Overview

The College of Law is the school of professional practice for lawyers in Australia and New Zealand, servicing over 4,000 students annually, making them the leader in legal education and training for professional practice across Australasia.

Increased competition in the number of colleges offering similar services, as well as a plan to expand into the Asian market, saw the college looking to overhaul their online business model, with a goal of providing a far more tailored product and service offering.

By undertaking deep research into the developing career of a range of legal professionals, we mapped eight pivotal moments in the average lawyer's working life. For example, from student to graduate and from partner to a senior lawyer considering practicing in a different jurisdiction.

We then looked to leverage the extensive marketing suite of the Sitecore platform in order to personalise content for people dependent on the stage of their career e.g. promoting standard CPD training to lawyers at key times of the year and surfacing bridging courses to assist lawyers in obtaining the necessary training to practice in another countries.

Deepend combined audience research, journey mapping, UX design, analytics and platform integration. The team used Sitecore’s marketing capabilities to personalise content and designed clearer pathways for course discovery, purchase and ongoing professional development.

Technically sophisticated, the solution seamlessly links the Sitecore CMS, Salesforce and the College’s Learning Management system, Canvas, with single sign on - facilitated by ADFS ensuring a singular experience for the user. U-Commerce has been integrated to facilitate E-Commerce transactions.

The site has driven an increase in online orders from the day of launch and the personalised content only serves to make the site more relevant to each key user group.

The Challenge

The College of Law faced increasing competition and planned expansion into Asian markets. Its digital model needed to move beyond a traditional course catalogue towards a more tailored career and training experience.

The platform also needed to support thousands of courses, multiple purchase options and integrations across CRM, learning and authentication systems.

The Opportunity

Research into legal careers revealed eight pivotal moments in a lawyer’s professional journey. These milestones created a practical framework for personalising content, services and course recommendations by career stage.

The site employs a range of key UX / Design focussed elements aimed at aiding search and usability:

What We Delivered

• Audience and career-stage research
• Eight-moment legal career journey framework
• Personalised content strategy
• Natural-language course selection tool
• Mobile-friendly course filtering
• Ecommerce and multi-course purchasing
• Living front-end style guide
• Sitecore CMS implementation
• Salesforce integration
• Canvas LMS integration
• ADFS single sign-on
• U-Commerce integration
• High-availability Azure hosting
• Analytics segmentation and behavioural targeting

Impact

• Development paid for itself within 12 months
• Online revenues exceeded production costs in less than the first year
• Platform on track to drive a 5% year-on-year improvement across key metrics
• Multi-tenant efficiencies delivered across three installations, with two more planned
• Online orders increased from launch
• Personalised content improved relevance across key user groups

Problem & Insight

The College needed to compete more effectively while serving learners at very different professional stages. A single generic experience would not meet the needs of a student, graduate, established practitioner or senior lawyer.

Research identified eight pivotal career moments that became the basis for more relevant content and course recommendations.

Strategy & Experience Design

The homepage introduced a natural-language selector that helps users identify who they are and what they need from the College.

Mobile-friendly filters reduced friction across a catalogue of thousands of courses, while purchase journeys supported individual and group enrolments, secure online payment, offline callbacks and promotional discounting.

A living front-end style guide also helped maintain visual consistency and streamline the transition from design into development.

Technology & Delivery

The platform integrated Sitecore CMS, Salesforce and the Canvas learning management system, with ADFS providing single sign-on across multiple systems.

U-Commerce supported ecommerce transactions, while highly available hosting and monitoring protected a platform where around 80% of annual revenue is earned in the month leading up to CPD training cut-off.

Results

The platform generated online revenue in excess of production costs within its first year and increased online orders from launch.

It also created a scalable multi-tenant foundation for further installations and a more personalised, career-led experience for different legal audiences.

Frequently Asked Questions

How did Deepend improve The College of Law’s digital experience?

Deepend redesigned the platform around key stages in a lawyer’s career, creating more relevant content, clearer course discovery and personalised recommendations across different professional needs.

What technology powers The College of Law platform?

The platform uses Sitecore CMS integrated with Salesforce and the Canvas learning management system. ADFS provides single sign-on, while U-Commerce supports ecommerce transactions.

What results did The College of Law platform achieve?

The platform generated online revenue in excess of production costs within 12 months, increased online orders from launch and is on track to improve key metrics by 5% year on year.

How does the platform help users find the right legal training?

The experience combines a natural-language course selector with mobile-friendly filtering, helping users narrow thousands of courses to options relevant to their career stage and training needs.

How did Deepend support scalability for The College of Law?

The platform uses a multi-tenant architecture that has already created efficiencies across three installations, with two further installations planned according to the live case study.