6 April 2016. Modern tiles of various sizes, video and social media contents, as well as large-sized themed images await users on the new homepage of the University of St.Gallen. Category headings in contrasting colours ranging from "Campus", "Research" and "Background" to "People", "Opinions" and "Publications" provide visitors to the website with navigational guidance.

The "place of leadership" approach

In strategic terms, the redesign supports the approach, enshrined in the HSG’s vision, aiming to position the University as a place of thought leadership for the solution of current problems in the economy and in society. The network idea on which the relaunch is based and which conceives of www.unisg.ch as a "knowledge platform", fulfils this promise through the integration of internal and external channels, of dynamic feed contents and specifically placed issues. In this respect, the expertise of HSG researchers plays a particularly important part. At the time of the go-live, the homepage contents include op-eds and video interviews with HSG researchers on topical issues, among them the election campaign in the US and the challenges of digital transformation. In a new, three-to-four-minute video format entitled "Knowledge Bank", HSG professors explain central HSG research terms. The series is being launched by Prof. Dr. Oliver Gassmann, who talks about "New business models" in the first part of the series.

The University of St.Gallen’s central digital contact point

Whereas the homepage www.unisg.ch serves as the central digital contact point of the University as a whole and publishes items from the institutes, from faculty members and "student reporters", the "Newsroom" unites all the messages and media releases of the Communication Department, which can be searched according to categories, topics and chronology.

Responsive layout and optimised user guidance

Four years after the last relaunch of the HSG website, particular attention was paid to an update of user guidance, design and website technology. In the course of the project, the website was provided with subpages and a redesign with a special focus on its presentation on mobile appliances and on easy divisibility of all contents in social media.

The conceptualisation and design of the new website were developed in cooperation with Bänziger Hug GmbH, which is also responsible for the front-end. The back-end development was conducted by Namics AG, which has ensured the operation and maintenance of the Content Management Systems (CMS) used by the University of St.Gallen since September 2015.

With more than 13 million page impressions and over 2.2 visitors in 2015, the HSG website is the University of St.Gallen’s most important communication channel.