Reimagining Wisconsin's Official Digital Tourism Destination.

Traveler expectations had changed significantly since the previous generation of TravelWisconsin.com launched. Mobile behavior had matured, visual storytelling had become increasingly important, and Travel Wisconsin had developed a much richer collection of photography, editorial content and travel resources.

Travel Wisconsin also wanted to strengthen its appeal among adults ages 25 to 44 in priority markets. The opportunity was not simply to help people already considering Wisconsin plan a trip. The new experience needed to challenge familiar perceptions of the state and show travelers a broader, more unexpected range of reasons to visit.

At the same time, years of growth had created significant technical and content complexity.

Key challenges included:

• Modernize a website and technology foundation that had been in place for more than a decade.
• Create a more inspirational experience for Travel Wisconsin’s target audience.
• Challenge familiar perceptions of Wisconsin by showcasing the breadth of experiences available throughout the state.
• Make better use of Travel Wisconsin’s extensive photography and visual content.
• Reorganize a large content ecosystem around traveler behavior and current marketing priorities.
• Simplify a taxonomy and categorization structure that had become increasingly complex.
• Replace an aging custom CMS without losing specialized functionality developed over many years.
• Modernize the Partner Portal responsible for supplying point of interest, event and seasonal information.
• Improve mobile usability, accessibility and performance.
• Preserve organic search value through a significant content and platform migration.
• Give Travel Wisconsin’s internal team greater flexibility to create, manage and reuse content.
• Create a technology foundation capable of supporting future initiatives across the broader tourism ecosystem.

The challenge was not simply to redesign a website. Travel Wisconsin needed to modernize the digital infrastructure connecting its tourism brand, travelers, content team and tourism industry.
 

Ascedia approached the redesign as an interconnected strategy, UX, content and technology initiative. Research established the foundation, creative decisions supported Travel Wisconsin’s brand and audience goals, and the technical architecture addressed both traveler needs and the operational requirements behind the experience.

Research & Discovery
Travel Wisconsin and Ascedia had already established a culture of continuous research and optimization. Previous enhancement projects used analytics, heat mapping, personas, competitive analysis and user testing to identify opportunities and validate decisions.

The redesign expanded on that approach.

Research and planning included:

• Stakeholder research and discovery.
• Website analytics analysis.
• Secondary research.
• Competitive analysis.
• Heatmapping and behavioral analysis.
• Sitemap development and testing.
• Content inventory and mapping.
• Technology and solution architecture planning.
• Third-party platform and integration research.
• User testing.
• Identification of high-traffic and high-priority content.
• Evaluation of categories, attributes and content relationships.

Ascedia evaluated year-over-year analytics at the page level to understand what travelers were actually using. Those findings were considered alongside Travel Wisconsin’s marketing priorities, helping the team identify where high visitor demand and strategic opportunity intersected.

To ground the transformation in real behavior, Ascedia conducted eight rounds of user testing across key site experiences, including the homepage, regional pages, stories, events, categories, itineraries, evergreen content and the Snow Report. Testing spanned both in-state and out-of-state users from Wisconsin, Illinois, Minnesota and Texas to capture a spectrum of familiarity and intent. 

The result was a site that prioritized traveler behavior rather than assumptions about how a tourism website should work.

Information Architecture & Content Strategy
TravelWisconsin.com contains an interconnected collection of destination information, events, points of interest, stories, seasonal content and travel-planning resources. Reorganizing that information required much more than simply creating a new navigation menu.

The redesign introduced a more intuitive planning ecosystem built around how people actually think about travel, including immersive seasonal storytelling, mobile-first itineraries, contextual discovery pathways, interactive mapping, dynamic content hubs, upgraded business listings and simplified navigation structures that prioritize intent over location. 

Travel Styles, such as Adventure Seekers, Weekend Wanderers, Families and Couples, were introduced as one layer of this broader system, helping users self-identify trip motivations and enter the planning journey through experience rather than geography.

Ascedia mapped existing content against the new sitemap and evaluated what should migrate, move, consolidate or be removed. Analytics helped identify high-value content, and Travel Wisconsin’s strategic priorities helped determine where greater visibility was needed.

The work included:

• A redesigned sitemap.
• Revised taxonomy, categories and attributes.
• Content inventory and page-level analysis.
• Content mapping for migration.
• Identification of outdated or unnecessary content.
• Introduction of new content types to prioritize intent-led exploration
• Navigation planning around high-traffic and high-priority content.
• New relationships between content types.
• Metadata and content optimization.
• Redirect planning.
• Structured content models designed for reuse.

Approximately 193 content pages were manually created before launch, with Ascedia supporting page building, content entry, revisions and final review.

This work gave the new visual experience a stronger content foundation and reduced dependence on structures inherited from the previous site.
 

The site was built around a single core UX principle: reduce friction between inspiration and action by aligning the site with how travelers naturally plan trips. Instead of requiring users to begin with geography, the experience was structured to mirror real-world planning behavior, starting with emotional inspiration, moving into exploration and ultimately guiding users toward itineraries, destinations and booking considerations through a connected system of content. 

Ascedia developed a visual system that puts Travel Wisconsin’s photography at the center of the experience. Larger imagery, stronger hierarchy and purposeful motion help communicate the variety and energy of experiences available throughout the state.

The design system created consistency across a large collection of page and content types. Reusable patterns also allowed design and development to progress iteratively, giving Travel Wisconsin opportunities to review and refine the experience throughout the project.

Motion was used intentionally rather than decoratively. The objective was to add energy and support storytelling without creating unnecessary distractions or accessibility barriers.

The result creates a stronger connection between Travel Wisconsin’s brand marketing and the experience travelers encounter once they arrive on the website.

Accessibility

Accessibility was incorporated directly into design and development rather than treated as an enhancement after the experience was built.

Considerations included:

• Color contrast.
• Keyboard accessibility.
• Screen reader compatibility.
• Content hierarchy.
• Interactive element behavior.
• Responsive presentation.
• Motion and reduced-motion preferences.
• Accessibility testing throughout development.

The custom front-end system was built with accessibility as a core requirement, allowing accessibility considerations to carry consistently across reusable components rather than being addressed page by page.

Post-launch analytics can also monitor preferences such as reduced motion, providing another source of information for future optimization.

SEO & Content Migration
TravelWisconsin.com entered the redesign with years of established search visibility. Ascedia had managed an ongoing SEO program for the site dating back more than a decade, so protecting that value during migration was a significant priority.

SEO was incorporated throughout the project rather than addressed shortly before launch. A comprehensive risk mitigation plan was developed and executed, to minimize the impact after launch. 

Work included:

• Risk mitigation planning 
• Content and metadata optimization.
• Search-informed content analysis.
• URL and redirect planning.
• Technical SEO.
• Content migration planning.
• Google Tag Manager implementation.
• GA4 tracking.
• Tracking validation.
• Google Search Console monitoring.
• Post-launch search analysis.

The migration strategy balanced the opportunity to improve the site’s structure with the need to preserve the search equity built by established content.

Analytics & Measurement
Measurement was built into the redesigned experience from the beginning.

Ascedia implemented and validated GA4 and Google Tag Manager tracking to give Travel Wisconsin visibility into how audiences interact with the new site. Search Console data provides another layer for understanding organic visibility and search behavior. A custom dashboard was created to access key metrics and insight in real-time. 

Measurement includes:

• Audience and traffic trends.
• Content consumption.
• Engagement.
• Seasonal experience performance.
• User journeys.
• Outbound clicks.
• Search visibility.
• Accessibility preferences.
• Campaign activity.
• Future optimization opportunities.

This creates a baseline for evaluating the redesign and, just as importantly, identifying what should improve next.
 

The previous TravelWisconsin.com ran on a sophisticated custom-built CMS that had evolved over many years. Earlier versions of that platform supported TravelWisconsin.com, mobile applications and related Wisconsin tourism properties, along with hundreds of tourism partners contributing content.

The redesign moved the consumer website to Xperience by Kentico, creating a modern structured-content foundation with greater flexibility for Travel Wisconsin’s internal team.

The architecture supports:

• Structured content types.
• Reusable content and widgets.
• Point of interest listings.
• Events and deals.
• Cities, destinations and regions.
• Stories and editorial content.
• Categories and attributes.
• Media management.
• Search.
• Related content.
• Administrative workflows and approvals.
• Versioning.
• Custom navigation and mega menus.
• API connections with external systems.
• Analytics and Google Tag Manager tracking.
• Caching and performance optimization.

On the front end, Ascedia developed a custom web component library centered on accessibility, performance and purposeful motion.

This architecture gives Travel Wisconsin greater flexibility to create and reuse content, introduce new functionality and evolve the website without requiring another fundamental rebuild each time priorities change.

Quality Assurance, Training & Launch
Design and development progressed iteratively, allowing Travel Wisconsin to evaluate working components and provide feedback throughout the project.

Before launch, the teams completed content review, migration, functional testing, accessibility testing, analytics validation, SEO checks, redirect preparation, training and launch planning.

Ascedia also provided documentation and training for the teams responsible for managing the new environment.

After a multi-year strategy, research, design and development effort, the completely redesigned TravelWisconsin.com launched in February 2026.