Priory

Priory is the UK's largest independent provider of mental healthcare and adult social care. With a mission to support over 25,000 people at more than 300 locations, Priory helps individuals move towards healthier, more independent lives. Their services range from inpatient stays to supported living, providing holistic care that empowers individuals to thrive in their communities.

Priory sought to consolidate its two primary service areas - healthcare and adult social care - previously represented by separate websites, into a unified digital platform. The challenge lay in representing Priory’s wide array of services clearly, including hospital care, residential care, supported living, and high street Wellbeing Centres, while ensuring intuitive access for various stakeholders.

Moreover, while their existing front-end website was robust for its time, it had begun to appear outdated. This new project presented an opportunity to refresh the user interface and enhance the overall user experience.

Working closely with Priory’s marketing team, we undertook extensive user research. This included in-depth interviews with external stakeholders such as NHS partners, local authorities, and healthcare referees, as well as workshops with Priory’s internal teams. Our findings revealed key pain points, particularly confusion stemming from having multiple websites, which made it difficult for users to find information on specialists, service types, and bed availability.

We responded with a redesigned user experience, centred on intuitive navigation and a powerful multi-step search tool. This tool enables users to find facilities based on location, service type, specialism, and bed availability, streamlining the process for both staff and patients.

Accessibility was a key focus in the development of Priory's new website. Following WCAG AA standards as a guideline, we worked to improve accessibility with features such as optimised keyboard navigation, high-contrast focus states, and support for up to 300% zoom.

The project introduced innovative features and content that significantly enhanced Priory’s digital platform. This included an intuitive search function, bed availability, and a new section called 'Live Your Life,' which showcases the success stories of those Priory has helped.

To engage users, we integrated news and blog pages with advanced tagging and organisational tools for easy categorisation and wider content distribution across the website and social media.

Additionally, seamless API integrations with services like Google Maps and Google reCAPTCHA bolstered the platform's functionality, security, and user experience.

Finally, we chose Umbraco as the content management system (CMS) for its flexibility, customisability, and user-friendly interface. Priory’s marketing team can now build custom landing pages for various conditions, hospitals, and specialists, using a page builder tool.

This included over 20 custom content components with a powerful theming system that supports multiple theme variations. This flexibility not only enhances the site’s visual appeal but also allows for dynamic content presentation, adapting to Priory's diverse service offerings.