Project Context
Founded after winning a landmark E. coli case against Jack in the Box in 1993, Marler Clark has become the nation's leading law firm in foodborne illness litigation. Over three decades, they've built an extensive educational resource network spanning 17 websites, and their settlements exceed $1B for their clients.
As the firm approached its 30th anniversary and the release of a Netflix documentary Poisoned featuring founding partner Bill Marler, they needed to consolidate their digital presence while preserving their authoritative voice in food safety advocacy.
Services
Timeline
4 months
Team
1 engineer, 1 designer
Key Technology
Industry
Consolidate Marler Clark's network of 17 food safety websites into a single authoritative platform, preserving their dominant search presence while modernizing the experience for families in crisis —all to align with their 30th anniversary and Netflix documentary launch.
Educational content strategy
We developed a new site structure that houses content from 17 different websites while ensuring clear pathways to both educational resources and legal services. Our custom migration scripts preserve thousands of articles and their relationships, while building an information architecture that scales with future content.
Authority-driven design
We offered three visual design directions based on our branding workshop with the Marler Clark leadership team. Our final visual design system balances the firm's legal expertise with an approachable, trustworthy presence.
The homepage hero utilizes an autoplaying video of partner Bill Marler to give users the sense that there is a real person in the law firm ready to fight for them. The enhanced News section serves as the primary entry point for most visitors, showcasing recent articles in a newspaper-like format.
Crisis-focused mobile architecture
We optimized the mobile experience for quick access to critical information, knowing many users access the site from hospital rooms while caring for sick loved ones. Our static page caching with selective dynamic loading of contact forms ensures fast load times while maintaining critical functionality.
SEO framework
Our interconnected content strategy pulls relevant information from across previously separate sites. The permanent redirect system ensures all visitors reach equivalent pages on marlerclark.com, while intuitive content relationships serve both SEO and user needs.
Unified publishing workflow
We streamlined content management by unifying previously separate publishing workflows into a single system utilizing Craft CMS. The new workflow makes it easier to create content relationships across topic areas, enabling the firm to maintain their position as a leading voice in food safety education.
Outcomes
Our website consolidation strengthened Marler Clark's digital authority while significantly improving their ability to reach and help families in crisis. The unified publishing system and optimized content architecture improved their search visibility and content management capabilities.
62%
increase in domain ranking from pre-launch
>250%
increase in organic search visibility
