Overview

The Coal Association of Canada (CAC) proudly champions a safe, socially responsible, and economically sustainable Canadian coal industry. To convey their initiatives to their audience members across the country, they came to Pace Creative needing a new website design strategy.

Hand in hand with their members—including mining companies, electric utilities providers, transportation firms and service providers—they strive to foster growth while upholding the highest standards of excellence & integrity across all disciplines.

The Canadian Association of Coal (CAC) partnered with Pace Creative to revitalize their website and reach out further in order to build a thriving community. We worked together on an innovative website design strategy to cultivate greater engagement from stakeholders, like members of CAC, as well as the public at large. With improved navigation features, content hub resources for all things coal related specifically in Canada, and clear messaging around membership opportunities – this new B2B website gave way for more growth than ever imagined!

1-2

new member inquiries per month

2.5

minutes averaged by website visitors

98%

returning members annually

Challenge

The CAC website presence was outdated, and content was not accurate, stakeholders were disengaged. The CAC wanted to increase website traffic, membership renewals, improving engagement on critical pages, filling content gaps, while also guaranteeing efficient design elements suitable for both mobile and desktop platforms. CAC needed to create an online experience that could exceed the expectations of its diverse target audiences.

Solution

Developing a Website Design Strategy

To ensure an optimal website experience for all our visitors, we delved into industry research to gain a better understanding of the customer journey for each stakeholder to create a well-structured site map. Our efforts allowed us to arrange content in ways that would enhance user engagement while providing easy navigation for the targeted website traffic audiences.

Optimizing the Content to Meet SEO Goals

By conducting an SEO content gap analysis, we optimized website content to drive SEO organic search goals. Our strategic investments in keyword research and page optimization enables CAC to reap SEO benefits and meet our marketing KPIs with tangible results.

Updating the Art Direction

By investing in a brand evolution for CAC, we updated the art direction to bring an ageless, contemporary flair to our website – preserving its original charm from when it first launched.

Optimized User Experience

To provide our customers with an unparalleled experience, we were dedicated to perfecting website functionalities. Functionalities include:

  • Secure login for the board and CAC members
  • Membership payment page with optional automatic renewal
  • Digital member signup
  • Membership listings
  • A news board
  • Integration with the Careers in Coal job portal

With this successful implementation comes a more satisfying customer journey and an improved overall user-interface.

Ensuring Website Best Practices

Our due diligence was key in creating a website that worked flawlessly across devices, while also adhering to industry standards and regulations. We followed comprehensive industry research reports along with proven effective web design strategies for the optimal online user experience. CAC’s website is 508 and WCAG compliant.

Result

  • In 2019, the website had brought approximately 24,000 new visitors.
  • Our website design strategy and refreshed content helped lower the bounce rate of the website to 55.84%, which is well within the industry standard of B2B websites.
  • We assist the CAC with ongoing maintenance and technical support to ensure all website goals are tracked and met.
  • Meets all online goals since launch
  • Ranks for specific keywords since 2019
  • Used as a reference and online content hub for the Coal Industry in Canada
  • Website is WCGA 2.0 compliant

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