Baptist Children’s Homes (BCH) has redesigned and launched its flagship website for the first time in eight years. The new bchfamily.org website was unveiled on July 15 giving the site a much-needed look and streamlined approach to finding ministries, events, and stories related to BCH’s many ministries.
Website responsibilities fall under the oversight of BCH Director of Communications Blake Ragsdale who gave a frank assessment of the organization’s online presence: “The former website had been outdated for quite some time. The redesign plan had more than several false starts to the point where I was uncertain of how it was
ever going to happen. Even with websites, God has a way of providing.”
What Ragsdale could not predict is how BCH’s acquisition of Christian Adoption Services (CAS) would offer the solution. As a byproduct of last year’s acquisition, CAS staff members Cyndie Truax and Lauren Hyatt became a part of the BCH’s development and communications team. Truax, who directs marketing and development for CAS, and Hyatt, who is the webmaster and site developer for CAS, brought the additional skills and expertise to partner with Ragsdale and BCH digital marketing specialist Jacob Riggs.
“Adding Cyndie and Lauren to the team has been amazing,” Ragsdale said. “We sat down in January and began to dream and we were on the same page instantly. It was exciting.”
Ragsdale joked that there were three main objectives for the new bchfamily.org: streamline, streamline, and streamline.
“The old website became so dense with information that it was difficult to navigate,” Ragsdale explained. “Giving it a clean aesthetic, creating a more intuitive navigational menu, and cutting the excess has given us exactly what was needed.
“I’ve tried to keep my humor about the process because a redesign was long overdue.”
That sense of humor carried over to the camaraderie shared by the team. When it came time to plan the site’s official launch, the team came up with a creative way to let the public know.
“I quipped that the new site was ‘decades in the making,’” Ragsdale laughed. “Cyndie ran with what I said and, before I knew it, we were in front of a camera filming this crazy promotional video. It’s been hard work but a lot of fun.”
Visit the new bchfamily.org and watch the “It’s About Time!” video below.