Making History with an Interactive Digital Experience
About
The Washington State Historical Society is an important connection point to the past. Its website is home to enormous amounts of content and is a resource for a variety of organizations, departments, and individuals across the state of Washington.
Problem Overview
The Society has vividly presented Washington’s rich and storied history through in-person events and exhibitions for over a century. Together we created a robust digital experience with an upgraded infrastructure and search experience to engage a diverse set of users and improve accessibility for the website and its growing collection database of 117,000 records accessible to the public.
Developing a Digital Destination
As the Washington State Historical Society moved through its second century of service, SiteCrafting wanted to help redesign the digital experience so people could connect with the information they were looking for quickly and easily — and so the Washington State Historical Society could realize its vision to be the recognized destination for Washington State history.
A Content Roadmap to the Future
More than 200 years of photographs, documents, and information make for massive amounts of content. Our team worked alongside the Washington State Historical Society in workshops, audits, and stakeholder interviews to develop personas and information architecture to guide the design and organization of the redesigned website. Content patterns and a content strategy framework helped simplify the process and guided the team through the content transfer process.
Improving Access to Archives and Information
The Washington State Historical Society collections database includes more than 115,000 records. As the main point of access for archival material, it was essential that the database be searchable and reliable. SiteCrafting’s team developed a replica database for collections and website search that is secured and hosted separately. The replica database means the collection items can be displayed more efficiently and flexibly through the website. If something happens to the internal database, the replica database ensures the website isn’t impacted.
Elevated and Integrated Search
The website’s previous search was inconsistent for website visitors. SiteCrafting’s development team updated the search experience with SiteCrafting’s product Sitka Insights to create a streamlined, easy-to-use website search experience that displays website results in tandem with collections results that match the search query. Sitka Insights gives the Washington State Historical Society the ability to organize search results and evaluate search behavior on the website to inform updates and changes.
A Website to Explore How History Connects Us All
At its core, the work for the Washington State Historical Society was about prioritizing user experience and creating a modern digital experience that could help connect people with Washington State history. SiteCrafting’s work for the Washington State Historical Society team is evolving and ongoing to help it serve as Washington State’s primary source for history.
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