Winning Writers Launches Redesigned Website
winning writers
filed under: News, Website Design
Early last year I worked with Winning Writers on a small optimization project. The goal? To see if we could use increase the number of entries to their contests by making design/interface changes. The end result? A nearly 30% increase in submissions. Building on this success we moved forward with a full redesign.
Simplified Content Entry / Simplified Maintenance
The old website had become a maintenance chore. It had grown organically over many years and keeping everything up to date was not easy. To address this first issue I used my custom configuration of ExpressionEngine. This configuration is all about making content entry as simple, easy and logical as possible. With this in place we were able to build out content.
New Content Models / Content Strategy
Like most sites that have grown organically over time, the old Winning Writers website had become tricky to navigate and content didn't follow any particular format. I worked with the Winning Writers team on defining new content models for different content types to be used on the redesign. No detail was overlooked. Yes, it was tedious but it definitely helped inform the design on this project. We now had a place for every content type, which brought consistency all the layouts used in the design.
Mobile Friendly
Analytical data showed that the client had a growing percentage of mobile visitors to the website. Based on this data, I created a responsive website design that adapts to the screen the visitor is viewing the site on. This ensures that visitors can easily read and navigate the new website regardless of device.
Working Collaboratively
I am a big fan of working collaboratively with my clients. I don't fancy myself some kind of artist that knows better than the client. Quite the opposite. I actively seek out the goals the client has and work with them to create a design that is appropriate to their audience. When questions arose, I asked. When they had questions, they asked. It's only through collaboration that a website project can really succeed in meeting the clients objectives. On this project, I think we did a-ok.
