Discovery Strategy for Website Redesign

While no two websites are the same, the process of discovery (finding out what the job will entail) has some standard approaches.

I asked ChatGP to create the outline of the discovery process for a Drupal website and Nano Banana 3.0 Pro to create a whiteboard   To say this is incredible from an AI image generator is pretty insane.

Image

Prompt:  outline the best approach to do discovery for a large website redesign.

I further refined it to ask: is this the best outline you can provide - are there any gaps or weaknesses

The final outline:

Full Discovery Outline for a Large Website Redesign

A complete, detailed structure with subpoints

1. Strategic Alignment

1.1 Organization Mission and Priorities

• Core mission and business objectives
• Long-term organizational goals
• How the website supports the mission
• Leadership expectations for digital presence

1.2 Purpose of the Website

• Primary and secondary functions
• Required conversions or actions
• Brand expression and communication goals

1.3 Success Metrics

• Quantitative KPIs (traffic, leads, donations, applications, membership growth)
• Qualitative KPIs (usability, brand trust, satisfaction)
• Benchmarks from current analytics

2. Stakeholder and Governance Discovery

2.1 Stakeholder Identification

• Leadership
• Marketing and communications
• IT and security
• Content owners
• Customer support
• External vendors or partners

2.2 Stakeholder Interviews

• Goals
• Pain points
• Internal process challenges
• Future needs and concerns

2.3 Governance Structure

• Roles and responsibilities
• Decision-making pathways
• Content approval workflows
• Ownership of key site sections
• Rules for ongoing updates and enhancements

2.4 Change Management

• Internal communication plans
• Training expectations
• Transition support from old system to new

3. Current State Analysis

3.1 Content Audit

• Full content inventory
• ROT analysis (redundant, outdated, trivial)
• Quality scoring
• SEO value of existing content
• Readability and accessibility

3.2 IA, Navigation, and Taxonomy Review

• Current sitemap
• Navigation depth and complexity
• Tagging and categorization systems
• Search behavior and findability issues

3.3 Technical Audit

• CMS architecture
• Hosting environment
• Performance bottlenecks
• Security concerns
• Configuration and custom modules

3.4 Analytics and Measurement

• Traffic patterns
• User flows
• Device usage
• Conversion performance
• High-value and underperforming pages

3.5 Accessibility Audit

• WCAG compliance level
• Problem areas
• Remediation recommendations

4. User Research

4.1 Audience Segmentation

• Primary, secondary, and tertiary audience groups
• Demographics and behavior patterns
• Motivations and expectations

4.2 User Goals and Tasks

• Which tasks are performed most often
• What users struggle to find
• Barriers in the current site experience

4.3 User Journeys

• Entry points (organic search, direct, referral, campaigns)
• Key paths through the site
• Decision points
• Drop-off moments

4.4 User Testing (optional)

• Prototype testing
• A/B tests
• Usability review of current features

5. Content Discovery and Migration Planning

5.1 Content Strategy

• Required content types
• New content that must be created
• Content gaps relative to audience needs
• Tone and voice considerations
• Translation or multilingual needs

5.2 Content Modeling for Drupal

• Entity and content type definitions
• Field-level requirements
• Relationships (entity references, media usage)
• Taxonomy and controlled vocabularies
• Support for SDC components

5.3 Migration Planning

• Source systems and formats
• Automated vs manual migration decisions
• Mapping old content types to new
• Clean-up rules
• Migration scripts and QA process
• Timeline for content rewrite and migration

6. Functional Requirements

6.1 Core Features

• Forms
• Search
• Personalization
• Events or calendars
• E-commerce
• Media libraries

6.2 Integrations

• CRM
• Marketing automation
• Payment gateways
• Identity management / SSO
• External APIs
• Internal systems (HR, ERP, knowledge bases)

For each integration:
• Data inputs/outputs
• API documentation
• Authentication method
• Security requirements
• Error handling
• Future scalability

6.3 Workflows and Permissions

• Editorial roles
• Review and approval steps
• Multi-site or multi-domain workflows
• Content staging environments

6.4 Future Enhancements

• Long-term roadmap items
• Planned extensions or modules

7. Technical Architecture

7.1 Platform Decisions

• Drupal 10 or 11
• Layout Builder vs Experience Builder
• SDC components and design system
• Module selection (core and contrib)

7.2 Hosting and Infrastructure

• Hosting provider
• Server configuration
• Caching strategy
• CDN usage
• Backup and disaster recovery

7.3 Security Architecture

• User authentication
• Roles and permissions
• Data encryption needs
• Integration security
• Compliance requirements

7.4 Search Architecture

• Search API
• Solr or Elasticsearch
• Faceting rules
• Relevancy tuning

7.5 Performance Considerations

• Image optimization
• Caching layers
• Lazy-loading
• Core Web Vitals targets

8. UX and Design Foundation

8.1 Design System Planning

• Global styles
• Components and patterns
• Responsive breakpoints

8.2 Wireframes and Prototypes

• Page templates
• Navigation structures
• Mobile-first layout options

8.3 Branding Requirements

• Logo usage
• Colors
• Typography
• Voice and tone guidelines

8.4 Accessibility Requirements

• WCAG guidelines
• Keyboard navigation
• Color contrast
• Media alternatives

9. SEO, Analytics, and Search Strategy

9.1 Technical SEO

• Page titles
• Metadata
• Structured data rules
• Link structure
• Redirect mapping

9.2 Search Intent Mapping

• Primary user queries
• Content needed to match intent
• Gaps in existing content

9.3 SEO Preservation Plan

• High-value URLs
• Redirect strategy
• Canonicals
• Indexing rules

9.4 Analytics and Tag Management

• GA4 or similar
• Event tracking plan
• Dashboard requirements

10. Risk Assessment

10.1 Technical Risks

• Fragile integrations
• Legacy data issues
• Hosting limitations

10.2 Content Risks

• Missing content owners
• Underestimated migration effort
• Delayed rewriting
• Legacy accessibility issues

10.3 Organizational Risks

• Leadership turnover
• Internal politics
• Department stakeholder conflicts

10.4 Timeline Risks

• Hard deadlines
• Dependencies on external systems
• Delayed review cycles

10.5 Mitigation Plan

• Contingencies
• Buffer timelines
• Clear approval gates

11. Roadmap, Phasing, Budget, Timeline

11.1 Phased Implementation Plan

• Launch-critical items
• Phase 2 enhancements
• Long-term roadmap

11.2 Budget Framework

• Estimated hours
• Ranges by phase
• Contingency recommendations

11.3 Timeline

• Milestones
• Dependencies
• Review cycles

12. Post-Launch Plan

12.1 Training and Onboarding

• Editor training
• Administrator training
• Technical documentation

12.2 Support Expectations

• Maintenance plans
• SLA options
• Bug triage rules

12.3 Long-term Governance

• Content lifecycle rules
• Annual audit plan
• Roadmap for enhancements

13. Executive Summary and Presentation

13.1 Summary of Findings

• Key insights
• Core problems identified
• Opportunities uncovered

13.2 Final Recommendations

• Strategic direction
• Architecture approach
• Timeline and budget
• Launch plan

Finally, in gamma.app I created this PDF (in about 3 minutes) - I have NOT edited it at all... this is what came out of the AI report generator.

or you can see the website it generated: https://drupal-helps-discovery-m81i1f7.gamma.site (it's not as clean since it's set up to be a 8.5x11 document)