Evolving a membership website into a freemium learning platform

A Level AHEAD gives students and teachers access to expert English Literature seminars and the resources built around them.

Made Grand has worked with Andy Hurley to develop the platform over the past two years. The latest phase did not replace the original website, it adapted the existing WordPress system to support a clearer publishing model, a much larger content library and a different approach to membership.

Today, all 103 video seminars are free to watch without registration. Paid membership is focused on the additional material that helps students revise and teachers turn the seminars into classroom-ready lessons.

The platform had evolved

The original A Level AHEAD website combined consultancy services, educational content and subscription access.

As the seminar library grew, the purpose of the site became much clearer. Andy wanted to focus entirely on publishing high-quality English Literature resources and make the seminar videos freely available to every student and teacher, regardless of their ability to pay.

This created a new challenge. The platform needed to open up its core content while retaining a sustainable paid offer around the supporting resources.

It also needed to make an expanding library easier to browse. A long, flat list of seminars was no longer suitable for dozens of poems, multiple poets, different exam boards and a complete scene-by-scene study of King Lear.

The next challenge

The 2026 restructure needed to:

• Give every visitor unrestricted access to the video seminars
• Separate free seminars from paid Student and Teacher resources
• Replace a flat content list with a clear Poetry and Drama catalogue
• Support poets, plays, exam boards, resources and printed guides within one connected system
• Preserve existing seminar URLs and established content
• Simplify membership without losing access for existing users
• Keep the publishing workflow manageable for the client

The work involved rethinking the information architecture, relationships between content and the access rules applied to individual resources.

From rough structure to working platform

The restructure began with simple sketches showing how visitors might move from Poetry or Drama into a poet, play or individual seminar.

Made Grand translated those early ideas into a scalable content model and a responsive interface. The finished structure lets visitors move from a broad catalogue to a dedicated poet or play page and then into the relevant seminar and supporting resources.

What changed in 2026

A clearer publishing model

The home page and navigation now focus on three routes:

• Free Poetry and Drama seminars
• Student and Teacher membership
• Printed study guides and teaching packs

Consultancy content remains available where needed for continuity, but it no longer competes with the platform’s main purpose.

A scalable content catalogue

The Poetry catalogue now groups 64 seminars under 15 dedicated poet pages. Visitors can search and filter the catalogue, then browse every seminar connected to a selected poet.

Drama uses the same expandable structure. King Lear currently includes 39 free seminars, organised across five acts with scene-level navigation and connected study resources.

The architecture can accommodate new poets, plays and other forms of literature without forcing another redesign.

Free seminars with focused member value

Every video seminar is now free, with no membership, login or account required.

The paid offer is deliberately focused on the resources surrounding each seminar. Depending on the membership level, these include:

• Student revision sheets
• Teaching packs
• Editable teaching PowerPoints
• Theme films
• Poetry readings
• From Poem to Playlist films
• Supporting classroom activities and handouts

Each resource carries its own access level. Free material remains available to everyone. Student resources are available to Student and Teacher members. Teacher material remains restricted to Teacher members.

This lets the site explain the value of membership clearly without placing the central educational content behind a paywall.

Simplified membership

The membership model now serves two clear audiences:

• Student membership: £25 for one year, with no automatic renewal
• Teacher membership: £40 per year, renewing annually with advance notice

The different renewal rules reflect how the memberships are used. Most students need access for a defined course period, while teachers are likely to return to the resources across successive academic years.

Connected books and teaching packs

A new Books catalogue brings together printed study guides and teaching packs available through Amazon.

The content relationships also allow relevant books and resources to appear alongside the poems and seminars they support, while members can access included digital teaching packs through the appropriate Poetry or Drama content.

How it works

The platform uses WordPress with Paid Memberships Pro, Pods and custom development by Made Grand.

The technical work included:

• Custom content types for poems, poets, resources, study guides, plays and seminars
• Relationships connecting each seminar to the correct poet, play, exam board and supporting material
• Dedicated catalogue, poet and play templates
• Responsive search and qualification-level filters
• Granular resource access for visitors, Student members and Teacher members
• Protected member downloads and embedded video delivery
• Stripe payment and membership configuration
• Migration and access handling for existing members
• Preservation of established seminar URLs during the restructure

The client can continue adding seminars and resources through structured fields without rebuilding page layouts or editing template code.

The outcome

A Level AHEAD now has a clearer purpose and a platform built around the way its audience actually uses the content.

• 103 seminars are permanently free to watch
• 64 poetry seminars are organised across 15 poet pages
• 39 King Lear seminars provide complete scene-by-scene coverage
• Students and teachers can immediately understand what is free and what membership adds
• Paid resources appear at the appropriate access level on the content they support
• The catalogue can grow without returning to an unmanageable flat list
• Existing content and URLs remained intact through a substantial change in business model

The result is a more coherent publishing platform that can continue to evolve as Andy adds new seminars, teaching resources and books.

“I am just so pleased to have secured free access to all, regardless of the capacity to pay.”

Andy Hurley, A Level AHEAD

The strongest part of this project is the continuity.

The original platform did not become obsolete when the commercial model changed. Its structure gave us a foundation we could adapt. We were able to open the seminar library, reorganise more than 100 videos, introduce more precise resource access and simplify the memberships without throwing away the client’s established content or starting again.

That is what a scalable platform should do. It should support the organisation as its priorities become clearer, not lock it into the decisions made at launch.