Explore New Bedford Redesign

The City of New Bedford, Massachusetts, is a coastal community known for its fishing heritage, innovation economy, and vibrant arts scene. As the #1 seafood port in the U.S. by value, it generates over $11 billion in annual economic activity. But the city’s aspirations extend far beyond the harbor — New Bedford has become a tourism and entertainment destination, along with becoming a model for sustainable development and civic revitalization.

To support its Explore New Bedford rebranding campaign with Medium Studio, the city brought in PSG Media to lead the digital strategy, architecture, and web development effort.

We helped ensure their digital presence would reflect the city’s bold future, while also honoring its deep roots.

The Challenge

Initially Destination New Bedford, site was long overdue for a transformation. Originally launched in 2013, the site had ballooned over the years to 20,000+ files and over 4,000 indexed pages, many of which were outdated, duplicated, or difficult to navigate — especially on mobile devices.

The city needed a future-ready platform that could accurately represent over 100,000 residents, speak to visitors, and align with New Bedford’s bold rebranding campaign. The challenge extended far beyond design: we had to make the city’s diverse offerings discoverable, accessible, and engaging for all.

Strategy

We worked directly with the Director of Marketing & Marketing Manager for the City of New Bedford from the very start of the rebrand, participating in focus groups to better understand the city’s brand vision and user priorities.

This hands-on involvement informed our architecture decisions and helped us design an experience tailored to real community feedback.

Working  with Medium Studio, the city’s brand design firm, we implemented the visual language they created that includes custom iconography and modular design components. These elements helped unify the user interface with the broader identity of the New Bedford brand.

We also led a complete content overhaul, streamlining massive datasets into a more intuitive structure and redesigning the site from the ground up using best practices.

The redesigned Explore New Bedford site went live in March 2024, and within its first year, it delivered a dramatic improvement in user experience, engagement, and performance.

Visitors began spending significantly more time on the site, with a notable boost in engagement across key pages like listings and events. Page views surged, bounce rates dropped, and meaningful actions — like exploring businesses and submitting events — increased sharply. Most importantly, traffic quality improved, with stronger engagement from organic search, referral links, and social channels.

City stakeholders saw real return on their digital investment, with clearer user behavior insights and a platform now ready to grow alongside the city’s ambitions.