Community West Bank
Services we provide:
- Discovery
- Strategy
- UX/UI design
- Website development
- Xperience by Kentico implementation
About Community West Bank
CWB is a large community bank in southern California with over 20+ locations and a track record of financial strength, security and stability gained over its 44 years in business. CWB has set itself apart from other banks by its people, dedication to client advocacy, exemplary "relationship banking," strong community support and a mission to exceed expectations. With a passion for providing customized solutions, the merger drove the decision to revamp their digital services to better serve their customers.
The Process
In an era where digital presence is critical to financial institutions and mergers are frequent, the successful merger of Community West Bank (CWB) and Central Valley Bank (CVB) depended on a robust and well-executed digital strategy, critical to providing a seamless user experience for customers and employees. SilverTech, leveraging its expertise in Xperience by Kentico website development, customized a digital solution that unified the brands of these two banks into one cohesive user-friendly digital experience in just 4 months from start to launch.
The Challenges
The merger of CWB and CVB presented unique challenges, particularly in integrating two distinct digital landscapes into a single cohesive website. The biggest challenges included:
- Differing Content Strategies: CWB's site was optimized for SEO with a rich content library, while CVB's site focused more on detailed product pages. Balancing these different content approaches was crucial.
- Short Timeline: The project needed to be completed with a demanding timeline, delivering a high-quality, functional website, from planning to launch in less than four months.
- Outdated Technology: The old CWB site suffered from poor mobile optimization, slow speeds, outdated information, and a lack of interactive features. This hindered customer engagement and usability.
Goals for New Site
SilverTech identified four main goals for CWB's new website with the main goal of unifying the brands. The merger of the two banks presented a unique opportunity to take advantage of the best from both brands.
Solution and Implementation
Based on the insight gained, SilverTech devised a comprehensive strategy roadmap to address the challenges and deliver a seamless digital experience for the bank merger. It was SilverTech's recommendation that Kentico's newest hybrid CMS platform Xperience by Kentico would be the best solution for the new website. Xperience with robust features and functionality allowed SilverTech to create an exceptional digital user experience efficiently for CWB.
The Key components of the solution include:
- Unified Content Strategy: SilverTech developed a content migration plan that combined the SEO-rich content from CWB with the detailed product information from CVB. This approach ensured that the new site would benefit from both banks' strengths while avoiding duplication and inconsistencies.
- Modern Design and Functionality: The new website was built with Xperience by Kentico, featuring a modern, responsive design to enhance user experience across all devices. Key features included:
- Enhanced Interactivity: Interactive elements and engaging content to improve customer interaction and retention
- Improved CTAs: Clear, strategically placed CTAs to guide users through the site effectively
- Technical Upgrades: Faster loading speeds, improved reliability, and mobile optimization to ensure a smooth user experience
- New Functionalities: Inclusion of essential tools like product comparison tools, branch locator and more
- Accelerated Development Timeline: Despite the tight timeline, SilverTech employed agile development practices to ensure timely delivery without compromising quality. The team worked in sprints to continuously test and refine the site, leading up to a successful launch within the four-month timeframe.
HIGHLIGHTS
This is What’s New in Sitefinity 15.2 MVC
By: Anoop Sandhu | 11/13/24
Upgrading from Sitefinity 14.4 to 15.2 is a game-changer for businesses looking to enhance their digital presence. As a premium agency partner of Progress Sitefinity, SilverTech is excited about the new features this upgrade offers to MVC users. The latest version introduces advanced dashboard widgets, AI-powered content creation tools, new site sync features, Sitefinity Insight implementation, and a multitude of bug fixes. These enhancements not only streamline content management but also boost operational efficiency and scalability.
Sitefinity 15.2 Enhancements & Improvements
New Dashboard Widgets: These new widgets in Sitefinity 15.2 are designed to provide more flexibility, improve workflow efficiency, and enhance the overall user experience. Here are some of the key additions:
- A widget dedicated to listing "Pages with no SEO Description” specifically designed to help you identify pages that lack SEO descriptions. This widget can be added to your dashboard and provides a comprehensive list of all pages missing this SEO element. This widget quickly addresses SEO gaps, ensuring that all pages are optimized for search engines.
- If you are connected to Sitefinity Insights, utilizing the new “Most Visited Pages” widget allows you to quickly evaluate which pages on your site are receiving the most traffic. By integrating with Sitefinity Insights, it provides detailed analytics and insights into user behavior, helping you understand which content is most engaging to your audience.
- The registration widget enhances the user registration process including a dashboard warning when a required password is not configured. This improved functionality also includes the ability to add CAPTCHA protection and an email activation process.
Optional AI Elements: Generative AI is available within Sitefinity with an Azure AI Service connection. When creating or editing a content item (like news or content blocks), new AI capabilities can now make the creation process go smoother with features that allow you to summarize and compose new text and even improve your writing. You can even generate tag suggestions with both existing and new suggested tags. This approach helps ensure that your content is accurately tagged, improving content discoverability and organization.
Site Sync: The SiteSync module has been enhanced to include the synchronization of the revision history for content items and pages. Sitefinity 15.2 allows all versions of a content item or page and details about the users who made changes to be transferred when you synchronize between environments. Other improvements include:
- Enhanced performance in calculating Site Sync dependencies.
- Ability to review SiteSync dependencies before syncing an item.
- Ability to configure SiteSync cleanup. You can now remove old log entries from SiteSync and clear the sync history
Sitefinity Insights: Sitefinity CMS now automatically reports visitors' interactions with embedded Vimeo videos to Sitefinity Insight. The reports include detailed interaction data such as play, pause, and completion events. The upgrade also integrates UI improvements that create a more user-friendly and intuitive experience. Updates to the persona configuration including enhanced rule management capabilities allow relevant audience targeting.
Other Updates: As with all version updates, Sitefinity 15.2 has dozens of bug fixes and internal performance improvements all aimed at improving the overall stability and performance of the platform. Here are a few of the notable changes.
- Personalization menu has edit icons
- Issue with link attributes not saving has been corrected
- NativeChat functionality has been removed. It will be available for projects already using it but is being deprecated.
Upgrade Today!
With the new Sitefinity 15.2 release, now is a good time to revisit your upgrade plans and how your users' digital experience can set your brand apart from the competition. Contact us to learn more about putting this new functionality to work for your business.
