Best Version Media - Website Revamp

Branding, Website Design, UX/UI, Visual Design
2022 American In-house Design Awards

Overview: With BVM’s continuous growth, there comes many needs to update the brand representation and information to match the current market trends, added services and offerings. This led to the initiative of revamping the current website with a new look, more diversified and up-to-date contents, and better user experience.
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Collaborated and co-led alongside with the PR Manager from conception to production, including documenting process, engaging in strategy and stakeholder meetings, conceptualizing and executing visual solutions, as well as communicating with Development team to ensure production quality.

The new website is set to launch in early May 2022, which targets to serve and be utilized by a community of 5000+ audiences, including publishers, region and division managers, ICs (Independent Contractors), Home Office staffs, and potential clients.

THE CHALLENGE

THE CURRENT WEBSITE

Didn't answer the simple questions about the business ("Who we are" and "What we offer" were not clear), or tell a story about the company as a whole.
Design was not on-brand and not user-friendly, with long scroll time and distracting elements. Navigation is confusing with unnecessary extra steps.

THE PROCESS

Miscommunication within the inexperience project team, requires more specific visual feedbacks, better quality control and regular check-in time

MARKETING GOALS

Maintain and improve SEO with internal and external linkings, and new contents
Create an easy, user-friendly experience, and visually improve the website design
Increase diversity in website contents
Improve the communication and collaboration between the parties involved, as well as the project process to move quicker toward completion

PROJECT TIMELINE

WEBSITE IMPROVEMENTS

USER EXPERIENCE IMPROVEMENTS

Minor adjustments and clean-up were made to the sitemap to maintain and improve the site's SEO. To make it easier for everyone who uses the BVM website - whether it is regular, occasional or new customers, we worked on improving the website navigation, starting with the on-site search function. This helps users find what they need with ease, as well as support and answer the simplest questions about the company without them having to bounce back to Google.

A landing page was also added with multiple direct buttons to help reduce navigation time and increase form submissions, as well as giving a short overview of the company and build credibility. Existing products/services, and newly added services and job opportunities information made visible to increase products/services awareness to potential Publishers and clients.

VISUAL IMPROVEMENTS

SOCIAL MEDIA POST

According to Chartbeat data, people usually engage the most with content on the lower part of the website (digital fold) and there's only 30 seconds or less to impress and grab the audiences attention with informative and helpful content.
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With BVM website at the time, people have to scroll forever and deal with distracting elements that tend to shift their focus away. To fix that, we removed distracting elements, rearranged content and shortened layout by breaking information into appropriate section and pages. This gives a smoother user's flow and help consume the information easier and efficiently. We also communicated the current BVM brand with new design, and added CTA to draw user's attention.

AFTERTHOUGHTS

For the executives are visual people, and to push the project moving forward, a few steps including research and low-fidelity wireframes development was skipped. It was determined that we went straight to create high-fidelity mockup and meet with appropriate parties to get feedbacks, discuss needs and possibilities. There were about 3-4 update versions to the wireframes before finalizing the design.
As the lead and only visual designer for this project, I was challenged with having to quickly learn new design tool (Adobe XD) and design standard (Design System), while continuing to ensure meeting deadlines and deliver high-quality performance in my day-to-day tasks. I also started a course in basic HTML/CSS to better understand the developers' end, what are the possibilities for the website and how we can collaborate with them.
Leading project in a larger scale and facilitate meetings: It was both an opportunity and a challenge, when it comes to communicate and articulating design decision to stakeholders and executives. This project helps improve my communication and presentation skills, shifted my focus on the business side of design, as well as understood better what project management entails.

Credit(s): Mitch W. (PR Manager), Kayla D. (Communication Specialist), Kyle W. and Collin L. (Video/Multimedia Producer), Alex D. (Software Engineer)

About The Company: Best Version Media (BVM) connects thousands of small businesses to local residents by offering business owners powerful and proven advertising solutions.