Community platformLive
Case study 01
Sistahz In SystemsA private members’ community, designed, built and launched on its own domain
01
The problem
Sistahz In Systems, a community for women in AI and technology, needed a private home where members could post, learn and connect under the community’s own name.
Michelle had already built a community platform for an earlier project. Rather than reinvent the wheel, she used her own proven foundation and made it Sistahz’s: its own brand, its own hosting and domain, and permission rules locked down at the database level before real members joined.
02
What was built
Michelle adapted her own platform for Sistahz from foundation to launch: rebranded screen by screen, moved onto its own hosting and domain, and secured so the rules that protect members are enforced in the database, not the browser.
- A member feed with posts, comments, likes, images, announcements and pinned posts, plus post types and topic categories for questions and polls
- Discussion threads, private messages, a member directory and profiles
- Courses with lessons and progress tracking, an events calendar and session recordings
- Coins, levels, badges, streaks and leaderboards, with rewards calculated on the server so members can’t change their own
- An admin dashboard for members, roles, badges, post categories and moderation
- An animated, on-brand sign-in screen, with a still version for anyone who turns off motion
03
Evidence you can check
No member numbers or outcomes here. These are things you can open or that were recorded when it launched.
- The sign-in page is public at app.sistahzinsystems.com. The community behind it is members-only.
- Test results recorded on the live domain before members were invited: 26 of 26 database permission tests passed, 35 of 35 browser workflows passed, and 12 of 12 attempts to change protected data were blocked.
- All test accounts and test content were deleted before launch.
04
Scope
The size of the work, counted from the test results recorded at launch.
05
Build timeline
Four phases, from Michelle’s own foundation to a live community.
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01
Discovery
- Set the spec: what to keep, the brand, and what launch needed
- Reviewed her foundation’s permission rules and how rewards were calculated
- Planned a soft launch with the founding group first
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02
Build
- Moved it off the platform it was first prototyped on, onto standard hosting
- Rebranded every screen from the crest’s colors: navy, violet, teal and gold
- Moved rewards and role changes to the server, with daily caps
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03
Testing
- Database permission tests for roles, rewards, messages and storage
- Browser workflow tests run locally, on staging and on the live domain
- Live attempts to break the rules, all blocked
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04
Launch and iterate
October 17, 2026
- Live on app.sistahzinsystems.com, with Michelle as administrator
- The same day, at the team’s request: post types, topic categories, polls, questions and an emoji picker
- New admin tools, including changing a member’s sign-in email
06
Tools and topics
Have a similar project?
Need a private community under your own brand?
Whether you’re starting from scratch or from something you’ve already built, Michelle starts with how your members actually use it, then builds the platform around that.