User Portal / Request Catalog

The client-facing user portal is a critical component of your IT service management ecosystem. Arguably, it’s the most important aspect to get right when transitioning to a new platform—more so than internal workflows or backend optimizations. The user portal is what your clients interact with day to day, and ensuring a smooth, intuitive experience is essential for maintaining business continuity and building trust in the new system.

When planning the switch to the new system’s web portal, timing is everything. Consider when to decommission your existing portal and how best to manage that transition. Implementing a redirect strategy—whether through DNS changes, HTML redirects, or web server rules—ensures users are automatically guided to the new portal without disruption.

Before simply replicating your old system, take the opportunity to review what worked and what didn’t. Identify the most frequently used request types and common use-cases from your current portal. Analyze user behavior and gather feedback to inform a smarter, more focused redesign. The goal isn’t to rebuild the old—it’s to improve on it.

Keep the new portal clean and purposeful. Reduce clutter by limiting the number of request options to only those that are truly valuable. Simplicity leads to usability, and usability drives adoption.