4Children has launched its new website to provide clearer information about its work and campaigns as it expands its service delivery role as the government’s strategic partner for early years and childcare.

A greater need for clarity of the service delivery aspects of its work following its appointment as strategic partner was cited by the children's charity as one of the main reasons for the redevelopment.

New features include a sophisticated services overview, with a map plotting every 4Children day nursery, children’s centre, out of school club and youth activity in the country, searchable by postcode and service type. It also has different sections for different types of users such as practitioners, parents, local authorities, commissioners, media or 4Children members.

Pauline Phillips, acting head of publications at 4Children said she expected the new site, “will contribute to an increase in the uptake of our services”.

Anthony Manuel, senior graphic designer at the charity, advised the next step was to develop microsites for each of the charity's 41 children’s centres.

4Children’s previous website was out of date and difficult to build new features onto so after deciding to overhaul its website the charity began a tendering process.

Chameleon was appointed because its open-source content management system (CMS) was flexible enough to build upon in the future. The charity paid £45,000 for the redesign of its site.

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