{"id":150416,"date":"2024-04-11T16:57:02","date_gmt":"2024-04-11T21:57:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wpengine.com\/?post_type=resource&p=150416"},"modified":"2025-11-25T09:41:43","modified_gmt":"2025-11-25T15:41:43","slug":"award-winning-success-for-a-strategic-agency-partner","status":"publish","type":"resource","link":"https:\/\/wpengine.com\/resources\/award-winning-success-for-a-strategic-agency-partner\/","title":{"rendered":"Award-Winning Success for a Strategic Agency Partner\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Creative technology agency whiteGREY<\/a> has a simple yet powerful ethos: Tension creates extraordinary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a viewpoint that’s set the agency apart since its founding, and by introducing diverse perspectives, whiteGREY continues to create tension and arrive at the extraordinary for a wide and impressive portfolio of brands and organizations around the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Australian arm of GREY<\/a>, whiteGREY is also part of WPP plc,<\/a> the world\u2019s largest communications services group, with 114,000 people working across 100+ countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But even with those familiar roots, whiteGREY has made a distinctive name for itself\u2014the multi-award-winning outfit<\/a> has racked up some of the world\u2019s most prestigious creative and effectiveness awards and is regularly recognized for its innovative and transformative client projects. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The full breadth of those projects spans headless architecture and multisite networks for large enterprise brands, as well as groundbreaking digital experiences for unique organizations doing extraordinary work themselves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One thread that\u2019s tied many of whiteGREY\u2019s most successful digital client engagements together has been the use of WordPress<\/a>, and because WP Engine\u2019s fully managed platform<\/a> is built for WordPress, it provides the agency with a secure, scalable canvas on which its teams can quickly bring client projects to life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

With priority support and hands-on training, those teams can also focus on innovation and the larger user experience, creating extraordinary outcomes for individual clients instead of wasting valuable time and resources on maintenance and troubleshooting.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This ebook offers a closer look at some of the most compelling projects whiteGREY has brought to fruition, harnessing WP Engine\u2019s platform performance, developer solutions, and unrivaled agency support along the way. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Melbourne & Olympic Park<\/strong>s<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Serving up a win with a fully managed multisite. <\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

whiteGREY was charged with developing the digital presence<\/a> for Melbourne & Olympic Parks (M&OP),<\/a> a precinct of sporting and event stadiums where the Australian Open is held. In addition to the international tennis tournament, the precinct hosts hundreds of other live events each year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe engaged whiteGREY to support us in the transformation of a new digital environment for our customers, guests, and venue hirers,\u201d said M&OP Director of Strategy and Transformation Ben Goodwin. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

To execute that vision, whiteGREY designed and built six websites (one per stadium + an overall M&OP site) within a span of five months, using a single design system and a WordPress multisite architecture<\/a> that was launched and hosted on WP Engine\u2019s fully managed platform for WordPress<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The impact of the project was immediate and impressive, with all of the sites presenting excellent performance metrics as soon as they were launched. Additionally, the new site architecture and authoring environment made it significantly easier and more efficient for M&OP\u2019s internal teams to edit and manage content across the sites. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When compared to the weeks immediately leading up to the 2022 Australian Open, the new websites saw a 400% increase in traffic<\/strong> once the annual tennis tournament began, with high site speed and no outages throughout the event. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additionally, compared with the 2021 tournament, the M&OP sites saw 192% more users<\/strong> and 199% more sessions<\/strong>, driven almost entirely by improved organic search performance. There was also a 5% increase in pages per session and a 12% decrease in the bounce rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2023, many of those numbers jumped again, including a 228% increase in users<\/strong> (vs. 2022) and a 126% increase in sessions<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis project was a major win in terms of the final product we delivered and the timeline we were able to deliver it on,\u201d said whiteGREY Chief Experience Officer, James Keeler. \u201cSince the launch, we\u2019ve been able to build out the site to include additional content and functionality, such as a greater range of search and event filters, a higher level of integration with the ticketing partner, more advanced stadium mapping, and a significantly higher level of accessibility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat\u2019s the beauty of building with WP Engine\u2014our teams were able to do exactly what we needed them to do without spending any extra time on servers, security, or other WordPress-specific maintenance tasks. For a business like M&OP, where traffic can spike suddenly as new events are announced, and where security is vital, WP Engine\u2019s hosted solution is perfect as the platform itself handles all of that.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, the project provided M&OP with a stellar digital home, and it\u2019s served as a prime example for other whiteGREY clients interested in larger websites with multisite implementation\u2014i.e., a multinational corporation with a master site and separate country-specific sites, or a master brand site with associated sites for sub-brands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Mammoth<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Protecting endangered wildlife with a world-first data intelligence tool.<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The iconic African elephant lives on the cusp of extinction and without the efforts of groups such as the Sheldrick Wildlife Trust<\/a> (SWT), this magnificent animal would be gone. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Born from one family\u2019s passion for Kenya and its wilderness, SWT was established 45 years ago and is best known for its Orphans’ Project<\/a>, the first and most successful elephant orphan rescue and rehabilitation program in the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While the organization has saved more than 300 orphaned elephants across Kenya, protecting others from the constant threat of human-wildlife conflict had become a race against time the organization feared it was losing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For help finding a tech-driven solution, SWT tapped whiteGREY, whose team accompanied anti-poaching patrols in Kenya for a close-up view of the challenges they were facing.   <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe quickly understood that real-time data was going to be the key element in winning the race against extinction,\u201d said whiteGREY\u2019s James Keeler. \u201cReal-time data takes you from prevention to prediction. It takes you where the elephants are, where the people are, where they’re going, and why.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To enable SWT anti-poaching rangers, pilots, and veterinarians to all collect data in real-time while on patrol, whiteGREY created a progressive web app (PWA) called Mammoth (given the mammoth size of terrain SWT protects), which works both online and offline as rangers patrol massive, remote areas of Kenya. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Until Mammoth was created, SWT\u2019s teams used pen and paper to record activity. Time-sensitive information was relayed by radio to an operations room, while full data sheets were manually input into a central database on a monthly basis, often rendering the data obsolete by the time it was received.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mammoth now makes data collection easy. Users simply log an incident at a location, and then add the details, largely using drop-down menus. At the end of a patrol, teams submit all of the data they\u2019ve collected, and they can also view their patrol on a map.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The app offers different interfaces based on user type (e.g. the pilots’ interface has large buttons to make data entry easy while flying whereas the anti-poaching rangers\u2019 interface has far more drop-down options and data inputs).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis project was a great example of using WP Engine in the PWA space and leveraging location services to provide an absolutely amazing organization with a game-changing outcome.\u201d added whiteGREY Chief Technology Officer Jono Casley. \u201cWe had to use a web-first solution to meet the need of storing data in both on and offline environments and getting that to work with the GPS coordinates provided some challenges. However, WP Engine\u2019s flexibility and connectedness helped facilitate what we needed to do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since its launch, Mammoth\u2019s impact has been felt by four groups:<\/p>\n\n\n\n