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Product Strategy & Organization

Categorization

For 13 years, PragerU’s videos and supplemental materials were assigned random, unregulated topics and keywords, with no owner to maintain their validity or logic. New topics were created as needed, resulting in a chaotic system of over 700 topics, making it difficult to group or target related content. I conducted audits on all topics, incorporating feedback from producers, editors, and executives, and evaluated the number of videos per topic and the validity of topic names (e.g., ensuring specificity and avoiding proper nouns). This process allowed me to reassign over half the content, reducing the topic list to under 400—still a work in progress. I also created a parent set of 18 Categories to consolidate topics into themes, laying the foundation for future product improvements. Stakeholder input eventually increased the number of categories to 25.

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Culling unruly topics and assigning them all a category not only made the content more organized and  targeted, but also provides a more logical  way for users to find the content they're looking for.

Curation Flexibility

I developed simple ways to automate video content, such as series page curations, that range from 0% - 100% curation across web and mobile app. Series content could now be spun up with either zero-touch post launch, small areas of curation for special callouts, or complete editorial control when the order and presentation provide a more complete learning experience.

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Editors now have an option to  leave a series fully automated, with select curations (low to medium curations) or in special circumstances, a curation where every item is ordered and placed manually.

Personalities

To make presenter content more discoverable, I built a system that allowed PragerU to distinguish between Hosts (in-house talent with their own show), Presenters (experts sharing their knowledge for 5-Minute Videos) and Guests (experts and news-makers brought in for interviews). Personalities, such as Xaviaer DuRousseau, can be a guest on one video, the host of a series, and a presenter on a third. Personality bio pages have been transformed to showcase how they were involved in each video (host, guest or presenter) and allows a larger written biography and updated photos. With over 500 hosts, presenters and guests updating and editing blocks of presenters was automated and streamlined during the last redesign.

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Previously there was one presenter per video. With the new system, multiple presenters could be assigned  to a single video and a new guest designation could be assigned as well.  This quick visual made the concept immediately understandable to the executive staff, project managers and developers.

Long-term Strategies

I proposed a major effort to organize PragerU’s content, which required a greater commitment to planning and strategy than the organization was prepared for. I likened the disorganized content to a “ball pit,” where editors manually sift through a chaotic mix of multicolored balls to make updates. For example, updating all “yellow balls” required manually locating each one, often leading to missed edits. Videos linked to related content (such as other videos, challenges, or supplemental materials) were manually connected without assigned sections or content relationships. To address this, I proposed a backend structure using sections and parent-child relationships to link content logically and transparently. This system would reduce CMS edit times from hours to minutes and leverage large language models for accurate, automated connections with high precision.

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When you know a 500 word document won't be read, a simple visual captures the main points.

As a non-profit, PragerU had operated in “start–up” mode for 12 years when I joined in 2022. They had never had an on–site product team dedicated to the digital experiences from both sides of the screen: user experience and internal work flows. I created many methods to scale editorial capacity, content organization and massive automations to allow a small team of editors to dedicate their efforts on campaigns and educational resources.

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