CaringBridge is a health communication platform that surrounds family caregivers with support while they care for a loved one going through a health journey. The organization offers tools to share and document a health journey, simplify care coordination, and connect caregivers with their chosen community.

Developed nearly a decade before most social networking sites, CaringBridge is the first, most widely used platform for communicating during a health journey. The organization provides free, protected sites that allow patients and caregivers to keep their friends and family updated on their journeys. HealthTech magazine called CaringBridge “an indispensable tool for managing community care and support.”

CaringBridge is a donor-supported nonprofit, with nearly 90% of its funds coming from those who have experienced the platform’s power firsthand.

The nonprofit developed a mobile app built on last-gen UI frameworks with a code base and tools that used older technologies. Over time, the app began to lag behind modern app UI patterns and user expectations. Additional concerns included:

• The app wasn’t fully native, so many features linked users away from it.
• Users had a disjointed, less-than-optimal experience that didn’t match the website experience, including frequently being logged out.
• There was an underdeveloped web-to-app journey.
• Users had limited visibility into how to easily donate to CaringBridge.
• The in-app donation process needed to be streamlined.
• Analytics tracking was limited, providing little to no data on app usage or user demographics.

Modernizing the app would help to keep CaringBridge operational since the nonprofit relies solely on contributions. The CaringBridge mobile app also needed to be refreshed to coincide with its new visual identity as part of the organization’s upcoming brand relaunch.

Like many nonprofits, the small CaringBridge team was unable to quickly and easily update, support, and grow the app. There was minimal automation available to assist its developers, and the team lacked sufficient resources to maintain the app.

Slalom was more than happy to get involved and provide our support.

Before we started building, we helped create a business strategy to secure donor funding for this modernization effort. Tom Booth, chief product officer at CaringBridge, says, “We have a number of ideas that are beyond the scale of what our team can do, but that our partnership with Slalom allows us to achieve. This partnership is so fantastic because it allows us to put a little work up front to build a package that helps us secure donor funds to continue to do our work.”

We focused our modernization efforts on several key areas:

• Redesigning the overall user experience and infusing the CaringBridge brand tone and personality into the app.
• Bringing attention to donations by surfacing them in a way that ensures the experience is clear, with the right message provided in the right place, at the right time.
• Making posting, an extremely popular feature, easier by building in several methods to drive engagement in posts.
• Improving the mobile app’s analytics capabilities, helping CaringBridge gain much-needed insights.

Slalom’s partnership helped CaringBridge shorten the time it would have taken to develop the app by several months. We shored up limited resources and missing expertise, upskilling and providing CaringBridge developers with the tools they needed to move faster with a small team. 

“We had some product management help from Slalom paired with a product manager on our side,” says Booth. “We had one of our engineers sitting side by side with an engineer from Slalom. We had a designer who was fluent in the new CaringBridge design and was able to work with Slalom to get both done at the same time. It was a really good mix of resources, all on one team, getting this done.”

Booth also appreciates the consultative guidance the team has received from Slalom. “Whatever the subject, whatever the technology, I can pick up the phone, and Slalom will find someone we can talk to. Salesforce, AWS, SwiftUI. It doesn’t matter. There’s someone that I know I can trust to pick up the phone and have a conversation with. It’s just been such an amazing partnership.”

And now CaringBridge can move forward independently based on documentation that details our approach to product development. 

Having access to enhanced analytics capabilities empowers CaringBridge to make informed strategic decisions based on user demographics and app usage. The organization can focus on building valuable features that support future product direction. 

CaringBridge has bolstered its revenue-generating potential with its modernized app. Its improved functionality makes it easier for users to donate funds to the nonprofit, which helps it to continue to support caregivers and patients. In addition, donor funders are seeing their investment in the CaringBridge technology platform pay off, leading to a greater likelihood of increased investment in future initiatives. 

The organization continues to explore new ways to use technology to build bridges of care through its no-cost, nonprofit health platform. CaringBridge remains committed to innovation and growth to improve the lives of caregivers, patients, and their communities.