Rockefeller Center

As a New York City hot spot with a 90-year history, Rockefeller Center needed a unified digital identity that connected its attractions, events, and content under one seamless experience. Our team focused on strategy and optimization across content, design, and development — enhancing conversion funnels, improving site stability, and strengthening search visibility. The goal was to maintain a high-performance website supported by smart, engaging content that could grow with the brand.

It’s an ongoing work in progress: we’re constantly iterating to modernize the experience in line with industry best practices. Every update is grounded in data, allowing us to optimize for both engagement and conversions while keeping the brand fresh and relevant.

From day one, our work with Rockefeller Center’s content ecosystem has been about elevating the brand voice and expanding reach. We revitalized The Center Magazine — Rockefeller Center’s online editorial hub — and its weekly newsletter, The Center, to deliver a steady stream of content that speaks to both locals and visitors.

We refined the editorial voice to feel authoritative yet approachable, increased the publishing cadence, and implemented SEO best practices across every article — optimizing headlines, title tags, and alt text, and strategically integrating keywords. We also launched a monthly events column covering all five boroughs to engage audiences beyond campus, which now drives more than half of its traffic from organic search.

This combined editorial and SEO approach has driven sustained growth: a 230% increase in organic search traffic and a 154.8% increase in magazine traffic from 2022 to 2024. Q3 2024 was The Center Magazine’s best quarter yet, with a 97.29% increase in sessions over the previous year.

As New Yorkers ourselves, it’s always been important to us that Rockefeller Center’s voice and content reflect the dynamic of our city. We spotlight its unique cultural access — from interviews with world-class artists to behind-the-scenes looks at iconic New York moments — while also optimizing every piece for discovery.

In 2023, we redesigned The Center Magazine to improve navigation, filtering, and article layouts — adding enhanced galleries, quote styling, and featured collections — making it easier for audiences to discover and share content. The Center newsletter continues to amplify high-value content, promote events, and share exclusive updates. With tested pop-ups timed to major moments like the Christmas Tree lighting and The Rink opening, subscriber growth has increased sixteenfold since 2021.

Our design and development work with Rockefeller Center is all about keeping a world-famous destination running at its best. We maintain, optimize, and evolve the site to ensure it’s stable, scalable, and ready for the surges of global attention that come with iconic moments like the Christmas Tree lighting or The Rink opening.

Acting as an extension of their in-house team, we fix bugs before they become problems, roll out new features, and continually refine the user experience. Biweekly check-ins keep us aligned on performance, ensuring the site stays fast, accessible, and modern.

One of our largest undertakings was localizing the entire site into nine languages, making Rockefeller Center’s attractions, events, and stories more accessible to the millions of international visitors who step onto campus each year.

The Rink and Top of the Rock are two of New York City’s most sought-after attractions — and Rockefeller Center wanted to make buying tickets for both as seamless as visiting them. In Q3 2023, we overhauled the entire backend ticketing system, replacing it with a new vendor and redesigning the checkout flow to reduce drop-off and simplify the process.

Previously, visitors had to purchase each ticket type in separate transactions. We introduced an “Add to Cart” feature, enabling users to buy multiple ticket types in a single checkout, easily view and edit their selections, and choose from popular add-ons like skate rentals or The Beam experience.

Our work didn’t stop at launch. We’ve continued to optimize the ticketing experience, introducing new options like the All-In Pass, which has helped drive significant year-over-year growth. The All-In Pass played a major role in that growth, alongside increased revenue from higher-priced ticket tiers.

Not every visitor buys their tickets online; The Rink and Top of the Rock box offices also see high foot traffic. When Rockefeller Center upgraded its in-person kiosks, we translated the online ticketing experience into a physical interface that was both branded and accessible. 

Rather than simply applying Rockefeller Center’s visual identity, we designed with usability first, placing all interactive buttons within the lower 50 percent of the screen to ensure reach for every visitor. The result: a simple, intuitive in-person experience that’s consistent with the digital one.

When Top of the Rock introduced two major new attractions, The Beam and Skylift, Rockefeller Center needed a way to showcase them as premium, must-visit experiences. We designed and developed dedicated web pages for each, giving them a bespoke black-and-gold visual treatment that set them apart from the main Top of the Rock brand while still feeling part of the Rockefeller Center world. 

Custom-built for performance and flexibility, the pages highlight each experience’s unique appeal, provide in-depth visitor information, and capture valuable SEO traffic from targeted search terms. Visually rich layouts and clear CTAs make it easy for visitors to turn inspiration into action.