Merging five websites into a cohesive digital experience

Evolving Web partnered with the University of Georgia (UGA) to create a unified digital platform for the Georgia Center for Continuing Education and Hotel, an organization that brings together five distinct business units: a full-service hotel, two dining facilities, youth programs, continuing education courses, and a conference center. The goal was to merge five separate units within the University into a cohesive online presence that reflects the Center’s multifaceted offerings.

The new website is built with WordPress, using a block theme and the new WordPress editor experience, greatly improving the ease with which UGA staff can make updates. It streamlines user journeys by bringing all services and programs under one roof. Visitors can now more easily explore everything the Georgia Center offers and plan a more enriching experience. The site integrates third-party booking tools, highlights the Georgia Center’s dynamic programming, and aligns with UGA’s visual identity to reinforce its dual role as both an educational hub and a hospitality destination.

For more than 60 years, the University of Georgia Center for Continuing Education & Hotel has been a leader in professional education and hospitality. With on-site lodging, versatile conference facilities, and exceptional dining, the Georgia Center is a vibrant hub for non-credit continuing education, offering both online and in-person programs for youth and adults alike. Dedicated to fostering intellectual exchange, it welcomes learners, guests, and participants from the UGA community and far beyond.

The Georgia Center for Continuing Education and Hotel needed a unified digital presence that could serve its wide-ranging audiences, from conference attendees and hotel guests to lifelong learners and youth program participants. The primary goal was to consolidate its fragmented online presence into a single WordPress website that clearly communicates the full scope of its offerings. Just as importantly, the new site needed to reflect the Center’s dual identity as both an educational institution and a hospitality destination, all while staying true to the University of Georgia’s brand identity.

Each of the three original websites of the five business units operated independently, with unique content management system, structure, and audience needs. Merging them into one cohesive platform meant reconciling different priorities, tones, and workflows across departments. Maintaining a unified brand identity while allowing each unit to retain its unique character required a flexible yet consistent design approach. Additionally, the hospitality aspect of the Center introduced technical complexity not typical of higher education projects, most notably, the need to integrate third-party booking and rating tools for hotel and event services without compromising usability or performance.

We started with an in-depth discovery phase to better understand the Georgia Center’s diverse audiences across its five business units. Through questionnaires and focus groups, we mapped user journeys for each target group and identified overlapping needs and behaviors. This user-centered approach informs a website experience that balances consistency with flexibility, and provides a structure that honors the unique goals of each unit.

The new website offers a consistent user experience across subdomains, with structured content pages, intuitive navigation, and strategic wayfinding that “speaks their language.” Visitors can move between hotel bookings, course registration, and event information without losing their place.

Our work included:

• Conducting a comprehensive discovery phase using questionnaires and focus groups.
• Developing detailed user journeys to support information architecture and design.
• Modernizing the visual design with more imagery and alignment to UGA branding.
• Creating consistent primary navigation that supports seamless movement across business units.
• Incorporating personalized labels and wayfinding to keep users oriented.
• Emphasizing calls to action and integrating third-party booking and rating tools.
• Building flexible structured pages and templates using the WordPress block editor, and displaying content from fields directly in the visual editor, providing a true WYSIWYG editing experience.
• Improving the site’s information architecture with a multi-level menu system.
• Using Section Styles to create a block library that makes it easy for editors to make content and navigation updates.
• Developing a custom block theme that leverages WordPress’s new site editor and visual page builder.
• Integrating with Modern Campus, using a daily import for continuing education and youth programs, so that critical content is always up to date and administrators don’t have to enter this twice.

The new Georgia Center website offers a unified, user-centered experience that serves customers across all business units and allows everyone to explore the full range of service. By integrating third-party booking and Course data, users can get all the information they need to make room bookings and find programs and courses without leaving the website. 200 Professional Courses and 86 Youth Programs are made available through the website via a daily synchronization, reducing content entry for Georgia Center staff. The result is a polished, flexible platform that meets the needs of diverse audiences and reinforces the Georgia Center’s dual role as an educational and hospitality destination.