Case study · Career, setbacks & entrepreneurship
Modernising a Declining Product Safely
I led a mobile-first redesign while ensuring the new CMS also supported the legacy product, protecting the investment regardless of the concept’s success.
The context
A legacy start-page product was losing about 17% of its traffic year on year. Many stakeholders saw the decline as inevitable: the product was no longer the default homepage in browsers such as Chrome, it offered links without richer content, and it was not mobile-friendly.
The challenge
I was asked to bring the product into the mobile era within an organisation where technology initiatives were still typically structured as large, multi-year programmes. My challenge was to modernise incrementally without betting the entire investment on an unproven new concept.
How I approached it
I led the collaboration with a digital agency to develop a mobile-first concept, followed by the build with our internal developers. I also secured additional budget and development capacity from the wider organisation.
The concept required a new CMS because the existing custom-built system could not support additional content types. I specified the requirements so the new CMS could also power the legacy product. This enabled a phased rollout and ensured that the CMS investment would remain useful even if the redesigned concept did not gain traction.
What it delivered
The new concept went live, but it had only a limited effect on the ongoing traffic decline. However, the phased approach delivered value along the way and protected the CMS investment. The experience reinforced that when a market trend is structural, a better product alone may not reverse it; the responsible approach is to reduce investment risk rather than bet everything on a redesign.
Looking back
I learned that modernising a product does not necessarily change a structural market trend. I would set clearer expectations about that from the outset, while still pursuing incremental improvements that create value and preserve future options.
The principle I carry forward is to separate necessary modernisation from unproven growth assumptions. By designing investments to benefit both the existing product and a new concept, I can test change responsibly, learn early, and avoid betting everything on a redesign.