lauren // associates

Last week saw the launch of the latest web site from Kilted Chaos:

lauren // associates - non profit consulting

For this write up we’re going to look at some of the key design elements that we addressed when putting the site together:

White Space, Use of Color, Navigation as Information and Images.

White Space

People scan your home page – they make an assessment of what’s there and what’s important in the first few seconds.  If it is busy with lots of text and flashy things, you’re making it harder for people to quickly identify what they’re looking for.

The approach here is to remove anything that can’t be represented through navigation off the front page and leave a simple core message.  The intent is to leave the eye free to take in the logo and tag line – and then wonder what the hell the green circle is for.

Use of Color

Color is awesome – used sparingly it is like a policeman for the eye: “Go directly to here – do not look at anything else.”  Aside from the big green circle – we use green to highlight certain words: Lauren (the name of the company), Profit (something that everybody wants – especially people in non profit!) and Changing (‘cos if they weren’t looking to change something about their business – they wouldn’t be on the site!)

The purpose of the circle is to create an independent platform within the space that can be used to spotlight text information.  The circle draws the eye to the words running around it and a mouse over effect pulls the explanatory text into the space.  The interactive nature of the tool encourages the user to try out the other words and in doing so get exposed to a deeper level of information about the company.

Navigation as Information

Over the years I have found that I learn just as much about a site from the navigation as I do from the content.  Navigation will tell you very quickly what the site priorities are and shape how you as a visitor move through it.

The primary navigation on Lauren Associates presents a visitor with 4 options - in effect saying: this is what we do, this is what we think, this is what we are about, and you can get us here.  Nice and simple and no horrible multi-level drop downs that you have to scan in order to work out where you’re going.

Secondary navigation shouldn’t detract from the primary message but should make it easy for the visitor to get around the site.  We used the mouse over effect on the front page but you can only really do that once - for the inside pages, the icon driven “micro-menu” sits nicely on the top right, we could have used small font text but the icons just look cooler!

An Image says a thousand words

And those words are often “this site blows - I hate stock photography!”  Over the years we have moved away from stock photos – we’re not saying they’re bad in all cases – but the idea of showing a happy smiling man in a business suit next to your new credit card offer not only seems banal to us, it also feels fake.

No real human being gets excited about mundane stuff  – we’re big fans of the Kotex tampon ads – in a world of overhyped bullshit and  exaggerated product marketing, the minute someone tells it how it is – we’re hooked.

Instead of using photos that had no relationship with Lauren Associates we designed a set of icons that represented each area of work and actually felt like they were part of the site.

Websites are not dead

If your website hasn’t changed in the last couple of years then you’re doing it wrong.  Lauren // Associates are adopting a content strategy so there is always going to be new content added but we’re not just talking about the blog.

The design of Lauren Associates is very clean, very simple and doesn’t have any photographic images (Cindy’s bio pic aside.)  Going forward we think a couple of great shots of Cindy working with clients would really accentuate the site and give the service area pages some additional color and relevance.  However, the shots have to be great and make sense within the overall design.

We prefer to develop long term relationships with our clients – we don’t just drop you when the site is launched.  New technologies arrive, standards are developed, things that could make your website perform better come on stream faster than ever before and we want you to benefit from them. 

There is no better marketing for Kilted Chaos than a successful client with a successful website – just checkout hip Los Angeles Realtor - Smilay Properties. 

Lauren // Associates is ready to go, we wish Cindy and her partners all the success in the world and we look forward to continually improving and developing the site as she grows.

Let us know what you think - considered input is always appreciated.  If you'd like to chat with us about your own site - then...