Web Development
Montcalm Community College (MCC) partnered with Marcel Digital to redesign and rebuild its website to better serve a wide range of audiences, including prospective students, current students, staff, alumni, and community members.
With an outdated structure and difficult navigation, MCC needed a modern, audience-driven digital experience that made it easier for users to find key information quickly.
Working alongside MCC and design partner Envy, Marcel Digital led the website restructuring, design implementation, and full development of a refreshed platform built for clarity, usability, and long-term growth.
The Challenge
As a public institution serving many audiences, MCC needed a website that could wear many hats without creating friction. Their existing site experience made even minor updates and common user journeys more difficult than they needed to be, leading to confusion for visitors and added strain on internal teams.
Key challenges included:
Poor navigation and confusing site structure, making it hard for users to locate important resources
Search results that didn’t align with user expectations, limiting the site’s usefulness as a self-service tool
Disorganized program and degree content, especially across certificates, job training, and academic pathways
Outdated visual design, which did not reflect MCC’s sophistication or leadership in high-value programs like Nursing
Increased inbound questions to internal departments wasting staff time and resources
The Solution
Marcel Digital approached MCC’s website rebuild with a focus on audience clarity, modern design, and scalable structure, ensuring the site could serve multiple user types without creating internal friction.
Strategic Information Architecture & UX Foundation
From the start, Marcel worked closely with MCC and Envy to develop a new information architecture that made the site easier to navigate for every key audience group. The goal was to ensure that prospective students, current students, alumni, staff, and community members could each find what they needed without confusion or unnecessary clicks.
Cross-Team Collaboration from Day One
To ensure a smooth build, Marcel aligned project management, content strategy, SEO/AEO, design, and development at the very beginning of the engagement. This “all hands on deck” approach helped the team proactively manage blockers and create shared ownership across every phase of the project.
Sprint-Based Execution & Transparent Communication
The engagement was executed in two-week sprints, anchored by an upfront Discovery session. Marcel and MCC met every two weeks for sprint demos where developers presented progress directly to stakeholders. Roadmaps and content planning documentation stayed current throughout, and content alignment happened early to reduce blockers during development and content loading.
The Results
Marcel Digital delivered a modern, intuitive website experience that met MCC’s goals for usability, structure, and visual sophistication, within the original timeline and budget.
Key outcomes included:
Clear, updated navigation that supports all major audience types
Improved degree and program organization, making offerings easier to browse and understand
More intuitive search functionality, aligned with user expectations
Enhanced visibility for priority programs, including Nursing and Athletics
Reduced reliance on staff support, as users could now find answers without contacting internal teams
Delivery within the original timeline and budget, ensuring a successful and efficient launch
MCC now has a future-ready website that better reflects its academic strengths and supports enrollment, engagement, and community connection.
