Australian Golf Digest
On Par For Excellence
Optimised performance and a sleek new website design for one of Australia’s premier golfing magazines.
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THE CHALLENGE

The need for speed

Australian Golf Digest (AGD) is one of Australia’s premier golfing magazines with an enormous online readership. However, when they came to us, the overall user experience was suffering due to performance issues and outdated design. Due to the nature of their news content and large readership base, traffic spikes were not uncommon. As a result, long load-times and site crashes were a common frustration that needed to be addressed.

On the administration side of things, there were several inefficiencies and limitations that required a solution as well. In addition to a re-organisation of content and site structure, there were over 11,000 URLs that had to be migrated, redirected, protected (for SEO’s sake) and accounted for. We definitely had our work cut out for us!

In addition to migrating AGD’s existing content into a custom WordPress build, we were adding several third party integrations and flexible functional options into the site to help modernise and future proof the site as much as possible.

Monetising AGD’s content was also a significant priority; so there was a paywall integration, video pre-roll advertising and integration of the latest ad units throughout the content.

WHAT DID WE DO?

What didn’t we do!

We started the same way we do every website project: at the end. Through several workshops we scoped-out the site’s functionality, looking at AGD’s objectives asking, “what does success look like?”.

We worked to understand their target audience through desk research, analytics, competitive analysis and discovery workshops. Then, based on some key insights, we set about re-working the navigation and content organisation to benefit both front-end website users and back-end content managers.

We developed a huge library of reusable components that provided flexibility over design, layouts, functionality and content management; all while working tirelessly to ensure pixel-perfect delivery.

As you may imagine, migrating over 11,000 URLs is no small feat. Organic search rankings are important to all websites; and AGD are no exception. To protect things as much as possible, a highly detailed site migration and redirection strategy was developed and implemented to protect things as much as possible.

And then, we made the whole thing fast.

Wireframe sketches showing flow of website modules.
Laptop user with Australian Golf Digest article displayed on screen.
Subscribers only paywall screen on mobile.

WHAT HAPPENED?

Every target we set, we exceeded

We like to let our work speak for itself, so here are some of the numbers:

  • 48% reduction in average page load speed
  • Stable organic search rankings and even a few improvements
  • Zero 404 errors after launch
  • Reduced bounce rate by almost 3% sitewide
  • Increased engagement with the site, shown through increased: traffic, new users, pages per session and time on site

(Information accurate at the time of writing.)

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0%
Reduction in avg. page load speed
0+
URLs migrated (with zero 404 errors)
0%
Bounce rate reduction sitewide
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Website mockup showing homepage after redesign
Website mockup showing homepage before redesign

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