TL;DR
We migrated the 2EA website, along with all of its content and data, over to WordPress from the previous Ballyhoo Refresh platform.
Project Overview
We created the 2EA website over 10 years ago using Ballyhoo Refresh, however the platform is no longer being supported and therefore 2EA needed to be migrated to another platform. We carried out the website migration to WordPress, ensuring that the site’s content and data stayed intact and the site maintained its features.
Who are 2EA?
With over 25 years experience, 2EA are energy management consultants who provide advice and guidance on the legalities of energy legislation, and implementing these requirements. 2EA works with a range of clients in both the public and private sectors, including supermarkets, hotels, hospitals, and schools.
Project Brief
2EA needed their website to be migrated to WordPress whilst still maintaining it’s functionality and content. Their migration also needed to include:
- Admin access to add and change content;
- Easier and more flexible content management;
- The ability to extend functionality with plugins.
Our Proposal
Based on the project brief, we identified key deliverables:
- Migrate the website to WordPress;
- Provide enhanced security and spam protection;
- Improve search engine optimisation;
Look & Feel
Whilst migrating the 2EA website to WordPress, we needed to maintain the look and feel of the website and its branding. We had already created the 2EA branding nearly 10 years ago, with a simple logo and green colourway, that is now well-known amongst their customers. Therefore, it was integral that this stayed the same on the new website platform.
The Technical Details
The first stage of the migration involved migrating content from the old site to a secure development area. We developed a custom script to export all content from the old site in a format suitable for the in-built WordPress content importer, which handled moving all content and embedded media.
We then began to re-engineer the Ballyhoo Refresh template to convert to a clean and completely custom WordPress theme. We also carefully documented the URL of all of the original content and mapped that to the URL structure dictated by WordPress; we wanted to let WordPress do it’s thing in terms of generating search engine friendly URLs but at the same time we wanted to ensure search rankings didn’t take a hit when the site was moved. We therefore set up a series of redirects where any URLs differed.
During the website migration, we made backups of the website to ensure that if we ran into any issues, we would have the original website at the tip of our fingers.
We placed the website on the WordPress platform, on our own Green servers here in the UK. Our servers have plenty of storage and bandwidth to function, scale and grow, and are monitored around the clock meaning there is no downtime for your business.
- #WordPress
- #HTML5
- #CSS3
- #JavaScript
Since migrating the website, we’ve achieved a 56% uplift in page views for 2EA, meaning that more users than ever are finding and their reading content. This shows that the website and it’s content is relevant to users, and is ranking well on Google.
Based on website page views for time periods Jan-June 2019 vs 2023.
SEO
Search engine rankings are vital to 2EA, as we have been creating content and working on their SEO strategy for many years. Therefore, when migrating the website we took extra steps to ensure that search engines continue to discover the website.
Beyond launch, WordPress now gives us more tools to easily help improve the site in terms of search engine optimisation including the ability to easily manage meta tags, page titles, image alt tags/descriptions and more.
SSL
We retained the SSL certificate that was on the previous 2EA website, ensuring that the website was safe and secure for users to browse. This also helps with Google search rankings.
Support & Maintenance
2EA are on our service level agreement package, where we offer ongoing support to ensure that WordPress and its plugins are kept continuously up-to-date. This ensures that the website and its plugins aren’t vulnerable to any security issues, and ensures website browsing is quick and seamless, further helping with SEO. They also benefit from our online marketing and strategy services to grow the site’s content and optimise for discoverability.
- #SASS
- #JQuery
Google Workspace
As Google Partners, we have the ability to manage clients’ Google Workspace accounts for them, helping organisations to build and run businesses more efficiently. Email accounts are configured on the client’s domain and users have access to Google’s suite of workplace collaboration tools including Google Docs and Google Meet.
Google’s Business Starter plan provides adequate features and storage for most businesses, but 2EA required extra storage and the ability to have shared Google Drives. We moved them to the Google Workspace Business Standard plan, which offers more storage (2TB compared to 30GB) to allow them to store important documents and certificates for their customers on a shared drive that admins can access, manage and update.
Being on Google Workspace has allowed 2EA to grow their business and save time and energy by streamlining the collaboration process.
How We Can Help
If you are looking to migrate your website to WordPress, or need a new WordPress website designed, get in touch now to see how we can help by calling us on 0121 295 5352, or sending an email to [email protected].
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