Wondersauce: Setting Clear Website Goals to Create Ospre, the First Open Platform for Hybrid Events

In a recent webinar, Marc Cracco, Director of Technology at Wondersauce, discussed how to analyze, set, and reach your website goals. You can watch the full webinar to learn key WebOps concepts, how to get buy-in from team members and stakeholders, and how to set and measure meaningful key performance indicators (KPIs). Marc tells the story through his agency’s practical customer experience.

Here are some highlights: 

Your Website Has a Job to Do

WebOps is a collaborative, iterative set of practices built on cross-functional teams. WebOps teams are able to develop, test, and make changes both quickly and reliably. Your website is a powerful asset, but it can’t be all things to all people and still make an impact. Here’s how to apply top-level WebOps concepts to start getting the most out of your website today.

1. Define

The first step to unlocking the full potential of your site is to determine its most important function, what is commonly referred to as its “north star.” To do this, work with key stakeholders to determine the main function of your site. 

Common drivers include: Ad impressions or revenue, e-commerce revenue, lead generation, unique users reached, daily active users, etc. It will take some time, negotiation, and collaboration to determine, but getting everyone aligned is vital for your website’s success. Invite all stakeholders to explain what is most important to them, then group and refine the recurring concepts you hear, in order to get to the heart of it.

2. Measure

The next step is measurement. Before making changes, measure how the site is performing now in regards to the north star defined in step one. Establish a baseline to make it easy to see the impact of future changes. Measurement tools can be tricky; take the time to understand and quantify what success looks like.

3. React

React to measurement data by iterating on your website’s high-value features. Change things up, measure these changes, and then proceed, roll-back, or wait, depending on the feedback and data you get. Through continuous feedback and product refinement, major relaunches or full overhauls aren’t necessary to get to where you want to be. Keep change as incremental as possible so that results don’t get blurry.

4. Improve

The process of reaction and measurement is an ongoing one – as changes are made, measure the impact and react. Improvements can be the creation of new features and functionalities or may be the result of rolling back to old, proven practices. Lean heavily on feedback from internal and external users and be prepared to back up choices with data.

How Wondersauce Created a More Impactful Website

The Challenge

Wondersauce is a new breed of digital agency — one that creates innovative solutions through iterative process and collaboration. They were approached by a beauty brand to design a virtual event as an adjunct to a popular in-person event. Wondersauce saw that there was no existing solution that was fully customizable from a brand, user experience (UX), and user interface (UI) standpoint. They set out to create a virtual event platform that was completely brand focused, all without losing the ability to track KPIs.

The Solution: Ospre

Wondersauce created Ospre, the first open platform for virtual and hybrid events designed with branding and user experience at its core. Ospre is a modular, user-focused platform that can go to market in weeks, not years. Cracco calls it, “Fully custom, without a custom build.”

Wondersauce sought out best-in-class partners to support their platform, including Pantheon. Pantheon hosts the core of Ospre, handles growing infrastructure-based needs, and provides Wondersauce with a full professional services team that handles any issues that arise along the way.

Ospre goes to market fully branded with unique workflows in 10 to 12 weeks. The platform is designed to evolve and improve over time. Ospre provides scalable, secure tech along with support for the brand —  before, during, and after the event. Each event has a single, unified team that covers creative, technical, and user support. This holistic approach keeps the events seamless and consistent.

The Results

Ospre helps clients measure success by working with them prior to the event to define KPIs and clear metrics. Post-event actionable data is provided to help gauge the client’s return on investment (ROI),  as well as inform tactics for future events.  

At the same time, Ospre itself is constantly evolving based on feedback and key metrics from its users. The platform grows with the client and the client grows with the platform in a mutually beneficial way. Ospre gets information about how to restructure UX of sections that aren’t delivering, add features from customer feedback, and more.

Never Stop Improving

The key takeaway from how Wondersauce built Ospre is that your website must always be improving and evolving. The way to get to that agile space is to determine the main function of the site, learn how to measure it, and understand what defines its  success. Get buy-in from as many stakeholders as possible and re-evaluate periodically, as opposed to going through major redesigns and overhauls of your website. Not only does your site need to evolve, but your goals and KPIs should evolve as well. Define, measure, react, improve, repeat.