or reject registered participants based on defined parameters. To avoid ‘false negatives’, we designed a third ‘Pending review’ state, sending only doubtful or appealed cases to a manual queue.
Uncertainty reduction
We added an explanatory event page (address, how to get there, requirements, and prep) and a countdown on the Home page that boosted early registrations by 40%.
04. KEY TAKEAWAYS
01. Design must survive the designer
Designing rigid templates might feel limiting, but when a project requires maintenance by non-technical profiles, it’s the absolute best way to ensure the product doesn’t degrade over time.
02. Flexibility above all
This project taught me the importance of being able to quickly and optimally discard an idea when technical or business needs change.