A Bright Website Redesign for a Window Coverings Manufacturer
Norman Website Design & Development
OVERVIEW
Norman is a window covering manufacturer that produces high quality shutters, blinds, and shades. They’ve been in business for over four decades and are innovation leaders within the industry.
Norman needed its new website to resonate with both experienced and inexperienced window coverings customers, and we were up for the challenge.
Discovery
While Norman is an industry leader in innovation, this was not conveyed on their old website. Norman came to us with a stagnant website that was confusing to navigate, making it hard for their target audience to browse products and find information.
We jumped into an extensive discovery where we conducted user interviews, did a full competitive analysis, built out user personas, and performed stakeholder interviews. The user interviews were extremely insightful – we uncovered valuable information and were able to use the feedback to generate new ideas for optimization.
Our competitive analysis gave us a good idea of what was working for industry counterparts and uncovered navigation and design patterns Norman could use for inspiration.
before
UX Strategy
Our comprehensive discovery phase gave us lots to work with for planning out the flow of the website. Our strategy was focused on creating optimal user journeys for both frequent and inexperienced customers looking for window coverings.
For those who were inexperienced purchasers, we created a path to “Get Started”. This section serves as a hub of information with resources to make it easy to learn the difference between blinds, shades, and shutters, and the best application for each. Paired with rich media, we created a powerful way to inspire while educating and drawing first-time purchasers deeper into the customer journey.
For those who knew what they were looking for, we created a direct path to product information. We strategized the layout of the product list and detail pages to make the dense content available easily digestible.
Build
After laying out our strategy, we began designing Norman’s new website based on what we had learned. The color palette, typography, and imagery we chose during the design phase all blended together to create a site that felt sunny and comforting. Our use of intentional white space enhanced the visual appeal and gave the eye room to breathe amongst the dense content.
The site was built on top of a custom WordPress setup, as it was the ideal content management system for easy admin management. It also offered the flexibility needed to fit the future plans for Normans’ site.
One particularly challenging section to program was the dealer locator feature. For customers hoping to be paired with a window covering dealer, we built an interactive map where visitors could search for dealers based on their location, or by a particular keyword. This feature served to lead potential customers towards the next step of making a purchase by bridging the gap between customers and dealers.
Test & Launch
Following site development, we began testing the website. Along with ensuring that the back-end of the website was working properly, we throughly tested the features and functionality of the front-end to confirm everything was working as it should.
Given how many products and resources are offered on the Norman site, there was a significant amount of content to be created in text and visuals. Once all content was loaded into the website, we were ready to launch.
With a launch plan in place, we moved through our list of tasks and took the site live!
Closing Thoughts
With such an extensive discovery and an intentional creation process, it took a lot of work to create the stunning experience Norman has today. We’re proud of the strong marketing presence we were able to create that will serve Norman for years to come.
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