A financial services firm needed a website that balanced brand presence with regulatory compliance requirements, plus a CMS that non-technical compliance officers could use to publish approved content independently.
Sterling's existing website was built on a consumer-grade CMS that had no compliance workflow. Every content change required emailing a developer, waiting for implementation, then having compliance review the live URL — a process that averaged 11 days per update.
The firm was facing regulatory scrutiny over digital communications, and their existing platform couldn't provide the audit trail or approval chain that regulators expected.
We designed a custom CMS with a built-in compliance workflow: content is drafted, submitted for compliance review, approved or rejected with comments, and only then published. Every change is logged with a full audit trail, including who made it, who approved it, and when it went live.
The front-end website was redesigned to reflect the firm's premium positioning while meeting accessibility standards (WCAG 2.1 AA) and performance benchmarks required by their compliance framework. We implemented a strict content hierarchy that prevents unauthorized layout changes.
The migration from the old site to the new platform was executed in staged releases over 6 weeks, with regulatory compliance verified at each stage.
Content publishing time dropped from 11 days to an average of 3.5 days, while maintaining 100% compliance across all published materials. The compliance team gained full visibility into the content pipeline and can pre-approve templates for faster turnaround.
The firm's digital compliance score improved in their next regulatory review, and they now use the platform to manage content across three subsidiaries from a single instance.
EXPERIENCE PREVIEW
100% regulatory compliance maintained during migration. The work connected customer experience, internal clarity and measurable commercial movement rather than treating them as separate design problems.