DIXIE.COM
The site redesign of an iconic American brand exceeded every success metric.
COMPANY
Droga5
CLIENT
Dixie
SERVICES
Content Strategy
Information Architecture
Content Development
YEAR
2016
—
Dixie, the renown paper-ware company, wanted to incorporate the new "Be More Here" brand platform into its primary communications channel: the company website. Instead of adding a brand page as originally scoped, we convinced them the site needed a complete redesign. Part product catalog, part brand story, part content hub, the new Dixie.com exceeded every KPI, and led to an 820% increase in newsletter sign-ups.
The map is the territory.
The first order of business was to audit legacy content and organize potential storylines thematically to inform the site architecture. Next, I performed an asset gap analysis to assess which content we should reuse as-is, repurpose with changes, create from scratch or retire.
Ensuring all content earns its keep.
Key content themes were reflected in the flat site architecture. Page-level messaging hierarchies defined business and content objectives, creating a blueprint for the user experience, visual design and copy. The exercise ensured every content component had a reason for being, that every item on the content map had a home, and that the overall experience was balanced.
One asset, many applications.
A kit-of-parts approach enabled content to be disassembled and reassembled to create new information products based on context, providing more value out of each asset. The backend featured a mix of exact and ambiguous classification schemes so that content could be grouped by meaningful relationships.
Mining for content gold.
Although an “About” page was originally out of scope, we were fascinated by Dixie’s rich corporate history, with its origins in the influenza pandemic of 1918. So we sent a researcher to the archives at Lafayette College to dig up interesting artifacts, like the Mad Men-era disposable martini set, and important milestones, like the Saul Bass logo redesign of 1969. To make “Our Story” happen, we re-skinned the “All Products” page and avoided costly photoshoots with fun illustrated designs.
Designed with upkeep in mind.
To grow the content hub, we needed to consistently publish content that our readers enjoyed reading. To stretch the budget, we stipulated an inverse relationship between the level of effort required to produce a content type and its publishing frequency. In general, the less costly the content, the more frequently we were slated to publish it. Over the course of the next year, we experimented with different formats and cadences to find the best frequency for our users.
The Year-Over-Year Effect?
More time on site, pages viewed per session and a reduction in bounce rate.
+111%
Average time on “Our Story” page.
+38%
Average session duration on site.
+104%
E-Comm vendor interactions.
+820%
E-mail opt in confirmation page views.