A design exercise with a focus on improving brand awareness and showcasing the product in a highly technical industry.
Hand-in-Hand
The quality of your website directly reflects upon the quality of your product or service. So when I see a company’s website I directly associate it with whether their product is any good. Unfair as it may sound, our brains are making these associations all the time.
People are irrational but it helps to understand why in order to create the best web experience for your company.
First impressions are often made within seconds. Once people make up their mind, its an uphill battle to change any of it. With that said, I looked to improve upon the existing experience in the following key areas:
- If a homepage does not quickly & effectively communicate who you are and what you offer, you are not making the best use of the user’s time and they will simply turn away.
- Mutually, if a website looks like no thought went into the design or user experience then the user will simply not care to learn more about the company or it’s products.
- The layout of content and the balance of text and visual imagery is paramount to the actual consumption of the content.
Keeping these ideas in mind, I created a mock up based upon small tweaks to an existing WordPress theme for the new homepage.
Let’s dive into the details:
- Clarified the navigation menu into logical sections
- Transformed a simple slideshow into a multi-functional carousel for displaying company news, product updates, events, etc. with overlaid text and a call to action button
- Informed the user of social media presence with social networking links and an embedded Twitter feed in the right sidebar
- Simplified text excerpts into a concise summary while making News and Press Releases more prominent
- Reorganized layout into two columns to present primary and secondary information in an easily digestible form
- Improved accessibility with the reiteration of navigation links, social links, and the addition of a newsletter signup in the footer
If thought is put into the little details, then it can be presumed that the rest of your product was given that same amount of attention.
In other words, the little things are essentially the big things. A company and it’s website go hand-in-hand. In order for your company to reach it’s full potential you need to create a great experience for your customers at every interaction. You might have an outstanding product but if you are deficient in any area, you are turning away potential customers. When it comes to the web — where you are presenting yourself to the world — give it that extra attention and make that great first impression.
