The Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining (IOM3)

The Challenge

IOM3 had an outdated website and a separate, bespoke CRM - ‘Concept’ by Advanced NFP.  The fact that the website wasn't integrated with their CRM was causing numerous difficulties and sub optimal working practices. In addition, they felt their website wasn’t realising its full potential in terms of recruitment and engagement of their user base.   

The main challenge was in the very complex technical requirements of the integration. IOM3  formed out of a number of mergers and with roots dating back to 1869, and therefore, like with many membership organisations, have intricate internal operational structures, systems and processes as well as a disparate and dispersed membership. The project as such was a complex digital transformation piece which touched many areas of the organisation and interfaced with numerous internal and external 3rd party systems.  

IOM3 knew Drupal was their platform of choice, as the scalability and flexibility it offers is perfect for such a complex, bespoke project.  They commissioned Pedalo, a London based web design agency known for their extensive experience with Drupal, to deliver the digital solution.

The Solution

In order to successfully deliver the project to the set timeframe, an effective streamlining of the project elements was needed.  Two separate project cycles were launched, running parallel to one another. The first cycle focussed on the website user experience, design, build and development, while the second cycle was dedicated to the larger and more complex CRM integration. In this second cycle, Pedalo, IOM3 and their 3rd party suppliers scoped out the development of a bespoke CRM API toolset, defined and facilitated testing phases, and migrated thousands of pages of restructured content from an old CMS tool to a new and improved toolset. The simultaneous cycles included a robust process of consultation, technical scoping, stakeholder alignment and testing.

A variety of hosting platforms were considered alongside Acquia, but Acquia proved to be the best solution because of its scalability and reliability, as well as their bespoke Drupal package.

As the simultaneous processes drew to an end, the result was a brand new website, for the first time integrated with the organisation’s bespoke CRM.  

The new website was built with usability in mind, the graphic design and build a result of a comprehensive User Experience work cycle.  The new website presents a fresh new online brand, optimised for viewing across devices and provides users with a vastly improved user journey, facilitating the online recruitement of new users and engagement of existing ones.  The site was built to modern website standards, including SEO optimisation.  

Drupal delivered a powerful solution that allowed internal work processes to be improved significantly.  The new website tooling is now more user friendly and powerful for administrators.  Back-office workflows have been vastly improved, bringing in efficiencies and reducing unnecessary working practices.  Thanks to the integration work, user data can now be viewed and managed, providing intelligent and valuable insights.

Paving the road for the future:

IOM3’s membership systems and processes have been interrogated and analysed, putting the organisation in a much stronger position to streamline and build for the future.  Together with Pedalo, they are continuing to build on the integration work that has been done, adding features and functionality.  No longer held back by the shackles of outdated technology, they are now liberated to grow and expand their digital activities to benefit the organisation and its members.