Fixing SharePoint site sprawl
Fewer duplicate sites. Faster provisioning. Real governance, without slowing teams down.
The Client Company
If you’ve ever searched for a file and found three different SharePoint sites that all look almost the same, you already know what “SharePoint site sprawl” means. Too many sites. No clear owner. No one sure which one is actually the right one.
One of our clients had this exact problem. Here’s what we did about it.
CLIENT NAME
Nicole
INDUSTRY
Engineering
TECHNOLOGIES
- Microsoft Power Platform
- Power Apps
- Power Automate
- SharePoint Online
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The Problem: Too Many Sites, No Clear System
Every team could create its own SharePoint site whenever they wanted. No approval. No rules. Just click a button and a new site appears.
That sounds easy at first. But after a year, it caused real problems:
- Duplicate SharePoint sites.Two or three sites for the same project, each with different files. No one knew which one was current.
- Confusing names.Every site was named differently, so people couldn’t find what they were looking for just by searching.
- No one checking new requests.Sites were created without anyone approving them first.
- Slow setup.IT had to build every new site by hand, folders, permissions, everything, which took days.
- Wasted time.Even with a template ready to go, someone still had to apply it manually, every single time.
Our client wanted teams to be able to request a new site on their own, without waiting on IT. But they also needed to keep things under control. Those two goals usually fight each other. We built something that lets both happen.
What We Built
A simple tool that manages a site’s whole life, start to finish:
- One simple form. Employees request a site directly, no emailing IT. This is self-service SharePoint site creation.
- Approval before anything is built. Every request goes through a SharePoint site request approval workflow, so someone always signs off first.
- Automatic setup. Once approved, the site builds itself, owner, members, folders, permissions, all set. This is SharePoint site provisioning automation: days of work down to minutes.
- Consistent naming. A shared SharePoint naming convention means every site follows the same pattern and is easy to guess and find.
- Duplicate check. Before approval, the system flags similar existing sites, even with different spelling or wording, so people can join an existing one instead of creating another. (Currently rule-based matching in-app; an AI-powered version is available as an add-on for smarter matching.)
- Clean offboarding. Sites no longer needed get archived or removed the same easy way.
What Changed for Our Client
Before:
- Anyone could create a site, anytime
- Days to set up a new site
- Random, confusing names
- Duplicate sites per project
- IT built every site by hand
After:
- Every site needs approval first
- Minutes, fully automated
- Standardized naming convention
- Lookalikes flagged before creation
- Sites build themselves
Real SharePoint governance, without slowing anyone down.
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Is This Right for You?
- Small or medium-sized business wanting governance without a big budget
- Several teams or departments regularly requesting new sites
- IT team tired of building sites by hand
- Already seeing duplicate sites, messy names, or forgotten sites
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