Case Study
Business Publications Corporation
Business Publications Corporation operates Business Record, central Iowa's only independent locally-owned business media organization, along with DSM Magazine, Fearless BR, Innovate Magazine, and other related brand publications. eWay Corp partnered with Fajen Consulting to build a multi-site WordPress platform for the publication network, migrating 40,000+ records from a legacy .NET Framework site, with page-builder templating, WCAG accessibility, and a sustainable site architecture for fast search across a large content corpus.
- Industry
- Media
- Platform
- WordPress Multisite
- Services
- WordPress Multisite + Content Migration + Accessibility
- Engagement
- Project-based
Client Snapshot
About Business Publications Corporation
- Scale
- Multi-brand publication network including Business Record, DSM Magazine, Fearless BR, Innovate Magazine, and related publications across central Iowa
- Website
- businessrecord.com
Business Record is central Iowa's only independent, locally-owned business media organization. The publication strives to support and enrich the central Iowa business and cultural communities by providing essential knowledge, connections, and inspiration through innovative products, compelling editorial, stunning visuals, and enduring relationships.
Business Publications Corporation operates Business Record alongside DSM Magazine (dsmmagazine.com), Fearless BR (fearlessbr.com), Innovate Magazine (innovationiowa.com), and additional related brand publications. Together the network forms a coherent local civic-media voice for the Des Moines metro and central Iowa region.
The publication network's website is the primary digital channel for readers, members, advertisers, and the broader central Iowa business community engaged with the publications' editorial work and event programming.
The Challenge
A multi-site rebuild for civic-media publications carrying decades of archive.
Business Record's website was originally built on the .NET Framework and carried a substantial historical archive of editorial content. The publication network wanted to modernize the site with a contemporary platform that could better serve readers and the editorial team, while preserving the full archive that represents decades of central Iowa business journalism.
In 2021, Fajen Consulting reached out to eWay Corp to develop websites for Business Publications Corporation, including the flagship businessrecord.com plus five related brand websites, to closely align with the company's print, digital, and event brand standards. The goal was to improve the overall end-user experience while raising brand loyalty across the publication network.
The rebuild needed to deliver a multi-site platform spanning every publication, page-builder templating for editorial flexibility through drag-and-drop, full responsive design, WCAG accessibility, and a sustainable site architecture that could render and search a large content corpus without compromising performance.
What the rebuild had to deliver
Multi-site WordPress platform spanning the publication network
Manual migration of 40,000+ historical records from the legacy .NET Framework site
Drag-and-drop page templating for editorial flexibility
Full responsive design across desktop, laptop, tablet, and mobile
WCAG accessibility throughout the site
Sustainable architecture that supports fast search across a large content corpus
The Solution
WordPress multi-site with page-builder templating and a 40,000-record migration.
eWay analyzed Business Record's requirements and built a multi-site environment using WordPress. The platform spans Business Record and the related brand publications under one technical foundation. A page builder gives editors drag-and-drop page templating across the network. Accessibility and responsive design were treated as foundational requirements rather than features to add later.
WordPress multi-site environment hosting Business Record and the related brand publications under one platform
Page builder integrated for editor-driven page templating, letting editors customize layouts through drag-and-drop without developer involvement
Full responsive design optimized for desktop, laptop, tablet, and mobile reading
WCAG accessibility patterns and standards applied throughout the site
Manual migration of more than 40,000 records from the legacy .NET Framework into the WordPress content model
Sustainable site architecture designed for quick search and rendering across the large content archive without compromising performance or speed
Architecture
A glimpse of the stack
Platform
WordPress Multisite
Page Builder
Drag-and-drop page builder for editorial templating
Migration
40,000+ records moved from legacy .NET Framework into WordPress
Accessibility
WCAG-aligned implementation across the publication network
The Outcome
Multi-site WordPress that preserves the archive and improves the reader experience.
Multi-brand network on one platform
Business Record, DSM Magazine, Fearless BR, Innovate Magazine, and the related brand publications run on one WordPress multi-site installation. Plugins, themes, and platform updates apply across the network rather than being maintained independently per site.
Decades of archive preserved
More than 40,000 records were migrated manually from the legacy .NET Framework site into the WordPress content model. The publication's editorial archive remains intact and searchable on the new platform.
Editorial flexibility through drag-and-drop
Page builder integration lets editors customize page templates and layouts through a visual interface. Editors can adjust how stories present without depending on developer involvement.
Performant search across the archive
The site architecture is structured to render and search the large content corpus quickly. Readers can find archival editorial alongside current reporting without the performance penalties that often come with large WordPress archives.
Business Record's publication network now operates as a multi-site WordPress platform that preserves decades of editorial archive, gives editors the flexibility a drag-and-drop page builder provides, and maintains the accessibility and performance standards a contemporary civic-media publication requires.
Common questions about this engagement
What buyers ask before engaging us on a project like Business Publications Corporation
Why migrate 40,000+ records manually rather than automatically?
Editorial archives accumulated over decades on a legacy platform rarely have the data shape that an automated migration tool expects. Manual migration meant each record could be reviewed for content integrity, metadata accuracy, and structural correctness as it moved into the new content model. The trade-off is more upfront effort in exchange for an archive that lands cleanly on the new platform rather than carrying legacy artifacts forward.
How does WordPress Multisite help a publication network?
Multisite is a WordPress feature that lets a single installation host multiple sites, each with its own URL, content, and editorial team. The Business Record network's flagship publication and related brand sites share plugins, themes, and the WordPress core itself, but each publication has its own content and editorial identity. Updates and security patches apply network-wide rather than five separate times. New publications can be added to the network with minimal additional infrastructure.
What does drag-and-drop page templating mean for editors?
The page builder integrated into the platform lets editors customize page layouts visually rather than working with HTML or template code. Editors can rearrange page sections, adjust layouts, and customize templates through a drag-and-drop interface. The publication's editorial team can adapt how content presents without depending on developer involvement for routine layout changes.
How was performance handled at archive scale?
The site architecture was designed specifically for the large content corpus. Caching, query optimization, and content-rendering patterns were structured to keep page-load times consistent even when readers reach archive content from years past. The page builder operates within the same architecture rather than adding overhead.
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