Rebuilding a Healthcare Website Around How People Actually Search

American Brain Tumor Association

Services
Website Strategy • Information Architecture • UX • SEO • Content Strategy • Analytics • WordPress

The Challenge

The American Brain Tumor Association had spent years creating valuable resources for patients, caregivers, clinicians, researchers, and donors. As the organization grew, so did the website.

Hundreds of pages had been added over time, navigation had become increasingly difficult to follow, and valuable content was often buried several clicks deep. Different audiences needed different information, but the site wasn’t organized around how people actually searched or the questions they were trying to answer.

The challenge wasn’t a lack of content. It was making that content easier to discover, understand, and act on.

My Role

As Senior Marketing Manager, I led the website strategy and content experience, partnering with internal stakeholders across patient services, research, development, communications, IT, and executive leadership.

I owned the day-to-day strategy for the organization’s primary digital channel, balancing immediate campaign needs with long-term improvements to the site’s structure, usability, and performance.

The Approach

Rather than treating the website as a collection of individual pages, I approached it as a connected ecosystem.

The work focused on four key areas:

Reorganizing Information Around User Intent

Instead of organizing content around internal departments, I evaluated how patients, caregivers, and supporters naturally searched for information.

This led to clearer navigation, simplified pathways, and a more intuitive content hierarchy that reduced friction for first-time visitors.

Strengthening Content Strategy

Many pages contained valuable information but competed with one another or lacked clear calls to action.

I rewrote and reorganized key landing pages, improved internal linking, strengthened page hierarchy, and optimized content for both search engines and real users.

Building Better Landing Pages

I designed and developed high-performing landing pages in WordPress and Elementor for major initiatives including awareness campaigns, fundraising programs, patient resources, and research initiatives.

Each page balanced storytelling with conversion goals while maintaining accessibility and brand consistency.

Using Data to Drive Decisions

Rather than redesigning based on opinion, I relied on Google Analytics, SEO performance, search behavior, and engagement data to identify opportunities and measure success.

Every major recommendation was supported by user behavior rather than assumptions.

The Results

The improvements created measurable gains across both visibility and engagement.

+78% increase in organic search traffic

Improved information architecture and SEO helped significantly expand organic visibility, bringing more patients and caregivers to trusted educational resources.

Lower bounce rates

Clearer navigation and stronger page organization encouraged visitors to explore more of the website instead of leaving after a single page.

Stronger user journeys

New pathways connected educational content with support services, fundraising opportunities, events, and additional resources, helping visitors find what they needed more quickly.

A more sustainable website

Beyond individual pages, the project established a clearer framework for future content creation, making it easier for internal teams to maintain consistency as the website continued to grow.

What Made This Project Differen

This wasn’t simply a website redesign.

It was an exercise in translating complexity into clarity.

Healthcare organizations often serve many audiences at once, each with different goals, emotional needs, and levels of understanding. Success required balancing medical accuracy, accessibility, search performance, organizational priorities, and user experience without losing sight of the people the website was built to serve.

That balance—between strategy, content, technology, and empathy—is the kind of work I enjoy most.