WUSTL Diversity Site (Consultation)
2015
Project
Design homepage and secondary page to showcase my approach to solving communications issues, and my decision-making skills.
Objective
The website needed a more developed presence that provides an effortless
and meaningful experience for users and convey a community of respect.
and meaningful experience for users and convey a community of respect.
The Problem
There were several issues that needed to be addressed. The university has a full-time team of designers and developers creating WordPress themes and editorial staff to provide content, but one of the substantial needs was to provide the necessary means for the Diversity office staff to be able to maintain their own site over time.
UX Discovery
I identified several websites to get an understanding of how they approached to communicating diversity. I reviewed numerous universities, NAACP, (RED), and Gates Foundation.
Big Picture — How will departmental sites be connected together with the main university site? How many unique WordPress themes would be needing to properly serve the needs of colleges, departments, organizations, facility, and other initiatives?
Site Management — Who would be responsible for managing this site? This answer significantly impacts the scope of the site? Interviewing staff would be essential for long-term success.
Office Location — How do you raise offline awareness and make connections? A basic need was to provide an easy way for people to find the Diversity office on campus.
The Solution
Brand Glue — The Diversity site is one of many sites that represent Washington University. This and all other sites need to comply to current style guide.
WordPress Strategy — It was my recommendation to create an "org" chart to establish hierarchy of themes based upon "client" content needs. This would reduce the need to maintain too many different themes.
Responsive Design — Since creating native mobile apps was outside of scope, it was vital to take of advantage of responsive design for mobile users.
Content Flexibility — It was my recommendation to establish a content strategy that leveraged photos and text to be created by the marketing staff in the Digital Communications office for all high-level and long-term content, while remaining content would be procured and managed by the Diversity department.
Social Stickiness — The site should leverage the powerful and positive aspects of social media. Users should be able to easily add events to calendar, get directions; connect with professors/leaders via LinkedIn, join Facebook groups, Twitter, etc. Therefore, it was recommended that there should be abundant/appropriate calls to action.
Homepage View
Content was organized as a magazine. Establishing content hierarchy mitigates diluted branding. Populating homepage with small "info bursts" better accommodates candid photography and quick-read content.
The Big Picture
To reinforce all the Diversity initiatives found on campus and around the community, each page would have a section to raise awareness, exploration and engagement — either listing top resources or upcoming events.
Secondary Event Page
Showcasing a large number of organizations could be best handled by allowing people to filter by category. Category title and dropdown list are pinned to navigation bar while scrolling to improve user experience on any device.
Standardized Event Information
I felt it important to allow each organization enough space for image, brief information for event and action buttons to maximize engagement. This approach provides more value than instagram/pinterest tombstones that they chose to go with on their current site, albeit less trendy.
