“Geonetric has worked with us to build a system that works for our constantly evolving academic health system and helped us develop a design strategy that makes managing our complex digital initiatives easier.”
Former Director of Digital Strategy
UNC Health
The digital strategy for a health system can get complicated fast. And when that health system is an acclaimed academic medical center with dozens of partners and affiliates, the complexity only grows.
That’s why in 2013 Chapel Hill, NC-based UNC Health made the strategic decision to create a new system brand. The organization turned to Geonetric to bring dozens of websites onto a new content management system (CMS), redesign the websites of its flagship properties to be responsive and fit with the new unified brand, as well as develop a plan for bringing additional system sites onto the scalable platform.
A System-Level Approach to Design
The integrated marketing team for UNC Health partnered with Geonetric’s expert designers to overhaul the UNC Health system site. As a potential gateway to the system, UNC Health’s site needed to tell the new brand story and make it easy for site visitors to access care across the system.
The homepage of the design features a hero banner showcasing the diversity that makes up UNC Health community and reminds site visitors that UNC Health connects them all. The design gives a prominent nod to the University of North Carolina, sporting the school’s famous Carolina blue.
To make it easy for site visitors to move from one site in the UNC Health system to another, Geonetric built a responsive rotating banner that highlights the logos of the different entities, as well as built a dropdown into the header for easy navigation.
With the design for the system site determined, the Geonetric team created templates for additional clinical entities such as UNC Medical Center, UNC Children’s and UNC Rex Healthcare, and Chatham Hospital.
With each site built on the same CMS platform and sharing a similar design aesthetic, the vision of a single system brand is becoming a reality for the UNC Health team.
A Digital Home for UNCPN
With more than 227 providers representing 48 practices – and new practices being acquired regularly – UNC Health’s growing physician network needed a dedicated digital home.
Previously, many practices had their own sites, or dedicated pages on other UNC Health properties, and it was time to create a design that allows each practice to tell its unique story while still ensuring site visitors know they’re interacting with the UNC Health system brand.
Building off of the foundation already established with UNC Health’s system site, the UNC Physicians Network’s (UNCPN) site prominently features the Carolina blue and a similar look and feel. Family-friendly images and copy greet site visitors and providers are prominently highlighted.
The star of the UNCPN site is the location page. Using a consistent template that breaks important content down consistently across the practices, the location pages give each facility a dedicated area that feels almost like its own website.
Each practice has its own hero image, custom content about the practice, and even its own contact us form. In addition, each location now offers consistent information in the “For Patients” section, where visitors can download needed forms, learn how to make an appointment, and see if their insurance is accepted. The page also boasts hours and location information, as well as images of the providers that practice at that location, but all of that content is pulled in dynamically.
Bringing Additional Sites into the Family
With the flagship properties and physician group sites launched, the UNC Health and Geonetric teams are busy building responsive sites for the rest of the system. There are still more sites to bring into the brand family, but with custom templates and a flexible CMS, the process is seamless and straightforward. In fact, the new CMS makes it easy to spin up new sites when needed, which is important for this growing and evolving system.
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Design Unifies a Complex Healthcare Brand
